Turab for Mohammed Saeed Al-Sahaf
speaking live from the center of the lotus flower
here
in a country's final hour
as the endgame has begun and the civilians
remain nameless on the nightly news
you are looking at the journalists with eyes
like gun-barrels
saying noncommittal words
that even you laugh at slightly
you don’t know how beautiful you are
already i look at you
speaking, live
from the center of the lotus
your words wobble upwards like sparrows
the air around you swims with
the sand of the turab
with burning dinosaur bodies
jurassic compost
with B52 bomber fuel
with the desert exhalations
your death stands just next to you.
your eyes have stopped seeing
your mouth utters absurdities
somewhere you and i are having tea
laughing about this
i am forgiving you
you are forgiving yourself
we play a game in the park
we roll hand-sized silver balls
in a small sandpit
on the outskirts of Nice
we will sit for some of the strong coffee
you like so much
in the late afternoon
you will stir in more sugar
than i could stomach
whatever gripped you when they put that black beret on,
the stars, whatever it was that signaled you
knew something
could say it
people could die maybe
underneath the black scarf of your words
the skulls roll out of white linen bags
they say next to nothing
take my hand now
link arms
let's walk through pink twilight
past vegetable gardens
and dogs
speaking of nothing
important
***
your eyes are still, like reflecting pools
the ghosts already swim there
you never have to brush flies from your face
you are increasingly angry with the men
you command
they can taste the target around your head
they steer well clear of you
i see you before the cameras
you are on a roof made of sand
you smile calmly and say how you
are winning
a man gestures wildly
towards smoke in the distance
the journalists move in obligingly
to obliterate the lone dissenter
there’s no picture to pose for after this
the cameras go dead, they turn dark
their roving eyes wander off elsewhere
you’ll have defended yourself
your land
these loaded words are constantly
pointed, cocked, at our hands
and our feet
they march us out into the turab
we face the duststorm when allah
and everyone else
says go home
we tie white flags to our brooms
no matter who comes lumbering down the street
men like you with your dead eyes
with the weight of hatred on your head
with marksmen adjusting their targets to that soft plate
where brains do fall out
go home now
go home to your wife
touch your children
feel their soft hair with your fingers
forget the men with mustaches
the ancient rifles, those muskets
of mass destruction
stop your game of self-deception
though i admire it
so strangely
glowing pink in the baghdad sunrise
go home
before they kill you, or forget you
eat honey, sip rose water
drink a cup of coffee in your garden
you are as dear to me as thunder
your eyes are hollow like the world
whose brilliance never surrenders
here
in a country's final hour
as the endgame has begun and the civilians
remain nameless on the nightly news
you are looking at the journalists with eyes
like gun-barrels
saying noncommittal words
that even you laugh at slightly
you don’t know how beautiful you are
already i look at you
speaking, live
from the center of the lotus
your words wobble upwards like sparrows
the air around you swims with
the sand of the turab
with burning dinosaur bodies
jurassic compost
with B52 bomber fuel
with the desert exhalations
your death stands just next to you.
your eyes have stopped seeing
your mouth utters absurdities
somewhere you and i are having tea
laughing about this
i am forgiving you
you are forgiving yourself
we play a game in the park
we roll hand-sized silver balls
in a small sandpit
on the outskirts of Nice
we will sit for some of the strong coffee
you like so much
in the late afternoon
you will stir in more sugar
than i could stomach
whatever gripped you when they put that black beret on,
the stars, whatever it was that signaled you
knew something
could say it
people could die maybe
underneath the black scarf of your words
the skulls roll out of white linen bags
they say next to nothing
take my hand now
link arms
let's walk through pink twilight
past vegetable gardens
and dogs
speaking of nothing
important
***
your eyes are still, like reflecting pools
the ghosts already swim there
you never have to brush flies from your face
you are increasingly angry with the men
you command
they can taste the target around your head
they steer well clear of you
i see you before the cameras
you are on a roof made of sand
you smile calmly and say how you
are winning
a man gestures wildly
towards smoke in the distance
the journalists move in obligingly
to obliterate the lone dissenter
there’s no picture to pose for after this
the cameras go dead, they turn dark
their roving eyes wander off elsewhere
you’ll have defended yourself
your land
these loaded words are constantly
pointed, cocked, at our hands
and our feet
they march us out into the turab
we face the duststorm when allah
and everyone else
says go home
we tie white flags to our brooms
no matter who comes lumbering down the street
men like you with your dead eyes
with the weight of hatred on your head
with marksmen adjusting their targets to that soft plate
where brains do fall out
go home now
go home to your wife
touch your children
feel their soft hair with your fingers
forget the men with mustaches
the ancient rifles, those muskets
of mass destruction
stop your game of self-deception
though i admire it
so strangely
glowing pink in the baghdad sunrise
go home
before they kill you, or forget you
eat honey, sip rose water
drink a cup of coffee in your garden
you are as dear to me as thunder
your eyes are hollow like the world
whose brilliance never surrenders
