I heard it on the news Not the mainstream kind, no Their stories unravel to a sepulchral beat Where the truth lies buried under bones and teeth This was another source I read the caption and my heart Burst again Those men, women and children Were shot, sniped to the floor Because they’d gathered to collect Food, that had been plentiful before Growing in their fields and in their groves Now razed into cavernous holes Bleeding crimson into bare soles Into bare souls Bearing souls of loved ones gone On hearts and shoulders cut and torn Holding on to hope for one more hour Budding gently like a flower Reaching for a little flour For loved ones that still breathed amid The glowing flitter of their dead They reached for hope spattered in red They reached for hope pockmarked with lead They reached for hope among their dead They reached and were shot in their heads
Vermillion petals drift again in the wind Blooming in the ether of Palestine.
My palm in the flower pot Has grown tall Each frond strong A testament to nurture Mine, I like to believe And the perfection Of where she lives in our home Hers and mine Our spaces combined She sits across from me Diagonally In the warmth of the floor lamp An IKEA purchase A capitalist ploy gone right She sits light in her loamy soil In the soft glow From the 6 watt trio of bulbs Sometimes of a late evening My day done, when I’m thinking Of nothing in particular, she Waves a grand green frond at me In a little conversation A whisper in the quietness A reminder maybe That we’re still here In our little eden of serenity I smile at her my mouth lifting up My spirits in its curve She rustles happily Lightening in that moment Also the lines on my palms Sweetening destiny My palm in the flower pot In that mystical little moment Stirs the whole cosmos around me.
This is an unlovely ode to bad relationships. It is also for all those still tempted to give toxic relationships chance number 2 and 3 and God forbid even more. May you keep moving ahead, above, beyond.
That gaze was just too intense My head felt like a beaten egg Yolks and white all combined To give me wishy-washy legs
I was usually in control My heart never rested on my sleeve But that stare, your yen laid bare Made my ribs into a sieve
And so my sage old heart popped out Of its latticed bulwarked den It leaped gaily down my arm And upon my sleeve I wore it then
It leaped and skipped all the while That you sat to my left I tried to brush it off my arm But my heart dodged me, it was deft
By and by it took up the song Of new love, brazen and bold My thrumming blood picked up the tune As it danced in its venous folds
I felt my eyes light up like stars My face catch on wild fire As you cast your eerie spell Of infatuation and desire
The rest as they say is history It doesn’t behoove my gentle pen To transcribe and eternalize Chapters closed with an amen!
Like loaded missiles, your eyes today Once again bore into me That day I was the prey you sought But today I am armed to my teeth
That gaze is just deception cold It’s so clear, now I can see As back it kicks and ricochets Into the desert of your being.
I hope, I hope That you find Your version of paradise With babbling milky streams Sweetened with honey Dripping from trees There are no bees (They sting you see) In a vaulted other world May it be your vision unfurled
But I have this feeling Visceral, profound This tug of awareness In my gut That the body so righteous And ritual bound Has lost touch With the heart and the spine They lie dormant intertwined In the periphery Of the small intestine
But that’s just me I’m not saintly Not a bit, no not a whit But I have learnt to be a friend I now know how to sit With what lies deep within My spine, my gut and my heart That trio beating a path Clear and bright That despite Myopic eyes I can see and I can ply So I can make this very life My living, breathing paradise
And so I hope that you too At some blessed point Find your heaven as it awaits With its resplendent pearly gates I hope that you Can grasp that thread That quickening, vital line That dangles down Into mosques and synagogues And altars divine Leading you to paradise.
This is for all the girls and the women who are struggling to fit into the expectations, definitions and labels that have been created for them. Keep speaking, keep striving, keep moving until you are free.
They told me that I should slow down To put my roots into my soil But when I did When I trusted the hands that would Nurture those tendrils, tender fragile They instead beat them down Crushed and strangled them in the ground Burnt their life seeking ends And everytime that they grew When they reached for something new They cut them down Again and again they continued All my tomorrows were carved out to be Bleak as the ashen soil that held My soles, my skin, my soul, my sins Fusing them for the world and me They were one, coalesced That none could sunder Save the keepers of the roots And God himself Resurrected in their image to suit Him and him and Him and them In a conspiracy of guilt and hell
So I uprooted myself And I found someplace else
I slowed down and felt the ground The soil was light, loamy brown I sat down, took off my shoes I dug in my soles, my soul, my whole And that is when I found my roots.
This is an unlovely ode to drudgery of all kinds: professional, domestic, emotional and mental. This is also a bit of a kick to the steaming underbelly of corporatocracy or political capitalism. For those still in its grips, tomorrow is another day, and then another, and another …. This is to deep breaths, cathartic vocalization and despite it all, inner peace ☮️
I sit here with my tea It is past dusk, nighttime has come My day is done, the drudgery For now, has been overcome I know I should call it living A productive life, goal-driven One that should give me belly warmth The kind that you find In food that hugs your soul While it slowly dissolves Into dreams and hopes and Forging on; wanting more; The bar always moving up There are no rests, there are no stops
But Drudgery O Drudgery! When I call you out for thee That word becomes cathartic As it washes off the aches The tiredness, the ire The fresh and dutiful daily inks Of brimstone and hellfire It’s like a song, a one word air It fills the air with daring A momentary “damn it all!” No fear of anything Celestial, terrestrial or alien
Drudgery oh drudgery! I have been taught to revere thee In your sugar-coated entirety But to speak of you Honestly In all your tri-syllabic impiety Is to seek out fate When she should be Left alone Picking at her murphied* bones
And yet Drudgery Och Drudgery There are days when I acknowledge thee For what you are: A stinging thorn in my soul A worldly curse, a profanity And that is when I perceive An adroit lightness of my being. When I call you out, I feel A joyful whoosh of relief My hapless spirit is airborne Again, and I am fortified For another day spent in your arms Ceaseless, easeless Drudgery With a name that’s yet a purging charm.
