Vanitas, by Saadia Shaikh. Image courtesy of the artist
A thing must have hands
[to mourn]
what it cannot touch
//
Define in, I say when anyone asks
if I’ve ever been in a war. I smoked
pot with a boy who refused to
marry me. I slept through the
airport bombing. When the
window facing the street shattered,
I kept a piece in my mother’s glove
compartment.
//
Sometimes I’ll make myself thin
[enough]
to slip through walls
//
But if you don’t name the tree
My grandmother’s couch milks itself into the carpet
how can you love it
//
Palestine, a name that means
//
The worst ghosts are the ones that don’t come back.
//
The officer at JFK scans me. My body, ghost-white, flickering on his screen.
Pretty boy. Blue eyes.
Takes my fingerprint and winks.
Cheer up. You’re home.
~ Hala Alyan
Hala Alyan is an award-winning Palestinian American poet and clinical psychologist whose work has appeared in numerous journals including The Missouri Review, Prairie Schooner and Colorado Review. She resides in Manhattan.
