found written in the back of a book of Palestinian poetry in a hospital waiting room
I
But first
It’s my mother,
All stories start with a mother
The pushing and heaving of new life
She comes into my room
I will never unhear my name
Said the way she said it
Half curse half prayer all plead
I cannot turn her tears
Staining my pillowcase
As she sleeps in my bed
into poetry
Because sadness like this
My mother crying as I hold her
Is not poetic
But
Actually it starts with
My sister
And she’s cain and i’m abel
Or she’s abel and im cain
And none of us know which role we got
And now it’s 1948 and
Mom gave me a cookie
And she hit me
And none of us wrote it down
So we don’t remember who to blame
And I think
Maybe we are all blaming ourselves
But actually we are not
But perhaps we ought to
This is my punishment
Divine message from the heavens themselves
So many nameless souls praying and wasting and praying away and
I still think this is a message for me
As I’m sitting here
Reading Palestinian poetry
On Shabbat
But actually it’s my punishment
For Israel
A plague, a curse, a safety net that I never asked for
The apology permanently settling on my tongue
Occupying an illegal space on my conscience
A homeland without a people, a birthright with no life
A dry forsaken land I keep trying to run from
But it’s really not
(Don’t write it’s just land you know people died there
Don’t you hear their blood screaming?
Why can’t you hear their blood screaming?)
George Abraham ought to rip this book from my hands
In my gluttonous midday time of patheticness
I only eat carbs for lunch,
And the chocolate chips I scarf down my throat like a
Slobbering pig stains the pages of your book
The nicest book i’ve bought in a year
And it explains a lot
George, I never meant any disrespect
The stickiness of my thighs
The stubbornness of my inherited pride
Claim to a land I’ve never set foot on
Never christened like a dog peeing to mark his territory
As much mine as anyone’s. As much mine as no one’s.
And I’m still eating chocolate chips
And now I’m confused because I don’t know why I feel so sick
When she calls us to tell us she’s in the hospital
She being my sister
Or She being my homeland
Or She being the chocolate chips staining my hands
We drive to the hospital
It’s Shabbat
We drive to the hospital
Every poem I write where I am not the villain I am a liar
This is the truest thing I’ve ever written
I call her a bitch and hate her for doing this to herself
I exist just to spite her
And when it comes down to it
I still do not ask for forgiveness
I just pray
That my honesty garners the barest minimum of sympathy
II
Alternate retelling in which my sister is Black and male
We hear the gunshots and the phone drops from her hand
The police never take her to the hospital
We drive to take home her body.
Today is her funeral.
Her face on my tshirt.
Alternate retelling in which we get in a car accident on the way to the hospital
Is this divine punishment?
There is no more poetry
Alternate retelling in which I die from an asthma attack on the way home from the hospital
Romeo & Juliet style my family is reunited in their grief
Isn’t continuing to live the most selfish thing I’ve ever done?
Alternate retelling in which my sister goes to the hospital for a broken bone
This is all a lot easier
Alternate retelling in which I am born in Tel Aviv circa 1948
I have it all
Alternate retelling in which I am born in Ramallah circa 1948
I have a lot less
Alternate retelling in which I am born in Jerusalem
Awareness does not make a difference, neither
Do my fantasies
Photo: A satellite image shows Indonesian Hospital, in Beit Lahia in the Gaza Strip, November 2023.
Credit Maxar Technologies, via Reuters
