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.
this poem speaks so gently to me and my greatest fears. Mmmm. That last line, the use of “is” vs. “was” — of course, heck, that whole last three line line, and so beautifully earned.. Again,ONLY POEMS, thank you-- i hope to live long enough to read a zillion, zillion "ONLY POEMS Daily” poems. Bless you guys
The contrast between the opening of birds returning and then the war, and the two stanzas of statements toward the end! Such remarkable contrasts that make the war evermore painful.