Tablets V

1

Light falls from her voice

and I try to catch it as the last

light of the day fades ...

But there is no form to touch,

no pain to trace.

2

Are dreams

taking their seats

on the night train?

3

She recites a list of wishes

to keep him from dying.

4

The truth lands like a kiss—

sometimes like a mosquito,

sometimes like a lantern.

5

Your coffee-colored skin

awakens me to the world.

6

We have only one minute

and I love you.

7

All children are poets

until they quit the habit

of reaching for butterflies

that are not there.

8

The moment you thought you lost me,

you saw me clearly

with all of my flowers,

even the dried ones.

9

If you pronounce all letters

and vowels at once,

you would hear their names

falling drop by drop

with the rain.

10

We carved

our ancestral trees into boats.

The boats sailed into harbors

that looked safe from afar.

11

Trees talk to each other

like old friends

and don’t like to be interrupted.

They follow anyone who

cuts one of them,

turning that person

into a lonely cut branch.

Is this why in Arabic

we say “cut of a tree”

when we mean

“having no one”?

12

The way roots hide

under trees—

there are secrets,

faces, and wind

behind the colors

in Rothko’s untitled canvases.

13

Will the sea forget its waves,

as caves forgot us?

14

Back when there was no language

they walked until sunset

carrying red leaves

like words to remember.

15

It’s true that pain

is like air, available

everywhere,

but we each feel

our pain hurts the most.

16

So many of them died

under stars

that don’t know their names.

17

If she just survived with me.

18

A flame dims in the fireplace,

a day slips quietly away from the calendar,

and Fairuz sings, “They say love kills time,

and they also say time kills love.”

19

The street vendor offers tourists

necklaces with divided hearts,

seashells to murmur the sea’s secrets in your ear,

squishy balls to make you feel better,

maps of homelands you fold

in your pocket as you go on your way.

20

I am haunted by the melody

of a forgotten song

sung while two hands

tied my shoelaces into a ribbon

and waved me goodbye to school.

21

If I could photocopy

the moment we met

I would find it full

of all the days and nights.

22

It won’t forget the faraway child,

that city whose door stayed open

for passersby, tourists, and invaders.

23

The moon is going to the other

side of the world

to call my loved ones.

24

The seasons change

colors and you come and go.

What color is your departure?