Mosab Abu Toha: my grandfather and home

I

my grandfather used to count the days for return with his fingers
he then used stones to count
not enough
he used the clouds birds people

absence turned out to be too long
thirty six years until he died
for us now it is over seventy years

my grandpa lost his memory
he forgot the numbers the people
he forgot home


II

i wish i were with you grandpa
i would have taught myself to write you
poems volumes of them and paint our home for you
i would have sewn you from soil
a garment decorated with plants
and trees you had grown
i would have made you
perfume from the oranges
and soap from the skys tears of joy
couldnt think of something purer


III

i go to the cemetery every day
i look for your grave but in vain
are they sure they buried you
or did you turn into a tree
or perhaps you flew with a bird to the nowhere


IV

i place your photo in an earthenware pot
i water it every monday and thursday at sunset
i was told you used to fast those days
in ramadan i water it every day
for thirty days
or less or more


V

how big do you want our home to be
i can continue to write poems until you are satisfied
if you wish i can annex a neighboring planet or two


VI

for this home i shall not draw boundaries
no punctuation marks

Copyright 2021 Mosab Abu Toha. From Things you May Find Hidden in my Ear: Poems from Gaza (City Lights, 2021).

Mosab Abu Toha is a poet, short story writer, and essayist from Gaza. His first collection Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear: Poems from Gaza (2022, City Lights) won a 2022 Palestine Book Award. Abu Toha is the founder of the Edward Said Library, and from 2019 to 2020, he was a visiting poet and librarian-in-residence at Harvard University. During Israel’s 2023 attack on Gaza, Abu Toha was arrested by the Israeli Defense Force and beaten. With the intervention of the American Embassy, he was released, and he fled with his wife and children to Egypt.