Singing Stones and Silent Voices

Based on Luke 19:28–40 – The Pharisees ask Jesus to silence his followers, but he says even the stones would cry out.

Disclaimer: This story contains fictional elements inspired by historical events, including the Armenian Genocide and the Stolen Generations of Australia. While the narrative draws on the real-life experiences of individuals affected by these tragic events, it is crucial to recognize that the characters, specific situations, and connections made in this story are fictional. The intention is to foster understanding and reflection on shared histories of loss and resilience. The story aims to honour the memory of those impacted by these events while being mindful of the sensitivity surrounding the experiences of survivors and their descendants. Readers are encouraged to engage with these topics through further research, respectful dialogue, and ongoing learning.

It was the autumn of 1915 when the soldiers arrived in the village. The winds had shifted, bringing with them the faintest smell of smoke and ash, the scent of a world on fire. Hovhannes, no more than eight years old, sat with his mother by the fireplace, their small home crackling with warmth. His mother, Anna, looked out the window with a quiet, distant gaze, as though she already knew what was coming.

“Hovhannes,” she said softly, “take this stone. It will remember us when we are no longer here.” Her hands, trembling from both age and fear, handed him a smooth, dark stone, its surface worn and polished from years of use. She scratched something into it, something Hovhannes couldn’t understand, her sharp movements leaving faint etchings on the stone. Her eyes, though filled with sorrow, held a fierce determination.

“Keep it close to you. It will be the only part of us left.”

Before he could ask why, she pressed the stone into his small hand and kissed his forehead. There was no time for more words. The sound of boots marching in the distance grew louder. The soldiers were coming.

As Hovhannes and his mother were swept into the chaos of forced displacement, the stone was his only possession, a constant reminder of his mother’s love and the home he’d been torn from. He kept it in his pocket, even as he was separated from his family, forced into a camp where children like him were lost to the world.

Years passed. Hovhannes survived the camps, grew into a man, and eventually found his way to a new land—Australia. He married, had children, and buried the memories of his childhood deep within the corners of his heart. But the stone never left him. Through wars, hardships, and the quiet moments of his later life, it remained a constant reminder of a past he couldn’t forget, even if he wanted to.

As he grew older, Hovhannes found it harder to speak of those days. His children asked about his past, but he would merely shake his head, the stone in his pocket heavy with memories he couldn’t bring himself to share. Over time, his grandchildren heard only fragments, pieces of a life once lived in a world that no longer existed.

Maya, Hovhannes’s granddaughter, always felt a distance between herself and her grandfather. His stories were wrapped in mystery, always spoken in whispers, as though he feared the weight of his memories would burden her. As a child, she’d heard the words “Armenian” and “genocide” in passing, but it was never something her grandfather talked about openly. When he passed away, Maya inherited a few mementos—a photo, a few letters, and the stone.

Maya had never paid much attention to the stone. It had sat on a shelf, collecting dust, until one day, when she picked it up, feeling its weight in her hand. The etchings on its surface were faint, almost illegible, but its smoothness felt familiar and comforting. She wondered what secrets it held, what stories it might tell if it could speak.

Determined to understand more about her grandfather’s past, Maya decided to visit the local museum. The exhibition that caught her eye was dedicated to the Stolen Generations—a dark chapter in Australia’s history that she knew little about. As she walked through the exhibit, she felt an unsettling connection to the faces staring back at her. Children, their eyes vacant, torn from their families, forced to grow up in a world that didn’t acknowledge their roots. The stories were painful, but they felt oddly familiar, as though the suffering they depicted was not so different from what her grandfather had endured.

She paused in front of a display of old belongings—letters, clothing, and personal items of children taken from their families. Among the items was a small stone. It was not unlike the one her grandfather had carried, worn smooth and round, the kind of stone a child might pick up and hold to keep a memory alive. The stone in the museum wasn’t marked, but something about it felt significant, as though it, too, had been a silent witness to a lost world.

