In Glorious Terms

كيفِك؟
It’s you, +972.
It is heatwave
and power cuts
sunburnt flower
and your mirage
everywhere. There’s nothing
to cool me down. I settle
somewhere without my shoes
under a table. Ask for ice
where they don’t have.
I slide my plate away with two fingers.
Watch a bee hover over sticky cups.
I push the table with one leg.
Text back: تمام. كيف الجو عندَك؟

❂

I tell you: ألم
is an anagram of أمل
and isn’t our language
always a homecoming.
You, a homecoming. I love.
I worry in two languages
not knowing. You say:
speaking of أمل
am I seeing you tonight?

❂

It is midnight. We settle
on a qahwa. There’s a
street cart. We order
sandwichat كبدة.
Cool off with سوبيا
and you tell me
how you left غزة
with 11 recipes.
How before you left
your mother, your mother
left them for you
in a voice note.
How her voice
felt like bread.
I ask you, is she beautiful?
(because you are)
and you say, جداً.

❂

I found الله
last October. I was
knocked off by grief
I’m now 10 months
sober. I found Him,
small Gazan hands,
won’t touch November.
Clink of bones in a plastic bag,
a chill before the winter.
I waited for the world
to come forth, for Him
to prove this wrong,
for the trees to wrath
و يااللة what’s this
big plan You have
to love the size of trees
so full of grief, in glorious terms
because of war.

❂

I watch you undergo erasure
then I unwatch it. Fade you
back in. I think of you again
and again. What is belonging
without a place to belong?
I want to be that place,
this skin of yours so fair
despite your burnt enclave.
I want my country. I think of us
again. Coffees at 2 am
2 minutes from my house.
How they bombed your house
again and again. I fade you back in.
Tell you about my father.
Catch a glint of you in deep water.
I tell you أنا فلسطينية until night
fades, until day breaks.

❂

You stick to what you know
Text a rose  و يسعد صباح
You greet so generously
The siege you leave behind
you bring me in kinship community.
Black White Red Green heart emojis
 من يدَك  When will you feed me
(because they are your hands)
I eat everything, just not ضاني
You stick to what you know,
make Ouzi. Feed me Gaza, generously.
Everything with a side of green chili.

❂

I go see my sister.
We walk the streets of كوربة
though my feet are elsewhere.
We talk love والقضية
Me, you, and where it hurts us.
She says, careful. Hope is
pain when it’s all that’s left
and you are not what I am
looking for. You are not
my lost country. Don’t.
And I need to ask you
next time I see you, what if
they burn my country
before I find it?
What if you is all
that’s left?