Bitter death im my pocket

I forget and I take death out of my winter coat
I forget how I thought the earth was full of wings
And I come down little by little with my old sorrow
I say that sadness will go away
And my reflection in the mirror will become white
I might swap my excess feathers
With the time that has passed
A time wrapped around like a leaflet
And I might open it
And explore its memories

Memories of memories
Cues of virgins who hanged themselves on the branches
A faint moan flies like a shawl and sleeps in a basil pot
Pale kisses leaping from the bodies and clattering on the doors of the caves
Time hides everything in his giant body
then opens a small hole for light
a hole insisting like a lighthouse
and like a recent boat in the sea
I rush towards it
So salty and rusty memories can crush me

I said that death does not come from the future
Death comes from memory
Death is my bitter oblivion
Every time I stood there looking at life from the back
Each time I stretched over a rail and the taste of iron
Leaked to my mouth
And every time the whistling sound became my running feet sound
And I saw the trains returning
Forgetting that I am looking from the back

I forget and I take death out of my robe
And I stretch the death to sleep
I take my death, my sleep, and my bitterness
To other worlds
To where the branches had became hands, holding the sad ones
Before their death
And after their death
And after their long standing in front of the mirrors
waiting for this unknown white shadow to emerge
Hugging them
Telling them: “I am you”
When small deaths will wander the earth
And the sky will be full of wings

Marwa Melhem

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