When the outside world got real quiet at the start of the pandemic in 2020, the birds came out in the city. It was the morning when I heard the birds chirping outside my window that I noticed how quiet the outside world got, as if by overnight. Living in what is usually the noisy and busy part of New Orleans, I never hear the birds. At least I don’t notice when I do because when I woke up to the sounds of birds at my window that morning, I thought I was back in my hometown in Palestine where I was often awakened by birds.
Some time in the second week of October 2023, a Palestinian man tweeted that the birds had left Gaza, which instantly became one of the most heartbreaking sentences I would read that month. I have to mention that it was a man who tweeted this because it seems that the powers that be try their best to give license to murder men. The powers that be claim to want to protect the “women, children and elderly” and omit men from the conversation altogether, denying them the rights and protection they deserve. The powers that be tell those who don’t know Palestinian men, that our men only exist as humans that enact violence, and they don’t care about the birds. It seems clearer by the minute that this is nothing but projection.
But I know ones who do care about the birds, which is to say men who are caring. For instance, I have a memory of my uncle, a former political prisoner, caring for two love birds and feeding them every morning before he went to teach art at a private school. Don’t take my word for it though; you can see the tweet from this stranger as evidence that men notice birds, too. We, Palestinians, can provide the receipts of the men who care about birds, and best believe, we have receipts to provide after this when the amnesia kicks in and the nation denies they forced the birds out of Gaza.
The birds left Gaza, and reading this sentence at this moment, we understand why. It is not the time to contemplate where the birds have gone. But over the past month, I have seen individuals at various protests and marches in support of Palestine – in support for the right to live with dignity, the right to freedom – report on the birds. Some report and tell us the children of Gaza are flying over us. Some tell us they are the birds of heaven. Some tell us God is signaling to us that we ought to keep hoping because freedom is near.
The other evening, I noticed the birds at the end of a protest in the city of New Orleans. I haven’t seen that many birds in a long time in America. (Perhaps America could use more birds). I looked up and pointed at the sky, telling my friend next to me, “Look at those birds.” We both marveled at them.
The birds seemed to have joined in solidarity, and they didn’t leave until we did. Nature and wildlife feel man-made disasters. Many natural habitats are destroyed by man-made disasters. And the birds appeared to join in as we protested this man-made, heinous disaster known as the occupation of Palestine.
I am neither in the business of writing poetry these days, nor to offer that these might be birds from Palestine. I would not have any proof. I did, however, learn that birds can migrate up to 16,000 miles, and the distance between this city and Palestine is much less than that. Take that information and do with it what you will: hope, pray, protest. All I know is that the birds joined in that day, and we, Palestinians, have receipts.
Hasheemah Afaneh is a Palestinian public health professional and writer based in New Orleans. She has contributed to Adi Magazine, Mondoweiss, Sinking City Literary Magazine, 580 Split Magazine, Glass Poetry Poets Resist Series, Poets Reading the News, This Week in Palestine, and others. More can be found at norestrictionsonwords.
