Two Poems
By: Youseffe Ahalla

Salt City

Descending
from the olive tree by our ancient house
to the shakable ground
The handwritten poem
hidden under the nest
nestled in one of the many branches 
While I was rushing
to the city of salt
to meet Raja
the only girl who offers red flowers
to occupying soldiers
with camouflage and automatic guns
she was waiting in the rainy street
Spring and fall
beside a refugee camp 
which grows wheat
And fighters with strong arms
to resist
And welcome many bullets
with their open chest
And that year 
Was an open season
to assassinate comedy
In our childhood games
with drones
flying like beautiful bees of many colors
the history of sadness that we share
Raja and I
since the soldiers surrendered, Salt City
was preserved in the poetry of resistance
which was called “terror”
on the left side of the occupying soldiers’ brains
but their right sides love the flowers
from Raja.

Ascending 
to the sky
after My soul was stuck 
between two bullets
my blood watered red strawberries
because fruit in this city
have the taste
of salt from death
I still heard
a song
playing on a phonograph
While
mothers in the backyard of our house
prepared graves
digging the shakable ground
for their sons
to rest.

 
Tiny Details

Most of the time
you cannot see me
I live
tied to your dread locks when you are dancing
I’m the metal key when you open your room
To the early morning lights
often The logarithms 
if you touch your screen to navigate
the shaking nerve in your left eye
If you are shaking
the moon in your dream
if you lost your way 
the letters
In which you deliver your break up note to me
For the millionth time
quickly you forget
When you are reading the lines in my right palm
explaining how our shared life will go
each morning you doubt if I still love you
like I used to 

Years ago, we
sat under the peach tree
by your old house
speaking our poetry
loud to the walls
closing our eyes
and enjoying the echo 
of our first, raw feelings

Years later,
our romance became digital 
we fell into the spider web  “Internet”
our poems went viral
we gained a lot of followers
but we lost the public’s applause

 

Most of the time
we went to jail
because the opening line in your poems
was a smashed egg on the face of politicians
they accused us of noble crimes 
smuggling roses 
from hand to hand
writing stanzas and rhyming words
In any coffee shop we could find
buying stamps and recycled paper
to write letters for anyone
who believed in beauty of poetry
we jumped ton the first train
stopped at a random destination
only
one time they caught us
writing our poems on the old wall of history 
without an ISBN
back to jail
they let me go the next day
but they keep you one week
for “tiny details.”