4 stars
Palestinian Experience

This collection of poetry is so vast and ranges from rage to laughter to grief and it invites us to look at the Palestinian experience through a different lens than the one western media props up for us. 

The poems are beautiful and smooth and tackles concepts that fundamentally change you. 

Favorite Quotes:
 

“We are driving away/ because we can leave/ on the magic carpet of our navy blue/US passports that carry us/ to safety and no bomb drills/ to a place where the planes are made/and the place where the president will make the call to send the planes/ into my storybook childhood/over the seven hills/ next door to neighbors who will now/become refugees 

 

“In my language/ the word for loss is a wide-open cry,/ a gaping endless possibility 

 

“Let me be/ the one who goes first,/ let my heart never live a day without you./ children should bury their elders 

 

“They call us now before they drop the bombs 

Later int that same poem it says “They call us now to say/ run./ you have 58 seconds from the end of this message/ your house is next./ they think of it as some kind of/ war time curtsey/ it doesn’t matter that/ there is no where to run to/ it means nothing that the borders are closed/ and your papers are worthless/ and mark you only for a life sentence/ in this prison by the sea/ 

 

“If all that breaks our hearts is/ yesterday/ and the silent colonnade/ anticipating/ the dynamite/ if all we love/ is a lost world/ then let the dust/ swallow our names/ let the maps/ beneath our feet/ burn./ if all we are is past,/ who are these millions/ now/ gasping for air.