Beauty – 94
I gave my picture to my beloved: “If I die, hang it up on the wall.” She asked: “Is there a wall for it?” I answered: “We will build a wall.” “Where, in what house?” “We will build a house.” “Where, on...
View ArticleThe Kiss – 95
I can’t remember exactly, but I’ve moved at least once since Bassam came before, so he doesn’t know where to find me. But by chance, I see him in the street and Saida is just behind him. I stand there...
View ArticleCafé Society- 96
We meet Bassam as we’d planned that evening, and they leave for my city, for Damascus. The camp seems small and grubby afterwards. She was so beautiful and so feminine. A strange world it was, there, a...
View ArticleThe Gap – 97
The journalist tells me that Hisham, the Iraqi I’d known in prison, is in Beirut. I am so eager to see him again. He says he’ll send him to my camp. A few days later, we do meet. It is the first time...
View ArticleViolence Machine – 98
There is another air-raid in my fifth month in the city. Everything is more or less the same — a prior warning, people heading to the shelters, taking perhaps a last look at their poor houses as they...
View ArticlePassport to Libya – 99
I hear an infant crying in his cradle: Please God, let him have a homeland I lived without one! ~ Muzzafar Al-Nawwab
View ArticleTrust – 100
Abu Ammar has written to friends of his in Beirut, who contacted Hisham, who tells me to get some passport photos done. As much as I want to leave, I am not very happy about this — it makes me nervous...
View ArticleTrapped – 101
One day, I accidentally run into a guy who’d been part of that group of mine, the one that used to meet in the woods to talk until they broke us up. He is a Moroccan and he tells me that his official...
View ArticleLast Day – 102
But a few days have passed, and things are moving. Fast. Hisham has come and said, “Where is the money? We need it quick — the passport is almost ready.” I have managed to save up the money, and I go...
View ArticleTaking Flight – 103
In the morning, though, I feel better as you usually do in the sunlight. Soon I get a message to go to the Palestinian. I know what it means… I will have my passport. I didn’t know what to expect a...
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