Why did she come? Poem by Iman Mersal

Why did she come to the New World, this mummy, this subject of spectacle
sleeping in her full ornament of gray gauze,
an imaginary life in a museum display case?
I think mummification is contrary to immortality
because a preserved corpse will never be a part of a rose.
The mummy did not choose migration, but those who waited in long lines
at consulates and built houses in other countries
still dream of returning when they become corpses.
—You have to take us there!
This is what they instruct in wills they hang around their children's necks
as if death is an unfinished identity
that matures only in the family burial plot.

**

There are trees here too, standing under the weight of snow, and rivers where lovers do not sneak an embrace. Instead, there are joggers who run along the banks with their dogs on Sunday mornings not noticing the waters that froze from solitude. There are immigrants who were not trained in loving nature, but who believe there is less pollution here, and that they can prolong their lives by chewing on oxygen capsules before going to bed.

**

Why can't they forget that they are from there
these foreign losers
who train their jaw muscles to rid themselves of their accents,
transparent accents, inherited illnesses that expose them
and that leap out of their mouths when they're angry and forget
how to place their sadness in a foreign language?
Accents do not die, but foreigners are excellent gravediggers. They post the names of their dead relatives on their fridges so not to call them by mistake.
They pay a quarter of their wages to telephone companies
to make sure they live in a place that can be identified by its distance from
childhood. Why can't they forget?

**

In six steps the immigrant writes a successful letter to his family:
He chooses a time when he does not miss them.
He sits with his back to the window because walls are more neutral.
He distributes his greetings precisely.
He recalls cliches he was raised on, ones he thought he would never use:
'I love you as much as the stars in the sky and the grains of sand on
the shore. I long for you the way the thirsty long for water, and the ill for
medicine, and the stranger for his home.' He avoids mentioning details of his everyday life because he does not know
how they will interpret them.
He repeats 'Praise be to God' to assure them that he keeps his faith.

**

What you learn here is not different from what you learned there:
You read to absent reality.
You hide your shyness behind foul language.
Camouflage your weakness by lengthening your fingernails.
Suppress anxiety by smoking all the time and by organizing and
reorganizing the contents of drawers sometimes.
Use three kinds of eye drops to clarify vision then enjoy the ensuing
blindness. Most important is that wondrous moment of closing your
eyelids as a fire breaks out.
Here and there
life exists only to be watched from a distance.

**

On another continent you left pitiful enemies behind.
You have to feel ashamed of yourself when you remember them.
Nothing angers you now.
It is impossible to meet a classical communist here, and in any case, they hang
clocks in public offices instead of the President's picture.
Maybe it is a nightmare to spend a day like this under the influence of sedatives.
Nothing here deserves your rebellion.
You are content and dead
and life around you appears like a merciful hand
that k't up a blind old man's room
so that he can read the past.


Translated from the Arabic by Khaled Mattawa