by Sheikha A.
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| Mohammed Hajjar/Associated Press |
''The [US-sponsored proposal for a] ceasefire would evolve into a permanent end to hostilities and the release of all hostages in a second phase. A final stage would see the launch of a major reconstruction effort.'' —The Guardian, June 12, 2024
This planet will become a museum;
the future nodes of our past karma
will live in corridors without walls,
where displayed in liquid sunsets
will be an imagined version of blood
because it will no longer exist: extinct
artefact impossible to save for relic.
Humans will be dissolved vapour
from a combustion that was meant
to enforce power; and, neutralists
chose to write words to write-off
histories. Our veins will be draped
like decorative tinsel over our future.
The dominant climate being eternal
outrage, and no one to alter the code
to turn back time to halt the rockets
in the skies. Ahlan wa Sahlan, we
greeted ourselves into their homes,
and then eviscerated. Ma’afi mushkela,
we will now help rebuild it from scratch.
Sheikha A. is from Pakistan and United Arab Emirates. Her work appears in a variety of literary venues, both print and online, including several anthologies by different presses. Her poetry has been translated into Spanish, Vietnamese, Greek, Arabic, Polish, Italian, Albanian and Persian.