after Mahmoud Darwish
Why is a boy an exclamation,
and why are his dead a period?,
why do his sinews tighten when he sees
a Palestinian body? Does his vision narrow
because of their flight,
or because their world is raining with salt?
Why is a boy with a gun different
from a boy with a jail cell?,
if the tools of rupture are our arms for
repurposing the body, and the arms of
the state are our means of repurposing the male,
are we finally useful and breathing and nervous…?
Does the white mean Night’s arrival?,
or does night signal the white’s escape?,
and when that white city boy becomes
a White City man,
does the hate in his heart subside?,
or does it become an ellipses,
a Bauhaus history of stories started
and left unfinished
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR
Kaleem Hawa
has written about art, film, and literature for the New York Review of Books, The Nation, and Artforum, among others.