Adam Patric Miller: How (Not) to Wear a Keffiyeh to School

Fold the keffiyeh in a triangle, lift it to your face, lift your arms about your head holding the ends of the longest edge, then wrap it so the triangle covers your face, tie the long ends together behind your head, letting the patterns drape over your shoulders. Adjust the part off your face down around your throat so you can speak in class.

Wear it around at school. “That’s a beautiful scarf!” and “That’s lovely.” A janitor will stop you in the hall and say, “I am grateful to you.” You’ll feel humbled. The janitor will tell you his people have been struggling since 1948 and on the larger fabric of life, no one is neutral. He will tell you how he watched the protests at Columbia University and at Wash U. The U.S. veto at the UN didn’t surprise him. You think about the scarf and what wearing it means: anti-oppression, resilience, courage, hope.

Your principal says, “Hey, are you wearing a keffiyeh around school?”

“Not right now,” you’ll answer, and point to it draped on your chair. “It got a little hot, so I took it off.”

He’ll tell you a sophomore girl, a Jewish student, saw a teacher wearing a keffiyeh and it scared her. Her mom emailed him.

You’ll say, “I certainly don’t want a student to fear me.”

You’ll say you don’t think the fear she experiences is the same as the fear of women and children and babies in Gaza.

You shouldn’t have said that. So you’ll quickly acknowledge the fear of Israelis, the violence of October 7. But you will have just finished teaching Eli Wiesel’s book Night. With over 34,000 dead and 1.7 million people displaced, you will feel moved to say what’s happening in Gaza is genocide.

Your principal reminds you there’s a large Jewish population where you teach and you’ll say, “I’m of Jewish heritage.”

You won’t say your mother’s maiden name was Dreyfus or the story of a relative imprisoned on Devil’s Island.

Days later the DEI Officer will visit you. You like how he adds the following quote to his email: “When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.” He repeats what the principal said, and you will think there are no flowers blooming in Gaza, only rubble covering the shadow death toll.

The DEI Officer says he supports you but there may be problems if you continue to wear the keffiyeh, and he doesn’t want to get burned. He is a Black man working in a white space. He’s got young sons to provide for—you think you understand why he’s not sending his sons to the district where you work. You think about the teacher who complained she was outraged upon seeing your keffiyeh around school. You will email to thank him and say you will not wear your keffiyeh.

But suddenly it gets very cold again. You recently moved to a new town. It’s disconcerting on your drive home because there’s a building on a main street flying three flags: an American flag, an Israeli Flag, and the Thin Blue Line Flag. Months ago you saw that same blue line flag sewn onto the chest of the police officer who pulled you over for speeding on your way to work. 

So you wear your keffiyeh to school. That night at 8 p.m. you get an email from the assistant superintendent of human resources who “would like to invite you to a meeting at 8 a.m. on Monday morning to discuss the concerns that have been shared with us from students, staff, and parents regarding wearing the keffiyeh at school.” He says you can bring a representative with you.

Wrap your keffiyeh around your neck on a cold Saturday morning. Because you teach English and you’re a writer, you ponder the black and white symbols of the scarf: olive leaves for strength; fishnet for the connection between Palestinian sailors and the sea; bold lines for the trade routes going through Palestine. Monday, you remember, is Passover.

You will learn how not to wear a keffiyeh to school.

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Adam Patric Miller’s debut essay collection, A Greater Monster, won the Autumn House Press Nonfiction Contest, selected by Phillip Lopate. He teaches high school in St. Louis.

Copyright 2024 Adam Patric Miller