God make our rage count for something.
The apple tree. The grapevine wrapping itself
around the trunk, how it can’t let go.
Every day someone tells me to leave—
‘Beirut is next.’
Did I hear correctly. Do you see what we see.
Don’t tell me Lebanon. Don’t tell me Palestine.
In Baalbeck the orchards have yellowed.
The apples plopping like stones.
No money to water our lands, the farmer says.
We hate our guilt. We love the same journalists.
Wish they knew. Wish they didn’t have to.
When we gather we still light candles.
It will not be the last time.
The jar of raspberry jam breaks onto the floor,
and I dream you ate glass for breakfast,
but I can’t listen. My hair shreds like paper.
Rim Banna was alive. She sang of butterflies and night.
I chop more beetroot. No ceasefire.
25,000 killed in Gaza.
I wake up to check the numbers.
How dare the little wind put me to sleep.
My soup hardens into clumps.
I walk past the Mediterranean Sea,
then back home. These are not my feet.
I oil my hair in rosemary.
I open the windows. Who isn’t sick.
Everything looks like blood.
All those eyes watching. My despair. My hunger.
My coffee spills over the counter.

Editor’s note: An earlier, reversed version of “Glass for Breakfast” appears in Fikra Magazine.