Poetry

O Genocide

by Haider Al-Ghazali

translated by Zainab Al Qaisi

Image restates title, author, and translator

O Genocide,
Wear my clothes,
Take my form
And my desires.
Take my flat feet
And my limping walk.
Live my love stories
And my shyness.

Befriend those
Without enough time

And attach to them deeply

Wake early, as I do.
Wash your face with light.
Quench the thirsty mint,
And dream —
Unaware
Death comes gently to sleepers.

Take my life.
Perhaps then, you’ll die.

Translation from the Arabic

Haider Al-Ghazali, a twenty-year-old Palestinian poet from Gaza, studies English literature and translation at the Islamic University of Gaza. His poems have been translated into eight languages and published on various platforms. He volunteered with the Tamer Institute for Community Education and worked with the A. M. Qattan Foundation in child psychological first aid activities during the Gaza genocide.

Zainab Al Qaisi holds a PhD in English literature from the University of Jordan, with a dissertation on Palestinian American poetry. She is a literary translator and editor. Zainab is the founder and CEO of two startups: Al Nqsh LTD and The Writing Room (@kitabaroom). Zainab specializes in literary and cultural studies, focusing on resistance, human geography, archives, memory and spatial studies, and decolonial theories.

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