If I were a cat
I would wash my skin with my tongue
your scent passing from my skin to my mouth, so I’d think I’d devoured you
nothing remaining of you for anyone else to see
until I was satisfied, and I’d stretch out on the ground, content
that no one else but me would see you
and no one else but me would smell your scent
and no one else would hear your delicate bones cracking … but me
who said love is always docile
and that it must never be a beast
a beast with its senses sharpened
like the claws of an angry cat
Rasha Omran (born 1964) Syria
Translated by Phoebe Bay Carter
Source: ArabLit Quarterly CATS issue Fall 2020
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