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Water & Salt
Lena Khalaf Tuffaha
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eBook - ePub
Water & Salt
Lena Khalaf Tuffaha
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About This Book
Lena Khalaf Tuffaha's debut, Water & Salt, sings in the voices of people ravaged by cycles of war and news coverage. These poems alternately rage, laugh, celebrate and grieve, singing in the voices of people ravaged by cycles of war and news coverage and inviting the reader to see the human lives lived beyond the headlines.
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Topic
LetteraturaSubtopic
Poesia mediorientaleIII
AMULETS FOR THE JOURNEY
ALMOND TRILOGY
I
On the first clear-skied morning of spring
we roll down the windows.
Our winter-tattered skin
thirsts for sunshine.
The flowering trees send slender branches toward the skyâ
elegant fingers raised in thankful prayer.
We descend into the valley,
the orchard becomes more visible;
organza skirts of blush and white
clusters of young ballerinas
performing an arabesque in unison
in the breeze.
The fragrance of almond blossoms
distilled in midday sun
settles inside of usâ
a heady elixir.
I am frantic for the camera,
framing a branch against
the cornflower blue of sky.
II
At the market on Saturday morning
we jostle shopping heavyweights
who arrive early for the prize of
tender-as-silk grape leaves
or
sweet lemons and succulent juice oranges.
I am distracted by a wooden crate
of green almonds.
The tear-shaped fruit,
its skin like a beloved childhood sweater,
hides a pungent white jewel inside.
One bite transports me
back to the schoolyard
reaching into the pocket of my uniform
to dip the almond into a bag of salt,
mouth puckering at the torment
of sour delight.
III
In the air-conditioned grocery store
the neon lights glare down at the English
labels on every shelf.
Rows of carefully packaged dry almonds,
looking dapper and clean shaven,
stare at me through a cellophane barrier.
They show no signs of their wild green past,
their primal blooming.
They are labeled simply:
Raw Unsalted Almonds
Organic
Product of Turkey.
NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISORY
The Guardian reports on a Palestinian businessman who obtained a unanimous fatwa to open a pornography-free online sex shop to help couples reignite their love lives. The imams who approved the venture said: âIslam supports anything that helps a married couple to connect.â
Iâd like to alert the NSA agents tracking Arab men:
anonymous brown paper packages will be delivered
to married couples all over the Middle East.
Before you call in the Joint Chiefs of Staff
let me assure you,
our people are starved for love, not bombings.
Those late night calls from temporary cell phones?
They werenât plans to attack,
just plans to rendezvous
bypassing multiple layers of family surveillance.
The breathless whispered Arabic on the line?
Code: yes, but not sacred verses.
Arab love falls under siege.
Everywhere is public space
and the public are a sober bunch.
On our romantic jihads
the path is long and arduous
and fraught with prying neighbors.
We canât even find a place to take an evening stroll,
our war-weary streets dilapidated,
our squares overflowing with revolutionary traffic.
And even though the garden jasmine
pours forth its sultry perfume
and a million stars crowd the night skies,
everyone is indoors chain-smoking
their lives away
and watching the news.
And the news has been old
for a while now.
Sometimes,
all we have left is prayer.
So the women pray for fundamentalismâstrict
adherence to the Sunna.
And the Sunna says:
âLet there first be a messenger between you.â
Words and kisses first,
O bring back the words and kisses.
WASTA
Everyone who knows someone
gets to have what they want done.
And sometimes the results are deafening.
Itâs one thing to assign the drunken nephew
to a desk job at the ministry of culture.
No one looks for culture at the ministry,
so if he snoozes on the ...