A poem for the struggle.

A poem I wrote seven years ago. It pains me to say that seven years later, nothing has changed. It still applies. Painfully, it still applies.

taken from MEE- photos of my family from the village of Jimzu 1948.

I woke up

To the sound of bombs 

And my baby brother screaming under the rubble. 

What? Did you think I was going to start slow and gradually lead up to words that no one wants to hear? 

As if pain and suffering comes slowly as if the colonizers give you a warning to the time of your death. 

As if blue birds blue skies and blue waters are the reality to what Palestinians see when they wake up. It doesn't exist... like qareat Jimzu. 

The village where olive trees were plentiful 

And happiness a possibility 

Sorry was a possibility... 

Jimzu was ethnically cleansed in 2 days by an Israeli  assault 

Even in our dreams.. 

black birds dark skies red waters . 

I woke up

In a place less beautiful 

I woke up 

In a place where tax dollars torture my other half 

I live in a place 

Where  the clothes that I'm wearing 

Covers  me yet strips me from my dignity 

Strips me from empathy 

Because what is heard of us when  Palestinian boys are taken from their homes and used as human shields?! 

......

You hear that? 

Silence. 

Silence through the bombs that are dropped on Gaza,

Silence through the cries of the wrongly persecuted prisoners 

Silence through the pleads  of  help made by our  mothers 

Silence through the sounds of bullets entering our bodies.... 

silence... 

Because we love our material objects. Our hps and soda streams we love our current lives and hd tvs 

Black birds. Dark skies. Red waters. 

I woke up..

In a cell. 

My name was Shafiq al-Hawamda 

The year 1989. 

I was tied down. He sat on my chest. I felt as if my bones were breaking. You can only breathe he said, if you confess to something you didn’t do. 

I fell back asleep to only dream 

Of black birds dark skies .. red waters. 

Knock knock.

The door of the cell opens yet I pray that it's the angel of death 

Ir7amni ya Allah I shouted . All I wanted was to be free

All I wanted was to be.. 

2017... 

I wake up hoping it's different than before 

Yet what I found when I opened the news.. 

Syrian refugees are being washed ashore

Palestinian rights are still being ignored

Iraq is being thrown into another political war

Burma has more deaths than they account for

Yemen has a 9/11 every time someone steps out of the door

It's not meant to be this way.. 

black birds. Dark skies. Red waters. 

It doesn't have to be this way...  

I ask you to feel 

Ask you to realize

That the reservations that we set aside for action 

Are intentional 

I ask you to realize that the only way people can oppress is if we let them 

Realize that we can wake up to ..

Blue birds . Blue skies. Blue waters.