Poetry After Gaza
Poetry After Gaza[1]
We adorn our anger with lyrical poetry
Like gnarly old branches of the Joshua tree
Pointing silently towards the distant horizons
Tracing arcs of history from Orion to Zion
But Yusuf will return to the land of Canaan[2]
Where Adonai lives amidst spiritual devastation[3]
Jealously guarded by besieging a people
The world still ignores the banality of evil[4]
History’s only victims with monopolies on truth
A city for an eye, a whole tribe for a tooth
White phosphorous bombs, melt flesh, burn hope
While IDF reservists smoke Manalian dope[5]
Pinkwash the conflict with a rainbow flag
Tik toks made viral to laugh and brag
About hellfire missiles and bunker buster bombs
Settlers kill goyim while singing the psalms
Uprooting olive groves to create new ranches
While Western civilisation talks of olive branches
Their minds are shackled by guilt and hate
The Balfour Declaration has scripted our fate
Creating new victims in a fake democracy
Weapons grade hypocrisy fuels this kleptocracy
And like Pharma companies doing animal testing
Ghazza is the new lab for munitions investing
From the river to the sea, Filastine will be free
Open your eyes and think- its all about the money
The Ben Gurion Canal needs a path to the sea
Inconvenient populations can just die or flee
Golda Meir’s logic, killers are victims too
“We cant forgive you for forcing us to kill you”[6]
‘A gentile’s soul similar to a beast’s’
Do you know Rav Kook, Zionism’s head priest[7]
So C-sections in Khan Younis, no anaesthesia
Collective amnesia in modern day Rhodesia
Read the will of a dead poet: ‘If I must die’[8]
Your sword on my neck but I wont comply[9]
Record! I am an Arab- and the sky is my witness[10]
Only a dead Filastini has peace and stillness
But our children will rise and one day they’ll sing
Of the tyranny of leaders, of the silence of kings
And my dabka will unleash slingshots of my words
As we cross checkpoints like cattle in herds
There will be poetry after Ghazza we scream
Come to Ash-Shifa, where the corpses still dream
So bear witness to the living, bear witness to the dead[11]
Just pause, then listen with your heart not your head
A free Filasteen where sparrows once more
Sing the last shall be first, now lets end this war.[12]
[1] Reference to a quote from Adorno– to write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric.
[2] Hafiz Shirazi’s ghazal Yusuf-e gumgashta baaz ayad b-can’aan gham makhor
[3] Some names of G-D are so holy that once written they shouldn’t be erased. Adonai is a Hebrew word for G-d which also means Master or Ruler
[5] A lot of IDF soldiers go to this town and its environs Himachal Pradesh in India after their military service is over in order to relax and ‘chill out.’
[7] Abraham Issac Kook- first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of British Mandatory Palestine- https://www.yeshiva.co/ask/5200
[8] Dr. Refaat Alareer was a poet from Gaza who was targeted and killed. He wrote and published this poem on Nov 1 2023 on X.
[9] Ghassan Kanafani who was assasinated by Israel used this famous phrase.
[10] Mahmoud Darwish’s famous poem. Sajjil ana arabi! Record I am Arab
[11] Elie Weisel