The Land was Eden, and I was Eve
And the forbidden fruit hung there,
like a seductive sin
a godless crime
and an unforgivable wish
I heard the snake hissing in my ear,
“Leave,
Go and live
a better life.”
I dared to take a bite,
and the damned fruit watered my mouth
it took me out of Eden,
where there is no wall and no borders
no tanks and no soldiers
and Mama look at all the tall buildings,
are they trying to touch the clouds?
Why is Baba not smiling?
Where is the happiness that they said
we can find it on every corner in the countries of the West?
I step into my class, around me,
blond girls, blue eyes
They look at me,
Thick hair, and bushy brows
and with that nose, they immediately know.
Teta, you should see
how they put a mix in a box
they label it Falafel, and call it
“authentic Middle Eastern meal.”
No, it tastes nothing like yours.
On my plate, they put mashed potatoes and cream cheese
and they tell me, eat.
Where is the rice and the grape leaves?
How do I compound a word,
made of twenty-six different letters of the English language
to say “Sahten” after we eat?
I saw a worker on the street,
and did not say “Ya’tik Al Afia”
My Arabic tongue is a stranger to the English language.
Sahten
Habibi
Salamtak
InshAllah
Sleep does not visit my window at night,
Is it a sin
that I got used to falling asleep to the sound of bombs,
and tear gas in my lungs?
Wipe my forehead with olive oil
and sprinkle Za’atar in my hand,
maybe then I will dream about wandering in the lemon groves
and sitting on the camel’s back.
I see boys here, with their fancy cars,
and keys dangling from their ripped jeans,
I remember the boys in my Hometown,
who left the books, wrapped the Kufiya around their heads
held rocks in their hands to fight for Falastin.
They call her Holy, our Land
Did they see that boy who became a soldier,
with a big suit and tiny hands,
he pointed his gun at my grandfather,
at a checkpoint, told him to take off his pants,
so he can search him, and call him a “threat.”
In another world, he would have kissed his hands
that planted olive trees in the land.
Did they hear the cries of a mother
mourning her little son,
killed on his way to school,
I shall be baptized,
with the tears coming out of her eyes,
rose water and a salty spice.
Indeed, holy is our land
The Garden of Eden
A biblical prophecy
A miraculous dream.
I became friends with the wind,
and told it to carry me to a Palestinian village.
Lay me under an olive tree,
Get the radio and play Fairuz,
when she sang for the City of Prayer
Recite me a poem by Mahmoud Darwish,
when he said,
On this land we have what makes life worth living,
Read me a story by Ghassan Kanafani
about The Land of Sad Oranges.
Hold my hand, and let us dance Dabke
as we sing in the empty fields,
“Ana Dami Falastini.”
Give me this memory,
and let me lock it in my heart,
wear it around my neck,
tell it stories and hide it under my bed,
so that I would never forget,
even if I learn how to roll my R’s
and pronounce my P’s,
that I am from the land of the Holy.
Since 1968
