I WANT TO DIE 

in the arms of everyone who’s ever loved me, each

appendage a tendril expanding into the ether

of every moment I am leaving behind. Know this: I have dabbled

in the enterprise of affection; cut my teeth on what it means

to hold and be held. Behold: everything that has ever been

labeled “mine” was stolen.

From me, but also now by me. The land:

from us, and now the land

we were stolen to. I belong to nothing

but my friends—those who have entrusted me

with the gift of caring for them. For years, I trained myself

to not feel for anything to spare myself of having to feel

for everything: no partner, no child; my parents will

soon be gone too. Can you blame me? I watched men

and women say things they don’t mean and claim lives

from bodies they won’t ever eat. Some can’t stomach

culling the protein from a fly, but drop before the silhouette

of a gun. Have you ever fallen for something empty

as a word? For me, it was  joy—the way it bounces

when spoken. For years, I would whisper it hopelessly

to the moon. I thought nothing of it

until I found myself brave enough to chant before the sun—

it was in this light that I came to find

my peoples. I took shape among them:

Joy. Joy. Joy—what a lovely thing

to feel. But, then again, the word

doom exists—sometimes

it’s almost too fun not to say. Apocalypse.

Even cicada sounds lovely

with the right inflection. I wonder if

it’s stronger to nestle into the chest

of one’s sadness, or to lie about it.

Once, as a child, I spent a late summer night poking holes

into the window mesh that shielded us

against the bugs we had stolen

away from. Each puncture

a compromise with those creatures

seeking refuge. As I did it, I repeated the syllables:

sim-muh-nim, sim-muh-nim

caught between cinnamon and synonym. Letting each letter

pass through until the end of the word. I imagine that

when this world ends, it will happen like a boy

yearning to be released from a warm room—

little by little, not all at once; unbothered

by the thought of  losing his place.

WE ALREADY KNOW THIS

There is more to us than

what was taken from us.

A place to call

home. Land of olive trees,

and their branches.

Palestine. There,

I’ve said it. I want to be sure

everyone knows where my parents

hail from. Each of us

needs a place to return to. Genocide:

I would hope everyone knows

did not start, and did not end

at the Holocaust. I haven’t forgotten that

everyone needs a place on this planet. And I,

I prefer to live where I can leave

the doors unlocked —

or live without the doors —

or hell. I don’t even care

for walls. But, I do care

for the blues: water, the sadness

that comes when it is not within

sight. I don’t know if there is

a child, anywhere on this earth, that wasn’t,

at least once, held by their mother. Water:

where my mother held me

until I was given to land. O firm land —

how my father holds me — people keep calling

for blood, to dress you in it.

I don’t think any of them

know, truly, how much of it

the body can take; how much

the body can lose.

“I WANT TO DIE” first appeared in Poetry Magazine

“WE ALREADY KNOW THIS” first appeared in Tariq Luthun’s Chapbook “How the Water Holds Me”