Explorations: my author blog
Drinking the Sea at Gaza
This is another poem. I wrote this one in response to a call for works on resistance from Inspired Quill press, and submitted it several months ago. I do not yet know if it will suit their needs, but am putting it here because I believe it deserves to be read. This is again crossposted from my Substack
“Let Justice Roll Down Like Waters.”
In the rain of bombs,
The people drank the sea,
Its salt bitter
On their lips.
The children wailed,
Dry-eyed,
No tears left
In their parched bodies.
And still the bombs fell.
“God brooded over the waters,”
And, in another time,
A slender man marched to the sea
To harvest salt.
In this time,
A boy cried out,
“We had no water,
so God sent us rain!”
The sea is our mother,
The womb of all life.
Her tides
Pulse in our blood;
Her waves
Roar in our ears.
She speaks to us.
Listen.
Her voice is
The susurration
Of water on sand.
Over and over, she says one word:
“Shantih.”
Peace.
Peace.
Peace.
Notes: The title is copied from—or shared with—the title of a book by the great Israeli journalist, Amira Hass. The Bible quotes are from the Books of Amos and Genesis. The quote from a Palestinian child was from a film clip in November or December of 2023. I don’t know his name, and hope he is still alive. The final words are my own hope, but also inspired by T.S. Eliot’s “Waste Land”.
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