After Arwa said something about “not accepting a society that created the possibility of her death”
for Sarah Hegazi
This and every place has a hole
in which they are buried
in which we bury them
alive and their stories
enter no bedtime
moment between a parent and child
a hole in which the parent is buried
a hole in which the child is buried
a hole in which who i am is buried
beneath all the selves i am supposed to be
a hole in which possibility lives
possible enough to have existed
a candle brief enough to burn
a sapling old enough to cast a shadow
and when it is chopped or uprooted
it will have lived
and shaped
a clearing |
in the forest
wide enough
to mark its absence.
Copyright Credit: Kamelya Omayma Youssef, "After Arwa said something about “not accepting a society that created the possibility of her death” " from The Margins. Copyright © 2021 by Kamelya Omayma Youssef. Reprinted by permission of Kamelya Omayma Youssef.
Source: The Margins (Asian American Writers’ Workshop, 2021)