A Palestinian Day of Remembrance (that of Sabra and Shatila)

                       A Palestinian Day of Remembrance
                         (that of Sabra and Shatila)


In the eleventh hour of their day 
I am reminded
of your day
eleven primes ago 
when hatred and steel blinded
them and the sun gray
and halted your time
your smile your glow
eleven primes ago
I never bid you right
nor given that part
of what's left of
that partisan soul
hid in this wounded heart
that others stole
I never bid you right
I see your faces with no traces
from a past condemned 
without an offence 
or a place or essence 
penned in timeless cases
of borders, camps, and phrases
to a shadowless, faceless presence
I never bid you right
Never understood the two names
nor why and how
time is halted now
for you not me 
I will never see
or why from this day I grow to love and hate
in this shy remembrance from this side of fate.

My Arab Spring that Never Was

                                    My Arab Spring that Never Was

I thought in numbers we could say what is 

or what was right

placards drawn with blood and no fright

young and old stay the course

street by street 

and night after night

where the stars have turned a page

and time its stray discourse

and the whole world a stage

on my spring that never was

Tell me if I am right

if you happen to see my black from my white

tell me if might had always made right

in this arab spring of mine

that never was

tell me if you can

tell me if history

or geography

or a crude stereography

have me and my story

and our arab glory 

in their jaws

or will it 

in my night

and in my endless flight

ever shine?

Tell me if you can

Red is the new color of my sight

not white

red is the new word

on the streets of my arab spring

that never was

red is the new color of my sight

or have I erred

tell me if you can

what have I stirred?

in this history

this geography

this arab glory?

that turns right into wrong

weak into strong

and what is whole 

into the absurd?

is it darker 

is it bright?

Tell me if you can

Three years and counting

from Benghazi to Baghdad

have we forgotten how to count?

or have we laid to rest all

that which together 

we have breathed

and dreamt

and defended stout

tell me if you can

was it sane or was it mad

to heed that call

for my arab spring that never was

to drop all for what was unsheathed 

and for that which was just and a cause

tell me if you can

I was there in every corner

and every turn

in every broken bone

and every moan

I was there

I touched and kissed every tear

year after year

one fading smile after the other

one hopeless yearn after another

I was there

street, capital, and 

conference

I no longer dare

to speak 

to face or stare

at

my arab spring that never was

here or there.

What say you, Um Mas'oud?

              What say you, Um Mas'oud?

                         

Someone left heaven's gate ajar

Um Mas'oud

a lingering half prayer half answered

but enough for me to slip in uninvited

from afar

and into this glimmer of a realm

that is forever foreign

forever not from here or there

always unchosen

but always from this side of Safed

with all that's left to share

but a key, a sigh and a stare   

among the abodes of rough tenderness

that hide tall the rescued pride

of a captured sun

and the decaying scars of justice denied

What say you, Um Mas'oud

of fate of the aimless

or fortune of the hopeless  

when it wanders into your heaven?

Displaced no longer I wandered in

buoyed from below and from within

to all that is you

about you, and for you

Um Mas'oud

Unrehearsed and unsanctioned

I have become your dual

and you,

Um Mas'oud

my true, my cue

my final

I re-learned my aleph ba'

to spell and draw

your beauty and our history

in the only language I was meant

to know, in virtue and in mystery

What say you, Um Mas'oud

of two wanderers' fate

when it fights to-date

that which was dealt?

Um Mas'oud, I caught heaven's eyes as they knelt

or they seem to have when I have felt

your steps crossing that side of Safed

to this side of history

and as they wept for your past  

and our future

Um Mas'oud, heaven's eyes are speechless

for words are bound to meanings inept

and times passed

when our land was in-between

this epoch and that rule

but through your eyes

seen anew and breathless

only through them

those eyes could we dare to dream

to cross to the other side of hope

What say you, Um Mas'oud

of a pair not of this world

their sight that of love, dream and pain 

can we with their light alone cope?

A mere oracle or two too far,

dear Um Mas’oud

between you and that Tolaytela,

you and Safed

us and this side

of history,

between them and

our denied tragedy

a mere oracle or two, Um Mas’oud

As a mere number or two also stand too far

between you and I

Um Mas’oud

Where giant stars fade

and ancient seas dry

“our” numbers stay

to haunt us betrayed

What say you, Um Mas’oud

of souls and dreams

that come unmade

when things compute and abstraction hoorayed?

