A poem by Mohab Nasr, which can be found here, on the Sultan’s Seal. Other new poems by Mohab Nasr are here.
.
.
Society. Brother,
I don’t know what to make of this word,
though I cross the distance between my bedroom and the kitchen
without feeling it at all.
Though when my wife winks at me
or kicks my ankles underneath the table
I try to look as though I understand,
and turn my head as though
it will walk by.
“It musn’t see you this way,” she says
and I put out my cigarette in a hurry.
.
When the wind is so strong
we have to run against it, she tells me,
“It is right behind us,”
but I feel
light, a rumour
no one can catch.
.
Sometimes my wife and I perform.
One stands over a chair, the other
falls with eyes inquiring.
One opens their arms to the sky,
the other cries,
My God, society’s so beautiful.
.
Because she believed, she would dream
and remembered her dreams.
Society, too, comes in sleep,
and I must listen when she wakes
because I, too, am hoping
there is something there.
.
Strange things happen when we talk.
A war, say, somewhere far away,
the suicide of someone who was not
until that moment.
A revolution.
Every time the same
surprise at our inability to express,
the same fear of the loneliness
that words make, the same
cold feet sensation.
“Believe me,” she says,
and I believe her,
and I hand her socks so
society will not see her so exposed.
.
