Faith
Posted by Aysha El Shamayleh | Filed under Poetry, Print
I
Swallowed
a friend in-
To a secret,
black as a Sunday
morning shadow too clean
for its own skin. I had told
someone I’m in love with I wasn’t
‘man’ enough to be unfaithful. I
was too much of a ‘virgin’ to be trusted.
Slingshoot This [Gaza-Bound Poem]
Posted by Aysha El Shamayleh | Filed under Poetry, Print
Arabia holds Palestine in her drought-cracked palms,
As if its her miscarried fetus,
Blued,
Only strips of what it once was
Watch her shove it back into her womb,
An Arab woman refuses to give birth to death,
This is as Palestinian as the intifada,
From Qubbat al-Sakhrah
To Kanisat al-Qiyamah,
Pass by the Wailing Wall,
And shake off the dust,
Will you promise to continue believing in fragile dreams
Even after they tear them down,
Even if it leaves you with nothing but pain,
As much pain as digging up limbs and scraps of flesh from under rubble,
slowly you see it so perfectly resembles someone you love,
And they’ve been missing for so long
Will you promise to choose to live after this?
When their soldiers come marching into this Gaza strip,
Suffocating our melodies into their lethal rhythms
When even this earth starts shaking its hips to their bombs,
a soldiers feet starts stomping the concrete.
Will you belly dance to the beats until he bows down to you
Dance as if to prove to everyone nothing can break you,
let them know our sweat will always be easier to trickle than our blood,
Palestinian woman,
let you shake your hips
remind them of your flesh,
and how mortal it is,
they might have forgotten,
Believe me, only I know the difference between sweat drop and tear,
I see you
Dancing with wet cheeks, but smiling,
Still smiling,
you Arabian Queen
I can feel you breaking,
Remember only I know the difference between shake and tremble,
I promise they think you’re dancing,
But I see you crave life,
..And I wish I knew how to do it like you,
Laugh,
when they tell you our guerrilla fighting men got them thinking we were apes,
they don’t know this is as human as anyone could get,
We fight, because we crave life,
Can you ever crave life,
Like 4 Palestinian children,
Found starving,
Have been holding on to familiar corpses for days,
Cuz only in our deserts does a mother’s flesh freeze,
Crave life,
Like Molotov bombs,
Let that final blaze shine when you break and go.
Look around,
See men strap bombs to their chest as if its Palestine’s life-vest.
Stand as strong as these millennium old olive tree in your back yard,
Prove them wrong
to think ages of hardship can uproot you from your land,
When they point their guns at you
Will you take out your slingshot,
No, dont kneel down
not even to pick up rocks,
see, we are in no need of them
Take Stars of David,
Kiss your pain into that ancient peace sign,
And send it over,
Maybe it’ll hit them…
that this was never what their king had taught them,
Before they pull the trigger,
Will you take your most daring dream,
Pull the elastic of your slingshot far far back,
Aim at the sky’s abdomen,
cross fingers, hope hate does not shoot it down
then just…let go,
Will you watch your mother launch prayers into heaven like homemade rockets,
You hope they don’t shoot them down,
You know this is everything she has to defend herself with
but she
she prays they don’t shoot you down,
You are everything she has left,
Will you take your tongue for a rubber band…
Slingshoot Quran before you fall and hit ground,
Let them hear God speaking in poetry,
One day I will swear to them you are human,
But I don’t know if they’ll even believe me,
Please just continue believing
Believe in life,
Never stop slingshooting
peace.
Like Names on Bathroom Walls
Posted by Aysha El Shamayleh | Filed under '08 Fall: Notes from Underground, Poetry, Print, Show Poems
We were children…
Born alive,
we survived some nights only prove to you we were odd looking miracles.
He was hardheaded like our dictators,
often found running clinch-fisted
feet stomping the concrete paving our playgrounds.
at mid day, we would write our names on the walls of narrow alleys,
let the sun rays stare at them.
they were everything we could call ours.
Besides…
We were just like our countries,
Arab, and messy.
our kings treated world maps as if they were high school bathroom stalls,
signed I was once here Mr.
As if the world ever gave a shit.
well, unlike our kings,
we were no fools.
we wrote the names and then laughed at ourselves.
“unapproved sovereignty”
we hid under our beds waiting to get caught by the parents.
like Saddam hiding underground waiting to get caught by America
it was only a matter of time.
but we…
we laughed,
and I wished the world would for once take notice of something beautiful before its gone.
Because after that mid-march night they held him down.
too much of a coward I watched from a distance,
Never seen him this fragile,
look,
never this weak,
cuz this time he wasnt stomping with his feet scaring the kids around,
his face was pressed against the concrete,
we was bent down.
arms and legs spread apart like a 9/11 airplane crashed on ground.
One older man had his pants down,
and the others were keeping the boy in place.
I was only a child but old enough to know
This isn’t how it should go,
Men would push in and out in the wrong places,
and they would alternate on him,
his screams might’ve been pleas
I dont know,
they were hesitant, they would break,
and then sound.
I hear him break under their weight,
If you were standing in my shoes, maybe you would’ve swallowed the silence too,
But maybe not, maybe you would’ve joined them,
They were done with him now,
his crevices filled with more semen than they could hold so it overflowed,
promising no children,
no legacies of whatever this is.
please understand we used to walk around with lollipop rings on our left hands.
I guess we were kids
naïve enough to think the world ever owed us something.
Maybe a dream, or a future,
After all, we were fools to think the world ever took notice.
They walked out on him,
one by one,
no one looked behind.
he stayed laying on his belly for a while
mind conflicted,
then he stood up and i wished he didnt
eyes pouring.
He’s naked
rectum burning,
and blood barely dripping down his thighs…
tell me what is there for us to love now,
we were curious kids, but we never wanted to know
we were as fragile as this,
left behind with
only disgust,
only nausea,
only stench of blood and sweat,
and semen
and wrong sex,
he was suicidal,
like civil wars raging within his skull’s confines.
untaught how to love,
we were beasts
no longer children
after this
not knowing what to expect from anyone around,
all we wanted is that they keep their fucking hands off us.
he survived that night, then chose to live though the ones after it,
only to make it to the day when he can look you in the eye
and tell you I was once here Mr.
like a name on the wall of a high school bathroom
begging you to take notice.
But on world maps he would always sign his name
Iraq.
see its you who’s doing it…
raping him.
see people and countries are the same thing,
he’s bent down,
and he has blood barely just barely dripping down his thighs.
…you’re pulling out now…
..walking away.
