Summer Rain by Andrea Assaf


I wash my body in Beirut as missiles rain on abandon bridges (and crowded parks) ancient ruins, still defiant - Baalbek remembers Rome and whispers nightly between breaking sound barriers, we're still standing. :

As summer reigns, I bathe in citronella and olive oil, blood of Gaza , Tyre and Tripoli dripping from my right palm as Baghdad bubbles from my left. The rains began on my birthday, and I'm as old as Jesus, though faith escapes me, fleeing on a battered bus as poetry waives a white flag from the window ... 

I seek solace in hummus and lamb and remember drinking pomegranate juice on Hamra Street as newly reconstructed buildings shimmered in the sunlight ... in November.

I bathe in the blood of Beirut as the rains keep falling - phosphorus green and rusted orange smoking like acid through carpet, burning through sky ... But Sidon remembers the lion-hearted king, Tyre remembers Alexander,

I remember 1982. 

The Mediterranean floods with bodies of evacuees, my inbox floods with emails, and Phoenician ports crumble into memories ... of smoking nargileh on the Coriche at sunset, of nightclub-dancing on massacre graves, of wondering at banana trees in southern landscapes ...
I am tired of explaining.

And the rain keeps falling, as if natural, as if no one could stop it, as if all we have is memory, as if mint could cleanse our palates of war. I pray to our lady of (bone) marrow and drink in her holy water to bathe in her protection, thousands of miles from the bay of Jounieh . 

And East Beirut remembers the French, As Mount Lebanon remembers locusts, As Cedar trees remember Ottomans, As we all remember 1982,

As the Lebanon , the mountains, the cedars, the people will remember  u.s. .

I remember Byblos -
full of ruins ... still ...
standing.

Featured Writers


FICTION WRITER: Susan Muaddi Darraj
Susan Muaddi Darraj is associate professor of English at Harford Community College in Bel Air, Maryland ...


POET: Dima Hilal
Dima Hilal is a poet and writer, born in Beirut and raised in California, where she studied at the University of California ...


Original Arab American writing:

Voices from the South
Four Lebanese Women
...

Summer Rain
Andrea Assaf
I wash my body in Beirut as missiles rain...

Salti Dispatches from Beirut
Rasha Salti reports on the situation in Lebanon for RAWI

Laila Halaby's letter to an Israeli soldier
Normally in letters I start out by wishing the person to whom I am writing good health and spirits.

Mohja Kahf's letter to a friend entitled "Israel is Godzilla"
From where I sit: Israel has been Godzilla backed by super-Godzilla...

To see Kahf's essay 'The Israelyville Horror?' please go to the homepage of www.MuslimWakeUp.com

Security Apartheid
Ginan Rauf
Amidst all the horror visiting Lebanon recently...

My Family in Lebanon
Hayan Charara -
I have stopped counting the dead. A single death is more than this world can afford...

Elmaz Abinader poems - Two for Hayan
(nothing new)
(My Father's House is a Terrorist Target) 

Word from Dahiyeh, Lebanon
by editor of ArteNews Maymanah Farhat (electronic intafada)


 Featured Artist:

war ration(allies)

al-iqaa


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