This Old War, Again
by Nur Turkmani
A Found Poem After Etel Adnan’s “Sitt Marie Rose”
My spine is like a
twisted, stunted,
fallen tree,
disappearing.
I go out on the balcony.
The birds return.
The port burns.
I read the eulogy
for the anonymous
and the known.
Beirut is a port.
It glitters
on the asphalt.
When it rains
it’s the same,
the roots of a tree
split open.
To discover a truth
is to discover
a fundamental limit.
Time is dead.
I have no illusions.
I want to say
forever and ever
that the sea is beautiful.