Al Walaja
a perhaps Hand (which comes
out of nowhere), arranging
her young face,
a window into which people look
(but don’t see—
arranging changing placing
a paper in her hand,
a strange
thing Can you (and a known thing)
read this here and
changing everything carefully
—she can’t believe. It’s
a Hand in a window
(she herself can read
the writing
carefully to and fro moving
Old things
on the wall) while
people
stare, with no reprieve through
freshly cut windows
moving a perhaps
fraction of a flower here,
the bulldozer dropping
tiles, fixtures
in a pile of crushed
cement and jasmine (an
inch of air),
room after perhaps
room,
while my friend
whose home is
again, who throws
her head back when she laughs,
whose daughters are watching her,
sets the long plastic table for dinner without
breaking anything.
Note: Al Walaja is a Palestinian village located between Jerusalem and Bethlehem; many of its homes have been demolished or are under threat of demolition.