Rimaal*, it has been six years since I have seen you.

And yet.

I remember to anticipate you. I remember

how you cover even paved streets, the feeling

of you in my sandals, under my heels, 

so insistent, so bothersome, so constant.

In the apartment, I find traces of you still,

carried by the wind from mountains that 

are far enough away to be mere pinpricks,

but not so far for you to travel 

to make your irksome presence known.

And yet.

Rimaal, you are encompassing. You are

rickshaws, small and quick through city streets,

kicking up clouds of you into our faces. You are 

Sharm el-Sheikh, Gamasa, al-Sokhna, Port Said,

where we go when we want to remember

 that we still have horizons, with you beneath our feet.

In the one-bedroom-one-living-room apartment 

that makes the motherland, you are her bowels,

her leftovers, her faraway gaze, her forgotten dunes,

her nile as it calls and weighs and pounds upon us.

Rimaal, you are so aggravating. You are

the years I have forgotten, the proud balcony

presiding over generations, the midnight dares 

over a deck of cards in crowded gardens.

Rimaal, you are home, you are awful,

you are terrible, you are beloved.

And yet. 

Rimaal, love, can I tell you a story?

*rimaal = Arabic word for sands

Early skies come a new day

Of moving carts and lifting pallets

Destroying wood with mallets

And throwing away plant trays

All for a $16 hourly pay

Midday comes with a forklift

Restocking items with more lift

From boxes, paint buckets, to wood

I did as much as I could

But that’s the end of my shift

Butterflies

move from flowers to flowers

are delicate, fragile, and colorful.

But show that they are powerful as they fly through the wind.

There once was a butterfly without wings

She’d never seen them before

So she knew they weren’t there

She fluttered around and always wondered

Why they pointed and smiled at her bare body

She felt wingless and ashamed

Until one day she had a child

Who was as wingless as can be

But said she wanted wings as beautiful as her mothers

And so the butterfly wept

That’s when she knew that things were only true

If you believed them to be

Grey clouds

line the white skies

and drift, languorous.

I stare and think: “How shall I live,

today?”

At first it was just thoughts 

Something I paid no mind too

Second, it was stress and anxiety

Third, I wasn’t eating or drinking

Fourth, I couldn’t sleep anymore

Fifth, I stopped checking my emails

Sixth, I stopped talking to my friends

Seventh, I was on the balcony all the time

Eighth, I had accepted my new fate

Ninth, I was pulled out.

Clear blue skies in haze

Sit with me in the park now

Send a message home

Gaze at the blue sky

Sit on the grass below you

Breathe in the sweet air

Stay here forever

Be one with the wind and sky

Let dewdrops reign

A bird, a black bird

A bird that is despised and feared by others

Seen as evil and Menacing to the eye

A bird no one admires, that no one sees the kindness passed its darkness

A bird, a white bird

A bird that is loved and cared for

Seen as beautiful and graceful

A bird everyone admires, no matter even if it shows it’s evil passed it brightness

What did the crow do to become despised?

Its color, its features, or is it become its seen as ugly

Or because it’s seen as vicious to the eye

When otherwise it’s a bird that has a heart and only wants to be loved and cherished like the dove

Why is the dove so loved?

Why is the dove seen as kinder as the crow?

A dove’s heart can be blacker than its feathers

We protect the dove only because it brings beauty to the world and even though it may look ugly on the inside

A crow, A dove

Black and white two opposite colors

Much like Ying and Yang, they bring balance to each other

But instead the crow cries in sorrow and envy and the dove laughs as its worshipped

The mirror,

The glass window that points out everything in its view-

The wrinkles, the stretch marks, cellulite, freckles, acne scars, the most beautiful pair of eyes,

The imperfections and the perfections that we fail to see

The qualities that we fail to realize unless we have a digital camera in front of our faces

But we use the mirror to strike a pose and share our bodies with the world,

The mirror points out everything especially at our most vulnerable moments

But again, when was the last time we looked at a mirror and appreciated it for showing us our true selves

We can like what we see in the mirror because the mirror doesn’t hesitate to show us what it likes about us too

The reflection of light and love when we need an ounce of reassurance or a little confidence booster

The one that’s always there when we’re practicing for a big presentation the next day or trying to adjust our hair and our bow ties for a special occasion,

The one that’s there when we say damn I look good,

The mirror says damn right you do!

Yet they’re the ones that get punched and shattered for revealing who we are and the hate they get when we don’t appreciate our truth

Oh how id love to put those pieces back together with a hug

If mirrors could talk I’d say

Mirror mirror on the wall,

You are the fairest of them all <3

The sun goes back home

Back to its raging domain

Shadowy mind state

Light does not reach this dark space

This space that I call my own