Poetry by Farah Ali

     Dane CC




Countdown

I drop my daughter at preschool
into a sea of adoring faces.
I tell her to have a good day,
to use the toilet when she needs to go, 
not to hold it in until the very last second.
I do not tell her about Gaza,
about what I saw 
while she ate honey on toast,
about the children who look like her,
who share so much with her,
who are dead or broken or wishing for death 
because in this world the powerful decide
who are worthy of parents and peace
of water, nutrition, and four limbs
of medicine and anesthesia
worthy of hope 
worthy of life.
I tell her I love her, 
remind her to eat her fruit.
I do not tell her about this world
where she is less valuable 
than her little friends,
that one day somebody, 
maybe a stranger, 
maybe someone she knows, 
will make her feel ashamed
for the color of her skin, 
for who she is.
Instead, I wave goodbye.
It will be hours 
before my daughter 
is home again.





Ghazal: In Diaspora

Ancestors forsaken, now wander unknown in diaspora.
Enter the labyrinth, face the monster alone in diaspora.

On threadbare wings flocks of birds overwinter,
Migrants and refuge barely condoned in diaspora.

Study maple samaras, the graceful flight from mother.
Freedom snags on tangled roots, thorns of bone in diaspora.

Desert moon ciphers will be garbled by clumsy tongues. 
The future is already written, mutters a crone in diaspora.

Inheritance swims in black hair’s oil shimmer, dusk’s child,
the same hooked nose, seeds cannot be unsown in diaspora.

Sea glass can take up to two hundred years to form,
Ebb or flood, endure the intertidal zone in diaspora.

Calligraphy sweeps right to left, indelible on skin’s pages,
Trauma embeds, generational tattoos to disown in diaspora.

Ignore the Call to Prayer, flinch from the gaze of an-Nur,
Mountains, serpents, rivers of sin to atone in diaspora.

Tease flesh from fruit, pomegranate stains blood-red, 
color of slurs, learn to swallow stones in diaspora.

Loss burrows deep, Joy, gold beautifies the darkest cave,
so gather your trinkets: each lie gilded, honed in diaspora. 


Note: an-Nur (The Light/The Illuminator) is one of the 99 names of God in Arabic. 

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Based in the UK, Farah Ali writes fiction and poetry with a particular love for the Japanese short form. She has been published, and has upcoming publications, in a variety of reputable online and print journals including contemporary haibun online, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, MacQueen’s Quinterly, Modern Haiku, Rattle, right hand pointing, The Mainichi, and Tiny Wren Lit. Her supernatural Deerleap Hollow Series is available from Amazon.