A young writer and graduate of a Gaza university that is in ruins shares two of her poems.
Sahar Rabah
Translated from the Arabic by Ammiel Alcalay
Children of Wars
We’re the children of wars that ate our languages
and bequeathed us the language of blankness.
The last flame in her lamp
the last sorrowful moans flowing from
the edges in the map of this crying
we were uprooted until our hearts were torn apart like shredded cloud
and suns multiplied from our skin
from our bare feet on the pavement.
We’re the children of wars raised without respite
grown old with the sorrow of a thousand years
we’re no prophets
nor legends
nor Gods
we’re the ones hanging on the slogans’ cross.
We’re the children of wars that ate our languages
and gave us for a roof over our heads
or any home only hunger.
We’re the children of wars that ate our languages
and bequeathed us the bitterness of death in batches.
We’re the children of wars
and its last guardians
the last gravestones at its gates.
We wipe the tears of angels
and sing all the forgotten songs
to the tender anemone by the sea.
The Color of Blossom
We pray the color of the blossom
sprouts the dream in us to cross
the narrow darkness and hang
our clothes on the sun to dry
from all the tears of war and run
with the memory of a child
who forgives the country and
plays barefoot next to the rubble
