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Every day I see her in front of clinics, surgeries, huddled and clasping her little girl, staring at the passing elegant women. Her own dilapidated house glows in its village of smoke and straw. She prepares tea for us. Her husband arrives with the political mail from the dark palm grove. At the end of the night we leave some of our secrets behind in his house, where we discuss countryside problems. Trembling with cold over a dim lantern. Suspicious foreign birds scream. The surgeries close up. And the glittering cabarets open to reveal soiled nakedness. On which bank did he stumble to fall bleeding, stopped by the bullet in his shoulder?
He said nothing
but bled in the stone police station
until the night ended
and they wrapped him up
in the bloody mat.
The political mail waits in the dark roots of the palm grove. The door of the crumbling house bursts open. A bloody dust falls. And the net of the law falls over her. Water, let me go to the bank of the river to carve his face on its stones. Let me hang, like posters, his papers on the palm trees. Let our dim lantern be lit with an eternal flame. Let the surgery doors spring open and al-Rumaila fling its arms around the palms where we first felt the pulse of politics. Waters, take me to that bank where I can spread the waves of his shirt where the bullet pierced. Let me catch a boat to cross. And write on the cheerful face of the water.
Let me write a name
which the files have folded away
in the stone police station
to be wrapped in a bloody mat.
Her name fades on petitions. Every day in front of government offices I see her clasping her little girl under her cape and staring at the elegant women passing. The agricultural superintendent scolds her through the steam of coffee and smoke of his cigarette. Waters, take me to that bank where I can dig in the dark palm grove, and take out sheets of growing grass to hang like flags over the collapsing house in al-Rumaila. On the horizon, the stone police station. Water, take me to the bank where I can carve a face on the rocks. I see him every day in front of the surgeries, humiliated. Elegant women pass by. I am carving something about palm trees where we began to feel the pulse of politics.
He said nothing
but bled in the stone police station
until the night ended
and they wrapped him up
in the bloody mat.
The political mail waits in the dark roots of the palm grove. The door of the crumbling house bursts open. A bloody dust falls. And the net of the law falls over her. Water, let me go to the bank of the river to carve his face on its stones. Let me hang, like posters, his papers on the palm trees. Let our dim lantern be lit with an eternal flame. Let the surgery doors spring open and al-Rumaila fling its arms around the palms where we first felt the pulse of politics. Waters, take me to that bank where I can spread the waves of his shirt where the bullet pierced. Let me catch a boat to cross. And write on the cheerful face of the water.
Let me write a name
which the files have folded away
in the stone police station
to be wrapped in a bloody mat.
Her name fades on petitions. Every day in front of government offices I see her clasping her little girl under her cape and staring at the elegant women passing. The agricultural superintendent scolds her through the steam of coffee and smoke of his cigarette. Waters, take me to that bank where I can dig in the dark palm grove, and take out sheets of growing grass to hang like flags over the collapsing house in al-Rumaila. On the horizon, the stone police station. Water, take me to the bank where I can carve a face on the rocks. I see him every day in front of the surgeries, humiliated. Elegant women pass by. I am carving something about palm trees where we began to feel the pulse of politics.
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