Before you, I slept on a bayonet.
Bided my time in clothing. Neither experience
nor innocence kept me
from bleeding. Before you, I held
an invisible sign: please touch this abyss.
How pleasing to have you sieve me
through your lungs, leave me essential
dregs and seeds. Since there’s no place
a grain of sand cannot hide, deserts
and strands now travel the world
with us, in shoes. Let me kind you in two
tongues. Habibti, two decades ago,
we fell off a cliff, each holding a wing,
each holding a hand, and have yet to land.