Handkerchief, as words go, is an outlier.
Why not call it a damn rag instead?
Or any other name that is short
and less presumptuous,

conveying no more than what it is.
I think of a drunk, boastful German man
making up such a name:
we call it handkerchief in the motherland.

I see the word only in text, no one utters it.
Each time I read it, it feels foreign, imposing,
an imposter that doesn’t belong.
It lowers its head and elbows its way through.

My brain wanders as I read a novel. Its ideas,
spread across, trigger fireworks that I follow.
Sparks as abundant as the icing on a delicious cake.

My eyes bulldoze the words across neatly stacked lines.
I build a mental puzzle of a world inhabited by characters
on the move, where what happens next matters desperately.

Chasing the storyline is like running up seven steep flights of stairs
not stopping to catch my breath.
Although eager to arrive at the ending, I dislike the forced rush.

I put down the story, take a bath, and close my eyes,
searching for quietude. Some details of the plot are escaping,
like the rubber ducks engulfed in the steam.

Conflicting needs arise: not wanting to take a prolonged break,
not willing to start over, picking up yet another story
and begin a new ride, hopefully a wild one too.

It is like driving a long stretch on a fast lane of a German highway.
Afterwards, I am happy to leave the car behind.

A Dish for the Ages

Cinnamon, chicken, couscous, chickpeas, and raisins.
Steam greets your face. Warmth at first. Then heat.
Aura–rich of mixed flavors.

My earliest memory of this dish may have been when I was seven.
At home, my father was the cook. My mother did everything else.
Having couscous for lunch is a comfort, down the memory lane.

The cabbage stands high as a mountain protecting its citizens.
The round head is cut into four pieces. Served triumphantly.
Zucchini, the green stretched tongue of many love affairs.

It greets your lips with cautious heat. Makes your throat cringe.
The heat is held inside it with passion like a prison guard
in charge of a ruthless criminal.

Carrots beg to differ. An orange opposition. They accentuate,
add color. Turmeric. Salt. Pepper and double that in ginger.
The mystic ingredient is not my father’s magic hands.

Nor is it his lucky strikes at delivering savor. It is simply olive oil,
which turns any ordinary dish into a giant and adds character.
Thirty five years later, I stand in the kitchen recalling an act

I watched almost weekly every winter. I now am a father
tormented with a heavy legacy. Eager to please my son, guests.
I disturb the neighborhood with a frightening smell

that makes even the most civil stomach roar.
My son will still feast on couscous for a while. Then dismiss it
for many years, and later come back to it with pressing urgency.

Maybe an intellect to support his quest. On a good day of health,
fresh mood, rain, and to celebrate I will satisfy his request.
I wish he would remember his mother likes hers with tomatoes,

Maybe an intellect to support his quest. On a good day of health,
fresh mood, rain, and to celebrate I will satisfy his request.
I wish he would remember his mother likes hers with tomatoes,

potatoes, pumpkin, and she swore her favorite was served
with fish instead. He knows the act by heart. The delight of
preparing and serving couscous. I bet he’d happily play my part.

The white horses play flute as they fly.
An elephant enters the room, alone.
The land widens around wild animals.

Birds look for serpents who have, long ago,
abandoned trees and headed for rivers.
Monkeys can’t do business in here.

Trading during daylight is outlawed.
Last time a goat wanted to sell its milk,
offended neighbors growled at her.

Awakened before naptime was over,
furious dragons set the forest on fire.
The rain was on an extended sabbatical,

and winds, caught by surprise, amplified
and expanded the disaster. Eight cheetahs
summoned to look into the matter.

After much deliberation, they declared war
on the neighboring forests. They used emergency
powers to enforce curfews and impose sanctions.

Meanwhile, working chickens carried on,
undeterred, delivering eggs to all world’s citizens.

Skin washes skin, membranes are juxtaposed—
legs, breasts, arms, and lips
mingle as in a Picasso.
In which people hug the beasts,
and contrasted colors abound:
tanned and pale, olive and brown.
Blue on white: the de-facto background color.
Red is enhanced, in focus, thanks
to an exciting rush. Flesh in full blush.
Knights of many desires ride
in a race to taste it all, conquer feelings,
free prisoners from lifetime sentences.
Wind whistles gently as the skies light up
and stars get chatty. An evening on the rise.
An end leads to a beginning. All form
one body. Power is shared,
pleasure amplified; a dialogue
as intense and productive
as the taut clouds before the pouring rain.

As I listened to her, I fell in love with her energy.
She wears the aura of an inquisitive child,
in awe of everything around her.

