Conversation with my past love
words by Devika Gopakumar
My love, tell me why
you will not speak of
the dead brown chicken
in Gaza tonight
Do you
not mourn me
as I wade through
the lost words of all
my slaughtered poets
Do you
not dream of
Flour bags, drenched in blood
Bombed cities, in your lungs
Clear skies, raining ash
Your leaders’, stagnant words
Your friends’, silences
My Jaan, will you not
weep with me
as all our, ancient towns
and once our, Fathers’ homes
are exiled to the wind
and scattered with the dust
Do you
not feel that
all the water
in this broken world
will not wash away
the wounds of our
butchered children
Tell me now, past love,
how many
weeping Hinds* will it take
till you dream of
Flour bags, drenched in blood
Bombed cities, in your lungs
Clear skies, raining ash
Our leaders’, stagnant words
Our friends’, blind eye
Did you hear, lost friend,
Bisan flew a kite
in Palestine today
Do you think that the
missing kites of our
fallen children
will make their way
to our shores, one day
My love, I fear that
we have too much blood
on our hands today that
we cannot wash away
And all our, unsaid words
and all our, silences
drenched those flour bags
in Gaza, today
*Hind Rajab: Hind Rajab was a five-year-old Palestinian girl from the Tel al-Hawa neighbourhood in Gaza City. She was killed by the Israeli military after being the sole survivor of Israeli tank fire on the vehicle in which she fled with six relatives.