Bus Journals III (On soul-food)

& all I could ever do is cry on the pages of poetry,  

 to sweeten regret with saffron dreams  

Of which we shared on the carpets, 

  on the floors of our home  

Of which you built from scratch,  

 the overseer in the sea of concrete  

& I see your visions in different hues,  

as if it was different music cues,  

  & I wonder which one of them was true 

Maybe none were & it was just a thing a father has to do 

But I remember using our hands gluttonous & generous,  

 to eat the love prepared 

a feast for the heart that beats alone  

 & we're all lonely 

 & I wonder if you were lonelier than you let seem 

 & it seems the seams of our thobes  always unravel,  

when you rival the world on your own, 

  was your soul also alone?  

That’s not how it’s supposed to go. 

 Damned if you do damned if you don't, 

 but I wish you relied on us as we grew older,   like maybe a little bolder &

maybe we let you down enough  

& you never wanted to be a burden 

But what's a burden but something to share over tabbouleh with

fresh—  burghul & mint & parsley & Karak or even Fool  & Adas &

Tamees

but you're not here to act out more of these scenes 

So,  

I wonder if you believed it to be your burden to hold, 

& I can't get ahold of you but I can hold your memories 

as something precious, 

As something to be eternally grateful for 

1- Thobe: National dress for men in some Arabic countries  

2- Fool: Arabic pronunciation for beans  

3- Adas: Arabic pronunciation for lentils  

4- Tamees: A type of Arabic flat bread