Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear: Poems from Gaza

by Mosab Abu Toha

People say silence is a sign of consent. What if I’m not allowed to speak, my tongue severed, my mouth sewn shut?

This is a prolonged state of exile and estrangement and expulsion and ethnic cleansing. Our grandparents were driven from their homes and their cities, and any trace of them has been erased and replaced by something else, which is now called Israel. But we, their descendants, were also robbed of our right to dream and think about those places—no, instead, we are forced to live in the nightmares of our own current life.

These are all forms of collective punishment that we are constantly subjected to, for the most basic rights: drinking water, ability to move freely, keeping families together, getting medical care, and so on.