Maya couldn’t shake the feeling that the stone her grandfather had carried all those years wasn’t just a relic of Armenia, of a family torn apart by war. It felt like it belonged to something more, a story more significant than her grandfather’s own.

As Maya studied the stone in the museum, a thought crept into her mind—a quiet whisper that linked her grandfather’s past to the history before her. The Stolen Generations. Children torn from their families. Lives erased. A shared experience of loss that transcended borders. Though the histories were different, the pain felt the same.

The stone in her hand seemed to connect those worlds. It was a symbol of something stolen, something lost, something that could never be fully returned. The children of the Stolen Generations had been stripped of their heritage, their language, and their identity. Much like her grandfather, who had been forced to leave everything behind, these children were made to forget who they were, to leave their roots behind in search of a new, foreign life.

Maya couldn’t put it into words, but standing there, holding her grandfather’s stone, she understood something deeper: the scars of history were not isolated; they were shared. Whether it was the Armenians in 1915 or the Aboriginal children taken from their families, the stones—small, silent witnesses to tragedy—were symbols of survival, of memory, of resistance.

As she left the museum, the stone in her hand felt heavier, but in a way that brought clarity. Maya had learned about the cruelty and trauma her grandfather had faced, but she had also learned about a broader story of dispossession, separation, and loss. The stone her grandfather had carried all those years wasn’t just a personal relic; it was part of a shared human history—of survival in the face of unspeakable loss.

Maya placed the stone on the mantelpiece when she returned home. It no longer felt like just a family heirloom; it felt like a reminder to never forget those who had been silenced by history, whether through war, genocide, or systemic injustice. The stone was a memorial not only to her grandfather but to all those whose stories had been lost, to all the children—both Armenian and Indigenous—whose pasts had been stolen.

And for the first time, Maya understood the actual weight of her grandfather’s silence. It was not the silence of forgetfulness but the silence of memory—a memory that still cried out for justice.

The silence of the people echoed through the years, their voices lost in the noise of history, but the stones—silent witnesses to their pain—seemed to cry out with a truth that could no longer be ignored. In the stillness, the memory of the lost, the forgotten, and the erased would not remain silent forever; it demanded to be heard, urging the world to listen, to remember, and to act.

Singing Stones and Silent Voices
(shorter version)

Based on Luke 19:28–40 – The Pharisees ask Jesus to silence his followers, but he says even the stones would cry out.

Disclaimer: This story contains fictional elements inspired by historical events, including the Armenian Genocide and the Stolen Generations of Australia. While the narrative draws on the real-life experiences of individuals affected by these tragic events, it is crucial to recognize that the characters, specific situations, and connections made in this story are fictional. The intention is to foster understanding and reflection on shared histories of loss and resilience. The story aims to honour the memory of those impacted by these events while being mindful of the sensitivity surrounding the experiences of survivors and their descendants. Readers are encouraged to engage with these topics through further research, respectful dialogue, and ongoing learning.

It was the autumn of 1915 when the soldiers arrived in the village. The winds had shifted, bringing with them the faintest smell of smoke and ash, the scent of a world on fire. Hovhannes, no more than eight years old, sat with his mother by the fireplace, their small home crackling with warmth. His mother, Anna, looked out the window with a quiet, distant gaze, as though she already knew what was coming.

“Hovhannes,” she said softly, “take this stone. It will remember us when we are no longer here.” Her hands, trembling from both age and fear, handed him a smooth, dark stone, its surface worn and polished from years of use. She scratched something into it, something Hovhannes couldn’t understand, her sharp movements leaving faint etchings on the stone. Her eyes, though filled with sorrow, held a fierce determination.

“Keep it close to you. It will be the only part of us left.”

Before he could ask why, she pressed the stone into his small hand and kissed his forehead. There was no time for more words. The sound of boots marching in the distance grew louder. The soldiers were coming.

As Hovhannes and his mother were swept into the chaos of forced displacement, the stone was his only possession, a constant reminder of his mother’s love and the home he’d been torn from. He kept it in his pocket, even as he was separated from his family, forced into a camp where children like him were lost to the world.

Continue reading the full story here.