Um Mas’oud, look me in the souls

through this divide

and follow mine across this collated time

and this fragmented space

as it rolls untied

down the timeless hills of Safed

under the spell of her thyme

and yours

Um Mas’oud, look me in the souls

across this divide

and whisper to me, time and again

that I once belonged to this heaven

in a dream stopped sudden

but will belong, born and then
from its soil, where the angels cried,

and to where you will return 

What say you, Um Mas’oud

of dreams that do not know how to die

in a timeless time, and

of a heaven that knows only your name?

What say you, Um Mas’oud?

Bolero in Najd

                     Bolero in Najd

Bolero was there

dear Najd

under your bluer

than blue skies

under your old

and young stars

for you

and only you

to hold dear

and cheer

For you to wear

and to carry afar

and to leer

that lonely scar

with no one to share

Bolero was there

dear Najd

Bolero was there

From your high and low lands

high and low years

and their tears

were born

one precious drop by one

unfeathered and lonely

like your desert flower

a rare arabian beauty

from this earth laced its solemn

Shy like your desert rain

among your ageless wadis

Jumana was born

Jumana of Najd

as she will always be known

singular and blessed

a rare arabian beauty

on this earth as in heaven

In Najd

Jumana was everywhere

like its sun

in its moving sand

and in its restless air

Jumana was everywhere

in its stubborn wadis

that she wears as beauty scars

across this sacred land

adored with heavenly stars

its stand

against time and bliss

Jumana was everywhere

like a cosmic

eternal kiss

upon this land of

Najd

Jumana was everywhere

before time learned onto who to stare

and with whom to share

her eternal beauty

and her celestial grace

her gift and bounty

to her chosen place

Jumana of Najd 

Eyes meet across time

Jumana's and his

two novae not of this earth

a singular moment of an unwritten history

a moment of birth

a beginning of another surreal Najd story

to be written by both

like none before

or since

save

Leila and her Kayss

Eyes meet across time

Jumana's and his

in a timeless land

under timeless skies

a moment of birth

of an eternal prize

from this giving land

that is Najd

Now feathered and together

Jumana and he

take to the skies

still sands and

white air

below

and above

all the heavens to show

Sphere onto sphere

they roam

as princess

and her emir

suns young and old steal a glance

with light from their distance untrue

Do you see Miro

molding his Milky Way

dear Jumana? he calls

or Dali dragging his Virgo?

