19 Varieties of Gazelle Quotes

“Where we live in the world
is never one place. Our hearts,
those dogged mirrors, keep flashing us
moons before we are ready for them.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“We start out as little bits of disconnected dust.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“For you who came so far; for you who held out, wearing a black scarf to signify grief; for you who believe true love can find you amidst this atlas of tears linking one town to its own memory of mortar, when it was still a dream to be built and people moved there, believing, and someone with sky and birds in his heart said this would be a good place for a park.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“Skin had hope, that's what skin does. Heals over the scarred place, makes a road.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“A true Arab knows how to catch a fly in his hands,”
my father would say. And he’d prove it,
cupping the buzzer instantly
while the host with the swatter stared.

In the spring our palms peeled like snakes.
True Arabs believed watermelon could heal fifty ways.
I changed these to fit the occasion.

Years before, a girl knocked,
wanted to see the Arab.
I said we didn’t have one.
After that, my father told me who he was,
“Shihab”—”shooting star”—
a good name, borrowed from the sky.
Once I said, “When we die, we give it back?”
He said that’s what a true Arab would say.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“I support all people on earth who have bodies like and unlike my body”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“The thousands small birds of January in their smooth soaring cloud finding the trees.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“Why should it be any surprise that people find solace in the most intimate literary genre? Poetry slows us down, cherishes small details. A large disaster erases those details. We need poetry for nourishment and for noticing, for the way language and imagery reach comfortably into experience, holding and connecting it more successfully than any news channel we could name.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“Answer, if you hear the words under the words- otherwise it is just a world with a lot of rough edges, difficult to get through, and our pockets full of stones.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“those whom we did not know think they know us now.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“In these evenings he sat by our beds weaving folktales like vivid little scarves.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“I wondered stony afternoons owning all their vastness.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“Are people the only holy land?”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“what twists or rage greater than we could ever guess had savaged skylines, thousands of lives?”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“You will no longer pick this sage that flavors your whole life.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“the long sorrow of the color red.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“why are we so monumentally slow?”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“our limbs which had already traveled far beyond her world, carrying the click of distances in the smooth, untroubled soles of their shoes.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“Red Brocade"

The Arabs used to say,
When a stranger appears at your door,
feed him for three days
before asking who he is,
where he’s come from,
where he’s headed.
That way, he’ll have strength
enough to answer.
Or, by then you’ll be
such good friends
you don’t care.

Let’s go back to that.
Rice? Pine nuts?
Here, take the red brocade pillow.
My child will serve water
to your horse.

No, I was not busy when you came!
I was not preparing to be busy.
That’s the armor everyone put on
to pretend they had a purpose
in the world.

I refuse to be claimed.
Your plate is waiting.
We will snip fresh mint
into your tea.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“Love means you breathe in two countries.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank

“She stood on the roof, tears on her face.
What was the thing she never gave up?
The simple love of her difficult place.”
― Naomi Shihab Nye, 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East – A Collection About Arab-American Family Life in Jerusalem and the West Bank