the dust the dust over
everything
chair sheet skin sweat
we are shellacked
at least al figr
the pre-dawn prayer
has not started
there’s time still to sleep
but ah there it is
Allahu Akbar
Allahu Akbar
praying is better
than sleeping
it says but no no it isn’t
it is sleep I want
to dip into sleep
steeping in that blue wash
of light that grows cobalt
the color Van Gogh I think
said made life worth living
the cats complain a yell
a beep the kharoub seller
clanks his castanets
someone’s music
wails out from a distant
window and here comes
the bikya man
collecting broken things
toss it down whatever you got
blender speaker table
he will collect it he will take it
who knows where
to turn it into who knows what
he will come back tomorrow with different broken things
on his cart, and bellow out for more
bikya bikya bikya
bikya man: come back!
my country is broken
I am part of it broken
can we pull out the wires,
the crumbled bits of bridges
and levee walls
money jangle of shiny ads
blood in the soil tears trailing
and trailing sea to sea: can we
throw these onto your cart?
if we break the guns into bits of plastic
and steel can we collect the shadows
in the barrels and muzzles
swaddle them with silence
and gently toss them down?
bikya man will you take it
to the zabaleen
and help them melt it down
to cast a wheelbarrow
bikya man do you see first
what’s broken or what will be
whole again
bikya man fix what you can
of my broken country
and bring it back whole
or use it to build another
room in your house
for the baby to sleep in
bikya I will be here
bikya bikya
when you come back
