Before the Bombs Came

A short collection of poetry (4x) rooted in resistance, hope, and grief

A short collection of Poetry based in resistance, hope, and grief. I hope you enjoy. All of this poetry has been inspired by specific moments over the last 2.5 years o genocide. I hope these words do justice for our martyrs and serve as a reminder for each of us of what has been lost, and how much more we have left to fight for…

Thank you for reading!

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The Land Gave Birth

Palestine gave birth
her pavements smiled with groves of olives and roses
her children were shepherds, farmers, jewelers
she became pregnant with hope
It would be enough for me to die, here, on her soil,
Be buried deep in the earth of my country,
Only to sprout forth again as a bright bloom,
Waved gently by a child who calls this land home.
It would be enough for me to remain home,
Alive,
existing as a trace in her fabric …
So, they targeted her womb
And Death greeted every child she had.

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“why don’t you just leave”

(after a conference, somewhere in the empire)

he said

why don’t Palestinians just leave,

at least then they’d be alive

and i didn’t say

that we have left

and died anyway

that leaving is a kind of dying too

just with better lighting

he said he was “Ottoman”

like a legacy

like a pardon

like he wasn’t speaking to the empire’s child

but to its ghost

and i thought of the ledgers

where our names were counted like wheat

i thought of all the wells they sealed in my grandmother’s village

and the stones her brothers threw at the soldiers

because that’s all they had left

stones and mothers

i wanted to ask him

do you ask the earth

why it doesn’t leave the earthquake?

do you ask the olive tree

why it’s still rooted after the fire?

but i didn’t say that

i said

nothing

because I only had rage to offer

and maybe it was the coffee, or the badge that said “Palestine below my name,

or the ballroom carpet, patterned like all hotel carpets—-

something loud enough to cover grief

but i was tired

of being asked to explain

my own wound to the knife

tired of being

the Palestinian on the panel

the Arab with the accent they can’t quite place

the American who has to smile when Gaza is mentioned

because if they don’t smile, they’ll say you’re too angry

tired of having to choose

which half of myself to apologize for

depending on the room

i said

nothing

but in my head

i wrote a new conference name tag

it read:

this land was not empty

we did not leave

we were made to

---

The Inheritance

The solider leaned over

Me

Demanding

Why do you stay?

Oh, I said

These streets run through

My chest like rivers

Each stone speaks my name

But still

He aimed

Through smoke

You must disappear

As if bullets could shatter memory

As if occupation could divorce blood from soil

---

BEFORE THE BOMBS CAME

the boy with untied shoelaces unaware that time is a luxury reserved for those who live in different geographies
somewhere a pilot presses a button
somewhere a general signs a paper
somewhere a spokesman prepares to say unfortunate
the missiles do not ask if you’ve finished your morning rituals they do not care about the small fingers still learning to loop to pull to tighten to survive
his mother screams “YALLA HABIBI YALLA,” but childhood moves at its own pace in Gaza even urgency has its limitations
they will later say he was in the vicinity of they will later say human shields they will later say never again while saying once more
the doorframe becomes a mouth concrete becomes utensils flesh becomes meal
shoelaces still dangling when they find him when they dig him out from under his inheritance
they do not show this on television they do not count the shoes left behind they do not report on the many ways childhood ends
in the yard the orange tree drops its fruit too early the ground rejects what was not meant to fall
how strange to outlive your children how strange to outlive your tree