April 2007
It’s a miracle we’re still alive.
There were body parts all over the street.
There are more ghosts in this city than people.
––Amal Alwan, after a bomb exploded on a Baghdad minibus, February, 2007
I
In Ramadi, outsiders assume he’s crazy.
Crouching alone in an alley,
he holds two bare arms above his contorted face
to shield it from invisible blows.
He could be a statue leaning against a wall.
He could be a dancer poised to leap.
In this city of empty streets, he is never alone.
The air is thick with spirits, thick with conversation.
He hears voices, conducts meetings, accumulates wisdom.
He could be a direct descendant of Muhammad or Ezekiel.
He could be the only sane person left in the neighborhood.
II
In Amman, alone and unable to sleep,
Muna lies awake in a darkness that provides no cover, no protection.
From a crack in the black clay urn of her mind,
out of ash and dust,
images of her one-year old child emerge.
She remembers his enormous hunger as an infant,
astonishing intensity when he ate.
She remembers the promise his eyes held,
bright, brown lamps burning there
before a U.S. missile eclipsed them in the first days of this war,
consuming, in one terrifying convulsion,
her child, her parents, and her four brothers.
More than anything, she remembers the feel of his body,
its ripe, round plumpness,
its unsupported weight in her arms
trusting her to hold him, to hold him,
O! what she wouldn’t give to hold him . . .
III
In Baghdad, Hamid’s mother sends him down the street for candy.
A few pennies for a few moments’ pleasure,
a fair trade in this bleak city.
What parent wouldn’t make it?
Those dreamland colors, the fantastic swirls and sweetness, a balm
for an eight-year old’s eyes, hands, tongue.
Hamid is only a short walk from home when gunfire erupts
and the bullet that enters his left eye is itself blind,
fired from an insurgent’s gun, intended for another target.
The blind making the blind,
it exits behind his right eye.
Hamid’s fingers can still close around candy.
Small, hard treats lay like eyes in his palm,
and all that they see and have seen
he takes into his mouth and swallows.
IV
On a main drag in Karrada,
under a weak, wintry sun that provides no warmth, no protection,
Amal steps off a bus, six-year-old Anoush beside her.
Only seconds later, a hundred yards down the road,
the bus explodes,
shredding people on board,
orange flames and black smoke pouring from its wreckage.
Amal feels the street shake.
Her heart hammers.
Trembling, she looks down to see Anoush.
His eyes, still in his head, illuminate her.
His hand, attached to his young body,
is still in her hand,
blood at its wrist still pulsing in sync with hers.
If Irony Were Justice
Blood at the Wrist
First Day in Amman
Thay Reach Us
I was the Earth
Ammar's Story
