Thunderstorm in Glasgow, July 25, 2013
Rattle my heart, four-chambered sound
loosen my language from my teeth
tumble raaed out from a fallow throat
and a forgotten year
when hunched in barracks beneath the rain
that gushed from gutters, corrugated roofs
one sister clutched her mother’s hand
and one strained, strained against her grip
wanting the wet, the loud, the dark, the bright,
to shake hands with that searing flash
and make it her friend.
Say aasfi, say ghaymi,
unbury the words with this digging rain,
remember how gardens seemed to sprout from stone
as water struck it, drops unnumbered
fountaining upwards as if to try
for a place in the sky again.
Say aaskar, say hammam,
recall wondering why soldiers
needed such a big bathroom anyway—
while the storm sluiced over eaves and doors
and stirred into the sea—
gather the words like clouds to burst,
but remember too, the vicious truth:
when the sky lashed hard and cracked the air,
when you hipped your fists and stared it down,
shouting patience, shouting peace
as only a child can—
you left raaed, ghaymi, aasfi, hammam,
aaskar in your mother’s hand,
spoke English to the rain.
