We Are Looking For Palestine

The sun rises and moves around.

It sets to visit other places.

And we, we are looking for Palestine.

The birds wake up and look for food.

They chirp on the blossoming trees, laden with fruit, 

with peaches, apples, apricots, and oranges.

And we, we are looking for Palestine.

The sea waves lap against the shore.

They glitter and dance with the fishers' boats.

And we, we are looking for Palestine.

People travel to relatives and friends. 

They book round-trip tickets, stuff their suitcases

with gifts and books and clothes.

And we, we are still looking for Palestine.

Sir, we have no airports and seaports;

no trains, or highways.

We have no passable roads, sir!

We do have crutches and wheelchairs,

Young men with one or no legs, 

no longer able to work, as if there was work.

We travel to the West Bank or Egypt for surgery, 

even to set a broken leg.

But we need a permit to enter.

We stuff our suitcases with pictures and memories.

They feel very heavy on the ground; 

we can't carry them, neither can the roads.

They scar the surface of the earth.

We get lost in the past, present, and future.

When a child is born, we feel sad for him or her. 

A child is born here to suffer, sir!

A mother feels the great pain in labor.

A child cries after leaving her dark place.

In Palestine, our dark is not safe.

In Palestine, children always cry.

If we want to travel, we leave many times.

In Gaza, you leave via either Erez or Rafah,

a hard escape to make,

so we search for the visa interview.

Cairo, Istanbul, Amman? (But not in Palestine!)

We don't have embassies, sir!

The one in Jerusalem is farther

than the Andromeda Galaxy.

Andromeda is 2.5 million light years.

But our years stay heavy and dark.

It would take trillions of years.

Sir, we are not welcome anywhere.

Only cemeteries don't mind our bodies.

We no longer look for Palestine.

Our time is spent dying.

Soon, Palestine will search for us,

for our whispers, for our footsteps,

our fading pictures fallen off blown-up walls.

----Mosab Abu Toha, Forest of Noise