back out through the revolving door hurry toward the bus
the driver smoking a cigarette on one side does not
see me climb in through the open door on the other
& inside yasmeen has disappeared once more
i crawl into the very last row & cower as the shuttle
fills in sparsely with passengers though no one
sits in the back or sees me crouched in the dark
my face pressed into the smell of leather blood roaring
in my ears she’s real & she saved me & i need her
to come back the driver finishes his cigarette
& climbs cheerfully on board
& the shuttle glides off into the night
The Airport
at the airport the crowd swirls busily around me
i barely avoid being flattened by a luggage cart
& an irritated woman asks me to please move her
please pronounced like a threat i scurry into
an empty corner to think & hear a familiar note
of arabic in the air then another i look up
& the counter in front of me is crowded with
my people carts piled high with taped-up
suitcases & overflowing shopping bags mothers
draped in bright fabrics clamping rowdy children
to their sides a small boy is wailing angry tears
spouting down his face while his father tries
to soothe him you’ll love it back home wait
until you meet your cousins your grandparents
& see the river & eat the sweetest guava
you’ll ever taste i’ll teach you how to climb trees
how to swim you’ll see you are going to be
so happy & with a pang i miss my mother
Broken Arabic
i spot a stooped woman mama fatheya’s age
seated to the side in a wheelchair while her family
checks their bags i approach not realizing
i’m speaking in english until she shakes her head
& repeats in her gravelly voice only arabic
in my clumsy arabic i try to explain that i need
help getting home that i’m all alone & afraid
& don’t know who can help me i stumble
through the sentences pausing to remember
each word & finally the only sentence i can assemble
is i want to go home i want to go home
where is your mother? she asks concerned
& through my tears i blubber wetly at home
are you here all alone? & i nod & you don’t
have any way of getting home? & i shake my head
& in the mess i’ve made with my broken arabic
she calls to her daughter this poor child
wants to go home we have to help her & i don’t
realize that i’ve mixed up the words & the word
for home i’d been using this whole time was homeland
No Daughter
the younger woman puts one hand on my shoulder
nails stained red-brown with henna
smooths my hair with her other palm
& asks do you speak arabic?
still flustered by the spreading chaos i’ve made
with my half language i shake my head no
she clicks her tongue in disapproval & turns to speak
to the older woman look at her hair the dirty clothes
i don’t think this girl belongs to anyone no daughter of mine
no girl i named would ever be allowed out looking
like this she must not have a family at least not one
that she matters to & i feel shame like bile rising sour
in my throat she looks over to me & smiles
while continuing through gritted teeth to her mother
stupid child doesn’t even speak arabic & all my rage
all my frustration my exhaustion my fear fill me
to bursting my arabic finds me & i hiss
up into her widening eyes i have a mother
i belong to someone i belong before i turn
on my heel & storm away & see yasmeen
again flickering in & out of the crowd
headed for the elevator
The Elevator
i ram a button to summon the service elevator
out of places to go so i’m following yasmeen
& i want to track her down
to ask her to help me again the metal doors
slide open & shut once i’m inside
& she is not there
& in the silver quiet i feel the exhaustion soak
my body & i feel homesick for the confines
of the apartment safe from this enormous world
& its horrors i want to go home i want
to find my way home the elevator has not moved
i want to go home i push the button to open the doors
deciding instead to find the stairs the doors part
in a surge of warm air outside the airport is gone
& in its place is the photograph of my parents
life-sized & real with smells & dry expansive heat
everything still frozen in its place my mother
laughing & dancing & in love my father his hand
mere moments from her waist so close i can see
the sweat beading his brow the mosquito
a second from his neck my father’s dark hair
lush & dense & coiled flimsy cotton of his shirt soaked
in sweat little gap in his front teeth & the look
in his eyes dazed by his good luck
yasmeen steps into the frame & she looks fully
human solid & actually walking instead
of her usual supernatural glide from this close
we’re not so different she looks like me dressed
in costume with better grooming & better posture but still
me extends her hand & says are you coming?
& when i take it her hand is solid & warm a real
pulse full of real blood
The Photograph
we step into the party at the exact moment
my father’s hand meets my mother’s waist
& pulls her closer to him her laugh rings out
& soaks into the music the night black
as velvet but for the glow of fairy lights strung
across the trees the air smells green & floral
& in the distance the faintest smell of smoke
after a few songs i tear my eyes reluctantly
from my parents to take in the other guests
at a table playing cards i spot khaltu amal unbleached
& smiling her hair fastened in two skinny braids
& leaned up against a jasmine tree mostly hidden
by its branches is haitham’s mother khaltu hala
twisting a pearl ring around her index finger &
joking slyly with a man whose face is exactly
haitham’s & just beyond them on a makeshift
rickety stage the band pours its song into the night
the drummer my arabic teacher lanky
& with a full afro of hair restored tie loosened
around his neck on the keyboard is abbas
who drives the bus & leaned up against
the microphone crooning into it like a lover
barely recognizable in his joy is the man who runs
the bigala though here his face
is unlined
& without its signature scowl they all look
so happy so young & full of what is possible
how could they ever have left why couldn’t i
have been born into this version of us have
grown up being sung to swung from arm
to loving arm by both my parents by their friends
everyone still alive shining in the heat back home
Home
at first i think i must be dreaming or making it
all up but i walk across the garden & feel the grass
crunching beneath my feet i put my hands
against a date palm & its trunk is warm & rough
to my touch & in front of me is a jasmine tree
its flowers blooming & perfume heady & sweet
& when i reach for one it comes away easily into my hand
i could spend hours just watching my parents dance
watching the muscles animating my father’s living face
but i feel tugged toward the exit by my other longing
i slip through the clanging metal gate my lost country
just outside
Home
on the quiet street outside i mark the site
of the party by its muffled sounds then turn
a corner & find myself walking along the river
rippling in the darkness the aching notes
of the call to prayer echoing out
from a minaret nearby & before i can finish
catching my breath i feel a hand on my back
a waft of scent what might be sesame & a flower
whose name i never learned & i look up to see
yasmeen beside me my own awe reflected
in her widened eyes the eyes exactly mine my gratitude
makes me awkward & i do not look at her as i murmur
thank you for helping me & the hand is on my arm again
solid this time as she replies of course
& i don’t know what else to say so we are silent for a while
before she speaks again have you heard that saying
“there but for the grace of god go i” & i shake my head
it’s basically, like, that could have been me, you know?