Image: Jacqueline FaheyImage: Douglas Arthur
* The title of the poem is an adaptation of Karl Marx’s critique of political economy - Das Kapital
* Murphied: The word is derived from Murphy's Law (Whatever can go wrong will go wrong). Victim of bad luck and circumstance.
Part 2 of my poem, “Don’t Forget”. Birthed from the soul haunting paintings and videos of Palestinian artists and vloggers.
You want to know If I sleep? I don’t anymore, not normally But when I do When my eyeballs roll back in my head From exhaustion and from dread I dream I’m splayed across Broken stones And clay begotten slivered bricks Shattered bones And severed heads Skin like parchment Bomb-buoyed, paper-thin Every pore missile-singed Flying in the wind Up, up into the sky I send a prayer with my eyes I lift a leg and scrutinise The other one It lies unsprung, unsung, wrung From its muscles and ligaments It lies in the dust The dust is whipped into a storm It brings along The smell of death Of rocket-burnt flesh Bloody, fear-soaked it’s a mesh It clings to me I can hear Each howling soul As it holds me close I let it grip me as it curls Into my ears as they bleed Quietly so silently Tenderly, bedecking me My lobes dripping in rubies There is no sound anymore My wings unfurl I float away As they gently gently weep The tired lifeblood out of me.
I draw so you remember What happened in October Of 2023 And November and December and January and February And on and on in 2024 I draw
I stand where the stricken Lie dead or dying in the rocks Once homes and hospitals I stand And I draw so you remember
And should I lose my hands I will still paint The ravaged spaces that I see I’ll paint them with my feet I’ll sit With my reds and greys amid Strewn limbs and death debris A paintbrush in my toes
And should I lose my legs One of them or both And if I can draw a breath I’ll still draw the faces Of the living and the dead I’ll etch them with my eyes Into the watching skies
I’ll engrave them in the heavens Where angels wait to greet All of me and mine We, the flowers of Palestine
I’ll draw, I’ll paint, I’ll etch Until my dying breath So that you can always see So that you don’t forget.
They speak and words Fumble from mouths That wish that they Were speaking out Of something else Of the obvious
It has to be It has to be
Humanity has otherwise Lost its wings Its feathers shorn By barbs and stings From treacherous planes Rockets blazing By the ugly might Of vetoing Might it be Those hearts still beat To other things Resembling, faintly even An evenness, a balancing Of fickle acts, good intentions For a time, lost in a storm Treacherous, unsteadying
They speak and words Come stumbling out Of throats that lie In tender flesh Fleshing out sweeter things Like hearts that throb On other planes And blood that sings Of vital things Could it be those Soul-stirring thoughts Have lost their way In heart’s hollow They pulsate Knock-knocking On its ribs
You tell me I should have known Better than to trust another With tender things Like the blood reveling warm within Sweet imaginings You tell me I should have seen The telltale clues in between The spaces where I had wrapped My heart around someone, rapt In the throes of so much joy I beamed, I glowed for months on end You remind me now again I look at you and I smile Sometimes silence golden and still Is all that is needed to fill The pause waiting to receive Contentions, remonstrations, a speech I let that moment pass me by Bloated with pent up intrigue Silence exquisite, shimmering Now takes me in its calm embrace I had loved with all my heart No regrets, no shame, no blame My quietness golden and still Now safekeeps memories in that space.
She sits there selling bangles Set up in a wicker basket Some laid down on the grass Every now and then she gently Sweeps off the dust that spreads thinly From teeming feet that hurry past Barely slowing near the woman Sitting on her haunches hoping For someone to slow down, to pause Her concave belly almost touching The basket that is tugging The life blood from her womb Every time that she moves Spilling it in little driblets Onto its precious load
The maternal bond of glass and blood Unremitting, never enough As she sits car-caressing Sometimes fretting, sometimes fussing Rearranging, caring, loving Always loving, always loving A tender smile hov-hovering Around her tired mouth She is umbilical-corded To her treasures Resting in their bed of wicker Willing them to cleave their way Into the hearts of passersby Willing them to shine so bright That it brings tears to her eyes The boundless world of plenty In those bangles by her side
Behind her lie two little heads Heat-numbed and stupefied Little thumbs in little mouths Doing their best to pacify The endless hunger in their bellies Matured and rarefied Over lifetimes spent behind Their mother as she hums Little songs of gentle rain On golden fields of wheat and rye Watching their little sisters Take all their mother’s time Resting in their basket They tinkle and they wink They watch their little sisters Gleaming, laughing in delight Suckling on the joyfulness That streams from their mother’s eyes.
NB: Image is from the World Wide Web. Artist was not mentioned.
Mahvash Mohtadullah - The Roaming Desi 