Questions race through her head
like raindrops running down windows’ panes.
She has the intensity of drumsticks striking a fast rhythm.

She pursues life with an open-mind, upbeat,
treating every minute as an eternity.
A small dose of her observations keeps the mind rooted,

reminds me of how much I don’t know,
how much I take for granted.
Her sharp curiosity is humbling.

She addresses every subject as if walking into a room
the size of a football field, and flipping every light switch.
You can’t find a trace of a shadow.

The wristwatch leaped from a wall as a strange artifice,
as if it lived outside its time.

The two young men barely peeking into adulthood
rocked their heads in silence.

Their jeans were of a style that suited a lucky few.
Their menacing calm amplified their presence.

The lyrics of their songs were a quest to restore losses.
The talkative girl in front of me was fired up, on a mission

to force ideas on us all through uncompromising energy,
self-assurance— a longing or faith in the weight of her topics.

She talked about crashing her mom’s interview
while on speakerphone, never stopping to catch her breath,

to allow her mother a word. The mom had only picked up
after having ignored five prior, consecutive calls.

Now I know why the old man, who was sitting next to her,
left in a hurry, choosing a peaceful seat to house him and his

book. I took his seat and continued writing my poem
that I had started on the previous train.

The clock was on my office wall. The guys on the green line.
The girl and the old man on the red line.

In between, I read an interview with a contemporary poet
and looked up poems by one of the greats, long ago gone.

My wife and son will pick me up at the end of the line.

This is not my last poem. For verification, ask my wife.
I wrote these lines last, although I conceived them first.
Then I went ahead, wrote another poem,
and came back to finish this.

I am still alive. Typing— can’t you hear?
Technically, this can still be my last line in my last poem.
The debate will be sealed when all the facts are known.
I may not be there for that discussion.

I won’t be there for every discussion that ensues.
If forensics show this to be indeed my last, please know:

1- I did not believe that at the time.
2- I had no urgent message to communicate.
3- Like you, I have regrets, unfinished projects,
unfulfilled desires. I am not satisfied.
4- I fell short: expected to be better, stronger,
higher, more joyful, richer and … You got the point.

To end the poem, I understand all of this is temporary.
But again I may be wrong.

The moon is considering a change of orbit:
to hide, go on a strike; pack its many suitcases, turn off
the light, cut the wirings, turn its back, and take a dive.

It has been offended since we learned to talk about it.
It is an affront to its well-being that we’ve been invoking
its name, color, mood, taste, and even its feelings.

It is appalling that the moon can be shiny white,
bloody orange, a sad messenger, a fierce lion made of
silver, and a lover decrying loneliness and abandonment.

We also speak of the moon as joyful, majestic.
Or a loaf of Afghani bread, a ball of Swiss cheese,
and when we combine the two we refer to it as a pizza.

Some say delicious, others say amore.
We offer it up for slicing—
we talk about half and full moon. It can be skinny or fat.

It can be invisible, present or absent. Its appearance is tracked
down to align a calendar insisting on dragging its feet
up and down the lines of time.

Citizens of nations see the images of their jailed heroines
or exiled kings on its surface. Last time I checked,
I saw both many things and nothing.

I could make out mountains, clouds, waves, light, rivers, trees,
races, space flights, prose, math equations, and also saw nothing
but a round shape begging me to get engaged.

When the moon is full and looking its best, we are told our evil
side is on display and without a leash. The wolves howl the most.
But we are able to cross the desert at night, under its light.

The moon is a cold-blooded planet, suspended midair,
staring at us like a mute witness or an innocent voyeur–
an old man who doesn’t age, of foreign origins,

yet has recognizable facial features.
He reminds us of someone we have known
since we learned to look up, the likes of a grandpa perhaps.

She complains about her routine as she clings to it,
doing tasks on autopilot — early mornings, as if walking
on eggshells, she slips into the shower, then the kitchen

where the coffeepot she rinsed the night before awaits her.
Her shiny blue mug reminds her of a night,
far back at a campsite where a prominent moon

and abundant, cheering stars illuminated the dark blue sky.
The light, beamed and shined, expanded like fireworks.
Back to the coffee cup: she takes a sip, zooms in; feels left out.

Her friends have side notes, hushed discussions,
secondary acquaintances, secret addictions.
Quintessentially, they shop around, gossip, do yoga,

seek pleasure. They defraud time to forget a helpless present.
They extend and stretch arms, push up chests, inhale desires,
and soak in the forbidden— the messy.

She feels like a shipwreck, exhausted from long voyages, salty
baths, and the weight of the wrinkly luggage of young sailors.