Can you spell Leila in the stars of Hydra

dear Jumana? he calls

or Kayss chasing those rays for you in Antlia

like Duchamp's dream brush

one primal ray by ray

one rebellious star by star

he trawls

all provoked together for you to wear

in extreme lush

a necklace

for a princess

made in the heavens

for you dear Jumana

he sighs just for you

To steal a tethered stare

on your journey home

to the land of Najd

streaming hair in starry wind by hair

stripped bare

of envious space and time

only primal meaning and rhyme

will tie you always to me

he sighs

like your gentle smiles that hide our dreams from the night  

dear Jumana

till our desert sky disinherits this ancient sea

and our desert sun its lucent light

Bolero's tunes

were there

through Jumana of Najd

in those hidden chimes in her skies

and in her forbidden morphing dunes

in Jumana's eyes

playing those tunes

with her silent

rhythmical sighs

Bolero's tunes

were latent

in your dunes

Najd

and nascent

in Jumana's tears

tunes of drops gently falling onto dunes

drop by drop

dunes sculpt the desert image

of a celestial gift

Jumana's tears

and Bolero's tunes are one

with your dunes

a cosmic union

re-written anew in Najd

to usher in tear and silt

her unrehearsed

impending death

that looms closer and closer

to be the fore

of a triad

that is forever unversed

Jumana of Najd

you have been chosen to soar

In a singular moment of an unwritten history

unfolds a new surreal Najd tragedy

his Jumana ascends to skies he cannot reach

to heights Bolero cannot climb

and depths no tunes can breach

Jumana of Najd

can you hear me? he calls

Silent and abandoned

he falls

as does his meaning and rhyme

never stopped searching for that boundary

between the real and the imaginary

where he has seen her face countless times

in stars

dead and alive

and in his empty words and orphan rhymes

and has sensed her eyes countless flights

in cosmic sighs

near and far

but never close enough

to arrive

Can you hear me? he calls

his Jumana of Najd

He lolls for an answer

a whisper

enough to alter

this reality

of a singular moment of history

of a singular tragedy

whose lyrics were woven

by Jumana and he

to the tunes of Bolero

for a story stolen

and was never meant to be

because of one ascended

and the other subtended

in a surreal Najd tragedy

Jumana of Najd can you hear me? he calls

silent and abandoned

he falls

a final fall

to his abyss

his meanings shattered

and his rhymes torn

sands shifted

in the only form they know

death to call

less

his Jumana unborn

and an orphaned

Bolero in Najd

for all.

The Color of Our Zayt and Za'tar

The Color of Our Zayt and Za'tar


When the celestial colors fuse
they choose yours
an unforgiving cosmic green
with depths and wounds (un)seen 
as it has always looked
gleamed off your homeless eyes
and will always do
till time dies (un)foreseen
To us 
zaytooni and fest
yet dark and distant
to the rest
When they blink in hymn
those homeless eyes
two celestial fires 
are lit by them 
and sent far and near
across a dream sphere
where colors mingle and dance in cheer
looking for that qamar
that is our zayt and za'tar
Sheltered they shall find it
on the surreal side 
of those homeless eyes
from us
from time
and from the rest
who had long lost that polished guise
while they roamed
for that ancestral home
those homeless eyes 
who made zayt and za'tar
with light 
love
color and
sighs
Sheltered they shall find it
atop the celestial dome
waiting
a quiet fetal wait
of a frozen fate
in those homeless eyes
that have always embraced all
truths and lies
with no history to revise
and no future to surmise
Zaytooni they cry
tears now void of how and why
that cut a primal (un)holy river
across the dream sphere
through it they (un)flow
(un)chosen sad and bitter
on land barren
and under skies of fear
Destinies (un)reached
and promises breached
they (un)flow
their traceless steps (un)fold
despite time
despite fate
and despite all myths that are told
and sold
with both love and hate
Yours is the zaytooni
I seek
that some claim and others (un)claim
but both wreak
all that (un)holy fame
and shame
upon the color of
my zayt and za'tar
Yours is the zaytooni 
I wish to become
a timeless color
in a timeless dictum
of a word
of a poem
that belongs to another
who will never know
be or see
the color of our zayt and za'tar. 

Without a Protocol

    Without a Protocol


The blue sun shines down 
like it did for millennia
Its striped rays slice a bewildered landscape 
of half memories and orphaned reality   
Stripes of alternating blue   
covers my land and time 
In absentia  
where time is collated and 
my land 
violated 
without a protocol 


Of which half is half memories?
The shade of blue which I cannot name
or the dark one that hides in shame 
Which half is true?  
Which half is blue?
They stare at me as equal
as dual
I stare back 
but without a measure
or a protocol
the verdict is cruel
and one half cannot rule 


Collated time cannot carry events
that stretch across two scapes
two calendars
or two fates
It can carry half memories
across two suns
one blue and the other
less true
whose fates were once interwind
one of the other
but now severed
without a protocol



The orphaned reality endures
Its event streams 
and dreams
are gathered blindfolded
on a half stage 
and scolded 
under the blue sun
under the cusp of empty cheers
for what remains
to kneel and be one
with the half-forgotten realities 
and half memories
quietly and  
without a protocol  


Where do memories go to die?
Like dreams under the blue sun
or ether 
onto a sky
that fell?
Where does the other half dwell?
Our hearts
minds
or forever condemned to wander
both parts
without a protocol.



