Status Updates From The Lost Arabs

“Do you see? My grandfather and his children, my mother
& my body, my body and itself. Always turning

away from a country. The truth is: it is easy to give
trauma a body. To a body. I mean, it wants to be made

visible, a transformation often
mistaken for a miracle, a healing action.”

“In the evening, my father mistook me
for his father’s country. It is the day
of the republic’s birth and thus yours,
he said. He was off by a month.
Neither of us could believe so small
a span of hours separated
a boy from a nation.”

“Who was it that said you only write to the land
because the land cannot speak back?

They must not have been fluent in mountains
or an absence of certainty. I have prayed

every day in a language I know only in pieces. No wonder I have centuries of faith locked

in my hair and nails so long, so matted.
Mattered. I keep doing that. Bleeding

belief, spilling it onto mats and garden beds.”

‘Today
my aunty tells me, “You are not (Arab like)
us.” In Islam, in Lebanon, in Turkey,
in all my beginnings the mother is
erased, the earth destroyed by men
by machine by chance by design
& there are only the seeds of stars left
running from their own light’

“i asked
my aunty about the supernatural hush i felt & she said
the animals stand still in holy awe, they know the Day
of Judgment will fall on a Friday. & this is why neither
of us made a sound, why his fingers bruised my lips to
crush the gasping as one of us disappeared into the other,
why the park bristled with jungle knowing, the kind
with teeth, why it felt like the end of the world &
the beginning”

“I tore this page from somebody else’s book.
It was written in Arabic so I found a man to lend
me his tongue. Left the page splotched with his thickness
& the following words: this was never meant
for you. Your grandfather made that choice & you live
with the ashes of it black on your teeth.”

Was it ever meant to be? Could it ever be? It is human, so human, to leave, as Sakr observes. But it also so human to return, as I believe he is getting at.

In his acknowledgments, “Lead with kindness, or not at all,” rings with an inherent severity, a necessity that will never be read by the eyes that lack.

Nor is faith constant at a macro-historic level. The Church. Its history, its changes, its differing philosophies, how it’s split, and then split again, and split again, and now again and again and again and everyone lambasting everyone as heretical… No, faith is not a constant.

“In Order to Return” on page 95, the line

It would not be faith
Were it constant.

Very intriguing and interesting to me. A lot to think about there, a lot it drums up. Immediately I think of course faith is constant, but no, no it is not. Not in individuals. We waver. We doubt. We forsake. We curse. Sometimes, we leave, never to return.

Does it warm you? Does it envelop you? Or does it burn you? Does it burn away impurities eternally and engulf you in agony? There are no gates, all are welcome. All will be. All of us infinite, yet a morning fog decides our infinity.

Heaven Is a Bad Name on page 93, rife with self-awareness and intrepid thought, makes me wonder and think more about the Greek Orthodox idea that Heaven and “Hell” are the same place, the same plane. Everyone goes. It is only how your soul responds to the Light of God shining upon it.

my people, and his people, and our family as human beings. Sakr shines a light on how broken we can be to each other, and in the process, how broken we can become, and how we embrace it, as he does.

I will forever be glad I read this collection, chewed on the poems. They very much evoke, and they certainly provoke. I will return and chew, spur, churn some more.

In the ways my virgin eyes sense this to be provocative, it is not. It is painful, yes. Broken, yes. Sinful, yes. But it is real. It is human. It is authentic. A window into a soul into a universe into a man, and into again. Disgusting? To some. Familiar? To others. Beautiful? To others yet. I see it as a life yearning, colored by brokenness, brokenness through generations. Generations of brokenness sponsored by

I would say this collection is provocative, but it is not, or at least, it is not, meant to be in the ways that my psyche considers provocative. It is most certainly meant to provoke, as strong poetry should — not all poetry should merely evoke, much should provoke — but it is meant to provoke to prompt thought. It is meant to provoke to poke holes in the lies of peace we find in our world. Sakr achieves that.

The more I write poetry, the more I understand how difficult it is to do what Sakr does here. Brilliant baring of a soul in these pages.

There is something pervasive throughout these poems. A dark pain layered with more brokenness that is then exposed to the world with admirable vulnerability. A sadness rings throughout which brings about more sadness as the brokenness is framed as solace from pain. Pain.

Interesting batch of poems. Beautiful yet crude. Awe-inspiring yet harrowing. Some are not “for me” but they are not meant to be which is precisely why they are “for me.”

“Birthday” and “Chances” are absolutely beautiful, elevating this book from a 4 to a 5 imo!