& that’s what i would have wanted someone to do for me so—
& as she says this i can’t believe i haven’t already asked
so i interrupt wait, so, are you me? & i know
it sounds stupid as i say it & i already feel
the warm spread of shame but she doesn’t laugh
& she doesn’t say no instead she bites her lip in thought
well, i’m yasmeen she begins
which, by the way, hi here a small smile so, we’re parallel
versions of each other like, you’re me if something different
were to happen somewhere in the story & it’s like i’ve always
imagined i know the answer before i even ask
but still i ask in your version, is baba alive? she nods
& mama fatheya’s voice comes back to me clear
as a recording one child for each world
& i am tripping over myself with questions
enough that i don’t register the hollowness of her answers
is he amazing? yes is mama happy? all the time
do you have a lot of friends? her face makes an expression
i can’t name & for a moment she looks nothing like me sure
what are their names? what are they like? just some girls
from arabic class. they’re nice & haitham? & instead
of answering she turns the line of questioning on me
do you also collect cassettes? & i can’t contain my excitement
oh my god, yes, you too? & she laughs in recognition
yes! what’s your favorite? i love the sayed khalifa one
& immediately we are singing the line in unison
& for a moment all my questions are forgotten
my racing head quieted by this moment of kinship
i sit awhile in the feeling as yasmeen peers
into the river lost in some thought of her own until i ask
have you been here before? & she shakes her head
only in dreams & old pictures & she says it exactly like
i would have & even though she already knows
i turn to face her reach to shake her hand then decide
it would be weird so i pull my hand back & wave
you probably know this already but it feels weird not to say
hi, i’m nima she smiles & i watch my face in hers
my smile stretching into hers but the eyebrows
are less unruly & the hair is plaited neatly into a thick
untousled braid & i can’t help but ask how do you get
your hair to do that? to stay put? & she smiles again
sesame oil & edge control as i will myself to remember
all of it this not-dream this country this other girl
together we stand at the riverbank & watch the moon
float over the water illuminating the city in ghostly colors
Haitham
we walk back into the thrum of the party
& i don’t know who i want to follow first
my parents still dancing & whispering
to one another bright center in the knot
of dancers but my attention is caught
once again by the man leaned up against
the tree with khaltu hala haitham’s
disappeared father living & gesturing wildly
with his hands as he talks in the exact manner
of haitham his wiry frame & big teeth
walking next to me as we approach them
yasmeen whispers it’s amazing how he looks
exactly like haitham & i don’t think
to ask how she knows haitham’s face
haitham’s name if he’s there in her version
of the story too shocked myself
by the resemblance the face i know
better than my own fastened onto
this one i’ve never seen haitham’s father
absent from any photograph haitham’s father
whose name he never says khaltu hala never says
mama fatheya never says & here he is
smelling of cinnamon & sweat running
his thumb across the ring on hala’s finger
until a voice calls out ashraf! how are
you, man? & he pulls his hand away
as if bitten steps a respectful distance
from khaltu hala & turns to greet his friend
while hala slinks off into the dancing crowd
shame twisting itself in her face
Ashraf
torn between following khaltu hala
back to my parents & haitham’s
mystery father the story written
in their secrecy i give in to my curiosity
& inch closer to hear him chatting
with his friend work’s fine,
you know, same old, never thought
i’d end up working for the government
but, you know & his friend cuts in
we understand you have mouths
to feed how are the kids? your wife?
& i work to unscramble these facts
in my knotted brain kids a wife
who it is clear now was not hala
& haitham never mentioned having siblings
never mentions his father at all
despite the life he spends wearing that man’s
exact haunted face
Visitors
i walk dazed back into the knot of dancers
& just as i reach out to touch my mother’s arm
yasmeen grabs my wrist stop she can’t
see you we’re only visitors, you understand?
we’re not part of this part of time you’ll only
scare her & i pull my hand back to my side
then why are we here? does this mean we can’t stay?
& in her face i watch my features soften almost
as if with pity i think we’re just supposed
to watch to learn something maybe fill in
some of the gaps we both have answer some
of the questions, you know? & something in my gut
is telling me there’s more but i nod watching
khaltu hala approach my mother her jaw hardened
to keep the tears in yasmeen moves closer
to listen & i will too but first i steal an open
hungry stare into my father’s living face before yasmeen
tugs on my hand & motions for us to follow
as my mother & khaltu hala
walk to a quiet corner of the party
aisha, i’m pregnant hala whispers
as understanding arranges itself first onto
my mother’s face then panic oh, hala oh no
after finally submitting to an embrace hala turns
to go home refusing my mother’s offer for company
i’m tired i’ll call you in the morning
& leaves my mother to sit alone with the news
worry creasing her face
hands absently finding her stomach
i haven’t told anyone yet, but so am i
Haitham
never talks about his father even when we were little
the contract was wordless & understood the contract
i broke & i am afraid i’ve broken everything along with it
i wonder how much he knows about this man whose face
he wears i wonder if he knows how alike their features are
Home Is Not a Country Page 7
