Selected Poem Excerpts

The More I Love Me, Me, The Palestinian

The more they hate me, their convenient ugly Arab,

the more I love me,

me, illustrious and beautiful

Palestinian Arab

The more fictitiously they portray and write me antihero

and boogie man/woman me the more I know me, follow me, empower me …

SF City Hall Arab American Heritage Month

SF Beat Museum Revolutionary Poets Brigade Reading

SF Beat Museum Revolutionary Poets Brigade Reading

Embroidered Memory

Arabic tapestry embroidered into my soul is my memory of home

 Red on black pyramids octagons, lines and vines each village distinct

bedouin purple and fuchsia red poppies and tulips

my mother, sixteen--vibrant peacocks on linen

circle around down, up up, down

A fine needle in and out.

An artist's tool piercing a fabric, weaving culture

Women of this art fill my heart with hues of

red and orange fruit orchards filling the air with aroma of a culture of olive,

almond and fig groves kept safe and warm…

Published in Poetry of Arab Women- A Contemporary Anthology by Nathalie Handal

Wat er I Do Without Water

Water is the element that is all power

For the slicing of water is unavailable

Like a slice of pie

Water, the element that is danced for

Sung for

Prayed for

Rejoiced for

Water is the holy coveted

Water is what we are made of

Water is what we are scared of

Water is what holds secrets

Water is what holds babies

Water keeps large-feared creatures at bay

Water is darkness

Water is light

Water is life

Water is death

Water is motion

Water is still…

Marigold Project Reading for Day of the Dead event at the Exploratorium After Dark 2024

SF City Hall

Betryal

While the extreme form of capitalism consumes precious seconds,

minute by minute, hour by hour,

ingesting days and nights until one loses count,

loses oneself.

 The Homo erectus, us, who roam a wretched earth;

us, larger-than-life-personality dinosaurs

in search of water, oil, gas and blood-

flirt with cannibalism and laughing sinisterly at genocide.

 Cruel creatures, us humans, once opulent and mighty

in simple ways, in wholesome ways-

the lucky ones, gifted at birth with a heart, a brain,

and perfectly designed limbs.

 We learned nippily to squander nature’s generous marvels-

trading in our own hearts and souls at the neighborhood pawn shop,

for money, objects, status, power and control.

 It is not the mighty and exquisite earth that is wretched,

Indeed, it is the opposite,

for the Earth Mother is patient with evil.

It is the spineless human, the sadistic one that is vile, wretched.

I leave many out of my tirade. I love you!

Peacemakers and lovers of justice,

be assured your heart and soul is not in jeopardy.

Your work in this realm is not complete…  

Published in For All - Revolutionary Poets Brigade 2024

Picking a Palestinian Red Poppy and Painting it is a Crime

I awake from my glee to bad news

that the wings I covet from my visiting bird

are too frail for my freedom and flight.

She pleads with me to have patience

in no justice hell prison cell until a stronger

set of wings comes along to attach

to my outstretched   a    r    m   s.

 I gawk UP and bid dove 

f a r e w e l l.

 Luminous eyes of a free bird are hope as clear

and tangible as this wet drop

that enlightened the mourning

of the f r e e white dove bird

that will return stronger to lend her

                               w i n g s

                   for my salvation and delivery.

Published in Maintenant 18 July 2024

(Nominated for the Pushcart Prize) - Three Rooms Press

An Open Letter To My People

(For Gaza, Palestine martyrs of 2018 massacre)

My people, I call upon you

My people, I plead with you

My people, my heart and soul bleeds with you

The hemorrhage of your being is squeezed

And I shut the wound when I close my eyes tight

I close my eyes shut so tight, tears well up

As though I have created a dam

I cannot close my eyes without seeing you fall

Fall hard on the dry rubble beneath your bare feet

Where are your sandals my people?

Stay steadfast and don’t trip on a stone

Stay steadfast and hurl your stone

The stone that has the weight of a boulder

The boulder that has the weight of water

Water I can’t give you

water within your easy reach

At the bloody shore of your open-air prison

Water I can’t split in two with my wooden staff

Like the grandiose legend

When Moses sliced a sea in two

For his tribe to flee from bondage before

A receding tempest plunged inward

To swallow whole a vortex of

Marauding Pharaoh’s cavalry on chariots…

Published in Overthrowing Capitalism - Revolutionary Poets Brigade Vol. 5 2024

Videos

 Home, Away from Home - Photo Exhibit Event

San Francisco Public Library Reading

Jam for Justice: An evening of world music, poetry and dance

(please fast forward to 1:07:19 for my introduction and reading)

Reading at the Ruby, San Francisco 2025

Three Rooms Press - Maintenant 2025

 

Flor Y Canto Lit Festival - Medicine for Nightmares Bookstore/Gallery sf