(no subject)

[mizraim]

Bride of the Wind (1914)
after a painting by Oskar Kokoschka

1.

I am not prepared to give up my life
for portraits in winter without you

beside me. Night after night sleeping
to the sound of a flock of storks lost

to the dark of the forest
which also shudders at the thought

of wind. How it echoes through our wounds
carrying the voice of our mothers

from a flood they call to us with water
in their mouths. “We stood

in the water but it did not harden.”

2.

Look the night is turning
towards us as you sleep quietly

dreaming of picturesque scenes.
When the wind plunders the forest

the bones of storks retreat
from the trees. Your face

rescues the air from abstraction
as the presence of lightning

suddenly exposes the rain.
When enough air fills your lungs

you say “The body is a prison.”

3.

All I ever do is stare at your face
until the blood begins to form

on my forehead. The eyes in
my head harden like a stork’s

in the presence of jaws. I hear them
murmur in the water like scissors

asking for escape. I say not until
the rocks are red enough to walk

through. A light will shine
through them exposing blood

that was always there. We will
abandon our eyes for their wounds.

- Adam Ahmed