By: Hussam Jefee-Bahloul
Severed
How can I explain to my mother
that solitude is unique too?
how can I explain to my brother
this indifference?
how can I create any meaning
while my words are being pureed for the next man’s dinner?
how can I fathom anything
in these scrabble-filled chronicles?
Well,
here’s a mockery of my meaningful life:
delighted, I keep eye contact with whoever’s running towards
my deliberately escaping–
spaceship.
A bullet-train full of celebrities
Life and what it passes on, remind me of you— panoramic elevators and Richard Dawkins’ book about some selfish genes weird colors and that “hippie” scent illuminating the air roasted coffee beans the texture of old books the sound of a window squeaking on its track and that moment when winter blows against the glass life and what it passes on, remind me of you— peoples’ necks moles spreading on bountiful acres of flesh like a chair rocking alone on the porch of this universe life and what it passes on, remind me of you— Julia Robert’s smile Monica Bellucci’s tan and that wicked attractiveness of Scarlet Johansson life and what it passes on, remind me of you— dancing reflections on store fronts hunger and crying babies the smell of French fries and the taste of the blues after midnight so, it becomes a habit… every time I sit in a bullet-train going from B to A I close my eyes dismantle the wheels and windows enter the memory space— and use your carefully uploaded portraits to build a photo exhibit.
Hussam Jefee-Bahloul is a Syrian poet, writer, and psychiatrist. He was born in Lattakia, Syria, in 1983, and currently an assistant professor of Psychiatry at the University of Massachusetts. He published his first poetry collection in Arabic in 2008: فتّاحة الأمل المعلّب (The Opener of Canned Hope). His second collection was released in 2017 طيور تدخن الماريوانا (Birds Smoking Marijuana) at Al-Moutawasset publishing; Milano, Italy. His first English book of poetry (The Chronicler of Indifference) will be released in early 2019 in America by Červená Barva Press. He published extensively in the genre of creative non-fiction and is currently working on a book project for the MIT press on the topic of psychology of war and displacement. He is the founder of (ta'sheeq) project, a collaborative artistic project to present poetry in multi-media performances.