 

An October Birthday

                                     An October Birthday

Atop a special hill many, many years ago when I was nine or so, I sat cross legged among the graceful pines of the lost homeland, dressed in new clothes my mom had bought the day before, along with a wrapped gift. The gift on my lap, I gazed onto the windows and yard of a marble house downhill -  a cool breeze sweeping the pines, sunset yellow and orange reflecting off its windows with silhouettes and murmurs traffic chasing each other.   I had just left the house and the birthday party inside it and walked up the hill to sit among the pines.  The birthday party was for a nine years old girl who lived with her family in our neighborhood, but on the other, gentler side.   I knew the girl but not that well. We may have spoken once or twice before, but it was all from a distance, and always interrupted by everything and everyone else. Our moms, I suspect knew each other well.  The fathers were off in the gulf, working. 


Me and the other boys in our part of the neighborhood often talked about her.  I remember her being stunningly beautiful, graceful, to us nine or ten years old boys.  The older boys in the neighborhood invented myths surrounding her and her family's wealth.  Brazil and Canada are two destinations still resonate in my head. Since she did not go to our school, these myths were the unchallenged currency in our part of the neighborhood. She went to the other school, you see, on the gentler side of town, where the teachers, pupils, even the janitors, spoke only "ingleezy", one of the boys always was keen to remind us.   I mostly listened and nodded when one of them would invent his own, personal story about her, with her, about the two of them.   I kept my own stories to myself.  On few occasions I would glance her from our building, crossing the wide street with her mom, to our side, to my world.  I would keep staring until they both are lost in the crowd beneath our window, and I in my day dreams.   For few passing moments, for real or invented images that I still recall to this day. 

I had arrived at her house dressed in my new clothes, a gift in hand and a wide smile.  I do not remember being nervous or even restless, just anxious may be, with hope and anticipation.  I rang the big green metal door, her mom opened the door revealing a well lit hallway and a large dining room in the background with dark, oversized furniture, along with a colorfully decorated table in the middle with gifts on it and balloons and kids in bright looking new clothes all around it. The mom pointed me to the big room and dashed off.  For whatever reason, I expected her to open the door. She did not.  I expected her to be in the middle of that big room, she was not.  I toured the house, gift in hand and a frozen smile looking for her. She was no where to be found.  Suddenly, I hear a familiar laugh coming from outside the house. I rushed to the "baranda" and looked over the yard, and there she was.  Surrounded by no less than a dozen boys and girls, in loud but cheerful voices and chaotic gestures.  I began to open my mouth, to raise my arm, to alert her to my presence, up here, on the "baranda". I did not though.  I must have felt it was futile, or too late. I looked at the wrapped gift and headed to the table to put it there, next to the other gifts.  I did not. I headed to the front door instead, down the wide stone stairs and  around the house, then up the hill to the pines.

I sat cross legged between the pines gazing down at the house.  I could feel the commotion downhill, coming from the house, but could not see or hear any one, not her.  I found a twig I used to a dig a small hole that I was able to bury the unopened gift in.  I gathered few brisk pine needles to cover the dirt with. I got up, moved down the hill in the other direction of the house and headed home.  I do not recall my mom or any one else asking about the birthday party, the unopened gift, her, then or since.  Thirty years later on a visit to give a talk to the local university, I went back to the pines and the hill.  I could spot the big house (among many new ones) but not the exact spot where the unopened gift was buried.  I gather someone else had found it, and had given it (back) to her, eventually.  Or not.

I do not know how to under-analyze or over-analyze this October birthday story of mine which, I suspect, every boy at one point or another in his life collected a similar one, every October.  Time again, and again.

I see the passage of time not as an arrow but as a series of footprints, in the sand. Fleeting, disconnected events in an otherwise placid, infinite extant of Octobers. Few are mine to claim.

With those few, I am destined to have a cyclic, ritual dance with two profound sets of footprints in my little corner of this lonely extant. Every October.  They come to be in October by chance. They come to be my destiny may be by chance, may be not, I will never know.  My dance, however, is not.  It is my choice, my whisper, my ritual.  

The dance of those singular footprints, becomes "the arrow", tracing back and forth to where it was, where it could have been.  Where it started and where it ended.  Where it was born and where it was buried.

I fear that I lose a little every October.  I forget a step here, or a whisper there, every October.  One tear less every October.  

How many Octobers are there? Eight or nine? Thirty or forty five? Countless few? How many are truly mine?

Every October, there is a birthday or two.  One (was) mine.