Venice masks

Tuesday 30 March 2021

A Homeland - Mohammed J. Al-Nabhan

My Homeland!
Would a homeland abolish a loved one's name?
Red tape all his civil documents
Or cross-out with red ink the names of its people?
I hunger for the homeland that exiled me
To beg for a land
A name
A face that has no resemblance to the roots that created us.

My homeland!
I crave you a river that cultivates the heart
I desire you a heart despite the distance
I long for you to be my address.

Which of us preserves the secret
Soul's lilac, retrieving the doves of memory.

My homeland!

Would a homeland's dagger be in its lover's waist?
When he admits the seagull's sadness exhausts him
He groans, no water and no resistance.

My homeland!
Are you a homeland?
Or an undertaking oil well in the desert
That fills the foreigners' pails!

Mohammed J. Al-Nabhan (Born 1971) Kuwait (moved to Canada 1995)
Translator not stated

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