Brighton & Hove Palestine Solidarity Campaign

by Sharif S Elmusa

From: 'A Heap Of Broken Images’ by Sharif S Elmusa

No 4

What makes the man
who meanders,
like an uncertain river,
before deciding
what to have for dinner
which film to see
when he last had a haircut –
what makes this man
close one eye
aim intently
through the telescope of his rifle
and become the most precise,
direct of animals?

No5

In today’s toll, a row of men
with blindfolded eyes
and surrendered hands
squat, backs hunched,
before a stone wall.
A young boy stays home,
by himself, for five days
with the corpses of his family.
A man gestures with loathing
about how a soldier had defecated
on his bed. An old woman flails
her arms in despair, begging
the distant heavens.

To feel the humiliation,
touch the grief of each
you would have to become a monster
with many hearts.

(Courtesy of Banipal Magazine 15/16)

About Elmusa: he was born in Haifa in 1946, and grew up in the al-Nuwayima refugee camp nr Jericho. He has a PhD from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and has taught at Georgetown University. He is a poet, translator of Arab poetry, editor, and expert in Middle Eastern water resources.

Much published in America, he has also co-edited ‘Grape-Leaves: A century of Arab-American Poetry’ (1999). He is an associate professor and programme director at the American University of Cairo.

Other Poems:

Fadwa Tuquan

Mahmoud Darwish

Sameh El-Qasim