The Oxygen Trade: Leaving Hondurans Gasping for Air
Commentary
The carbon trade doesn't just fail to address climate change. In countries like Honduras, it funnels cash to notorious human rights abusers and threatens vital resources.
Where
The message comes through aol.com, finds me off
balance in a small school in Jersey, snow
puffing down, no newspaper in sight.
Hi love, the message reads, thinking of you
in London, heart in Gaza.
Unsigned, I know the e-mail address like my own
name, reply too quickly, no words in the text, then
correct my mistake, love, I write, yes
heart in Gaza. I don’t know
what else to say.
*
Is there a poem in Gaza that hasn’t been written?
*
I know you’re Palestinian, he said to me, I know you are
a man in the Dheisheh Camp.
Guards questioned me at the Telaviv airport:
where did we go, did we visit a mosque, a synagogue
did I eat the poems of Darwish
drink coffee he brewed, each grain an oud
standing at his window of fire
my tax dollars shining through?
In my suitcase I wrapped
shards of a bulldozed home, the only teacup
flew back, a dirty gull with a passport
each story contraband.
We are related, I rub olive oil on arms, belly, neck, soak bread in it --
I had to see for myself, after Seder’s bitter herbs
taste the lie.
Now I understand, my mother said, now I understand
reading my journey, Jewish girl, promised land, betrayal
a poem in Gaza.
(for S.)
Recommended Citation:
Kathy Engel, "Where" (Washington, DC: Foreign Policy In Focus, February 22, 2012)