Sunday, February 10, 2008

poem for Rafah

This is a poem that I wrote several years ago, while one of my dearest friends lived in Rafah as an International Solidarity Movement activist. I was visited by dreams often of Rafah, and through hearing her stories developed a profound connection with the place without stepping foot there.


my sister is crying
she is standing abandoned
in a battlefield
destiny signed and sealed
and I am hearing her
here on the other side of the earth
not nourished by apple pies
and freedom fried lies
I dry my own eyes
and cry back to her

habibi, I hear you

my brother is broken
he is hoping he wont have to lay down
like his home
like bedrock
his grip is deadlocked on stopping it
but slipping like grains of sand
a furious fist falls dead to open fingertips
submitting at once to an upperhand
but my brother will spill blood before tears on this land

my mother is standing
in the kitchen fearing famine
she is demanding me to drink tea
to swallow my sea of salt for her sake
she asks me to placate my disposition
save my ammunition for the firing line

I am trying to find my way warm in this freezing winter of humanity's conscience
though dormant I am forming seeds to disseminate
to penetrate the silence by calling

habibi, I hear you

1 comment:

TheOracle said...

Is a tractor bad? Is the power that turns the long furrows wrong? If this tractor were ours, it would be good - not mine, but ours. We could love that tractor then as we have loved this land when it was ours. But this tractor does two things - it turns the land and turns us off the land. There is little difference between this tractor and a tank. The people were driven, intimidated, hurt by both. We must think about this.
The Grapes of Wrath
Chapter 14

I watched the film last night and the comparisons to the Palestinian pogrom was outstanding in my mind.

The Oracle