Did You Know?
The corners
That people could have hid in
Disappeared
After God created the Earth
A big ball
A Slaughtered Chicken a Few Minutes Before Death
I thought
To stand up and organize the room,
And cut my nails
Or put on lipstick
That no one will see.
I wash the dishes
Or break them for a change,
I pace around myself
Do some crunches
Or go out to the balcony, cheapened by voyeurism.
I smoke two cigarettes without feeling them
Or flirt with a mouse on the opposing roof
I write and erase…
My feet are swollen
My fingers are numb
I double-check the acne on my face
Before I throw my sixth cigarette
At the serpentine souls
The werewolves of the streets
And go inside to die a little…
Quiet and Numerous
I saw several Chinese military marches
I saw Foucault and Chomsky and Derrida holding nets and encircling a word
They, too, are confused
Local cigarette pack turns yellow
Yesterday, I decided to fall into artificial sleep
I took several colored pills
I slept long and without dreams
I feel much better
I can barely feel the tar that fills my lungs
Even my imaginary friends lowered their voices
They are not my friends
I say that they’ re my friends to embellish a little
They’ re obscene and romantic
They know that I have a scarecrow in soldier’s clothes and the head of a slightly crushed pumpkin inside of me
I am dragging her behind me and scold her if she speaks
What I really want is to go far away
Or learn a new language
Thus abstract chains of time won’t besiege me
Neither do chained times of abstractions
I see among you those who understand me well
Those who are holding the paddles
In boats that are floating on a spot that is not completely frozen
In a remote icy river
Ah!
The moment of leaning on the city has come
I will walk and talk
I will ignore the broader cadences and tune in to the cadence of my companions
I’ll be quiet and numerous
I mean happy
Even if I were numerous it is none of your business
It is only what agonizes me
The Drowned
I come without ribs like this
The drowned have no ribs
I am the partnership of the drowned and the shipwreck
That is cage-free
The whale came in and out of my stagnant chest
Deep in the purity of emptiness
Like a cosmic station
To provide the passers-by with creative pain
Watered by human violence
I stood there, a peer to the sun
In a bout of creating and guarding a new world
Built on the flesh of the drowned
A world glorious with magic
And steadfast with blessed forgetfulness
Maybe a woman threw me here
Don’ t be afraid –tied to my wrists
Like a normal rock, that drowns who carries it upon arrival
These eyes are in my flesh
The fingerprints of marine forms of violence
With wings and halos
And knives of light, at the last breakdown episode
Of a full flood entering
A heart that beats and as open as this one
Thorns explode out of my vertebrae
I think of a flower
Fins sprout and magnify over my body
That is slowly fossilized
I even forget in the excess
That I am here
In the bottom of the purity of pain
Flaunt in the hair of a fairy
Like a drowned flower
All artwork is courtesy of Eman Osama.
