The storm came, but it wasn’t one of natural elements,
For this storm was man-made.
Man-made and unwanted,
The sirens responded when we could not.

How were we to defend ourselves?
We had but nothing,
Nothing but our pride.
It still came, and it ravaged.

Faster than the blink of an eye,
Buildings were razed,
And smoke filled the air.
The streets were clear, of all life.

Rubble filled the streets,
And the blood painted the Tigris red.
Before we knew it,
We were overrun.

The storm came and went,
But in truth it is still here.
Its empty promises,
Was it worth so much destruction?

Everything has changed,
Things will never be the same.
They say the night is darkest before dawn.
It’s pitch black right now, with no sunlight in sight.

Things weren’t perfect before the storm,
But we ate,
We bathed,
We drank.

We had what we needed,
Minus the fear.
But now we have a new fear,
A fear of each other.

From this civil fear arose a new evil.
It was an evil from among us,
Much worse than the one before.
He talks of peace and friendship.

How could this be evil?
Because he steals, pillages, and burns.
The people’s dignity and pride are no more.
He talks, and does nothing.

He encourages the pain,
But just like the others,
It is the will of the masses for him to go.
He has brought nothing but shame to the Great Nation.

Just like the others,
He will fall soon.
Just like Mubarak, Gaddafi, and Ben Ali,
Who have ruined their countries.

But the people of those lands took a stand,
They rose up,
And said “no more.”
They told the spiteful ones to go.

Out the door like them, you will go.
You can kill the people,
But you can’t kill the dream.
Despite the differences between the people, the dream is the same.

We are diverse in our beliefs and race,
But we share a common goal.
We want you to fall,
We want you to go.

What will you say,
To the sobbing mother holding her dead child?
You will just condemn it,
You won’t even mean it.

What will you say,
To the child huddled over his father’s lifeless body?
You will blame the shameless monsters,
But it was a result of your failures.

What will you say,
To the masses gathered in Firdos and Tahrir?
You will fight to the death,
Like others before you.

You will fight the Nation,
You won’t fight for the Nation.
You want your wealth, your gold,
Your power.

That’s not the leader we want,
Nor the one we need.
Before the storm,
We had a similar dilemma.

The leader before you was forced out,
But not on our terms.
The leader before you was forced out,
Then you were imposed on us.

You are worse than the previous one.
You have given us nothing,
Only taken away,
What little we had left.

Bouazizi’s act was not in vain.
It gave us the strength,
The desire,
To drive you out.

We are unfortunate to have a fool,
A fool who occupies the office in Baghdad.
You were not chosen,
And the poor office, disgraced by your presence.
God is great,
And He will not allow us to suffer any longer.
We now have the strength,
To unite and drive, drive you out.

The next one will be of our choosing,
And we deserve it.
It is not a dream that will fade,
Like our freedom and dignity.

We want bread, water, and light.
We want to live like normal people.
Why shouldn’t we?
We all bleed the same color.

We want a better future,
For us,
For our children.
We want the rights promised to us in the Scripture.

For the first time,
While it may be uncertain,
The future is not bleak.
We have been empowered.
For the first time,
Our children can be raised outside of the cage,
And in the fresh air,
Where the world started, where civilization was born.

The smiles have faded away,
But they are returning.
In Adam and Eve’s homeland,
The masses are rising.

Your time is up. Without you,
Our hearts will sing with joy.
Great Iraq deserves better than you,
Incompetent, selfish, cruel, Nouri.

We praise the martyrs,
Who endured the injustice.
We praise the martyrs,
Who would not tolerate the injustice.

They were the bravest of the brave,
They even fought a war.
They wanted the freedoms that they deserved,
The freedoms they protested and longed for.
From Basra to Baghdad,
From Mosul to Ramadi,
From Kirkuk to Karbala,
Our demand is the same.

We demand a better life,
A better leader,
A brighter future.
We demand your departure, al-Maliki.