The 'Other'

can you see my colours?
can you not see my colour?

can you see me colourless?
can you hear?
are you listening?
I am you not the other

look! I am white like you
jewish like you
a man like you
look well and you'll see

we are no different
I'm not the other
you are not the other

let me love you
allow yourself to love me back
life is slipping quickly , love me
you fade as I fade..
I am not brown or pink
I am a fetus
can I go back
to the warmth of the womb?
please come in
I am your fetus
your new born
I have no concept of time and space
of nations and divorces
what is conflict??

please don't see me as a colour
don't shove me into your categoties
see ME
can you try?
see me without your conditioning
and your CNN
I am you, you see
when you make me the other you become the other.
what about the trees , the flowers
what about our love
and that burning need to connect
hardwired in our systems
that inherent longing
mine and yours
our eternal unresolved issues
mine and yours

connect
talk
love
allow yourself
the world is falling apart, come
come lets talk hope
our world..
our lives…
your heart and mine
my freedom and yours
the culture of the future
we are the only hope
we are Truth
let me hold you and love you
see me
dont think of yourself as the other

when I try to open up to you
my tongue gets tied
fearing you
lets talk with no words
can you look into my eyes?
right into my soul?
and show me yours?

is that too scary?

San Francisco , 2001

I am Nobody Bint* Nobody

I am Nobody Bint* Nobody

My mother is an anonymous fallaha*
My father is a simple guy, part of the land.
No, you won’t know my family name.
No we don’t have relatives who are famous
But I am the people who make the history.
I come from the village
From the refugee camp
I am not a 'professional' - whatever that means.
I have a PHD from life and oppression
No, I don’t know where Stanford is
No, I don’t want to be part of a community that classifies me according to my religion or my family name or how much money I make
No I am not willing to climb the ivory tower of yours.
You come down here if you want the truth.
Come listen to the stories of the people - from the people

* Bint : daughter
* Fallaha : peasant woman

San Francisco- 2000

My third anniversary in Canada

Celebrating my anniversary
Three years  I’ve been in 'your' land
my new 'home'

Have you ever been in dream?
where you know it's a dream
and whatever happens doesn’t make a difference
cause you'll wake up and the dream will be over
beauty and fear and love is not real
just a dream
Have you ever found the magic lamp?
and rubbed it and got the genie
but you couldn’t think of anything to wish for
cause life has lost its contrast
cause nothing can revive your dead heart

Feels like thirty years
It's weird, the transformation
I watch myself live, and do things
like watching a soap opera on TV
I watch me make objects
and work and sleep
I sometimes feel sorry for that character
but I am mostly indifferent

Someone built a time machine
and I the adventurous wanted to test it out
the machine ran out of gas
I got stuck between two worlds
I shattered into 30 million pieces
they spread over the empty space
they float between the planets
aimless
feeding on patience
from music
and poetry
I carve my fingerprints on pieces of wood..
and I watch me...

Ottawa -  1999

Thank you for the pain

thank you for the pain
by pain i grow
thank you for the hurt,
it makes me glow
you, the oh so limited
invoke my limitlessness
the suffering upgrades my senses
i feel more
i sense better
i can see through walls
and hear sounds kilometers away
you are small
but you know how to hurt and enjoy it
but you're doing me a favor
i'm sure your limited mind doesnt know it
you help me grow
much bigger than even your coldness
i know it's beyond you to understand
but i have to thank you
thank you for the pain

Ottawa - 1999

The Death of "Dream"

one day someone knocked my door
i opened there was no one
just a little basket with a baby boy in it
a little baby boy who became my son
i fed him from my breast
and my heart
i called him 'Dream'
he was my security for the future
my eternal happiness
habibi my dream
i killed it
i killed my dream
because it was too big for me
to beautiful to be true
loosing him would be a disaster
i was afraid
that he would grow
and become more handsome
and i would love him more
and loosing him would hurt more
so i killed him
he was a baby
innocent
pure
didn't get contaminated by civilization
i killed him
with my own hands
because
i would die if he got polluted
my dream
habibi
he was smiling
with his rosy cheeks
his freshness
his beautiful big green eyes
tiny fingers
tiny toes
steals any heat away
makes the cruelest of all men
cry
with tenderness
habibi
dream
was smiling
when i killed him
now i am dreamless
he was the light of my life
ro7I , 7ayati
i killed him!

Ottawa - 1999