Das Unbekannte

I am familiar, familiar
like the dull hum
of the swirling fan
you have learned
to ignore, familiar.
But you are Africa, 
Al Andalus and Babylon
and the Tigris running.
You are incense burning,
slicing the hot days into
vapours of dizzy grace,
the taste of gingered
coffee, cardamom, 
crushed eucalyptus
to my unknowing soul,
a voice lost between
weeping and rejoicing-- 
like the tears of sacrifice, 
Abraham shed hearing,
he imagined, God’s forbidding voice.
You are young lambs in spring
bleating songs of tentative praise.
Not speaking the word stranger
Calling me without speaking..