2 poems by Yahia Lababidi

What is the Desert?

It’s forgetfulness
of trivia
and noise:

the city
or ego

Remembrance
of essences:

silence
stillness
and G_d.

It’s the stormy story of the sea
recollected in tranquility

death and birth and death
and transformation—

a gift granted only
to the patient
who surrender.






Lockjaw

Strange aches in quarantine
for our phantom limbs:
others and nature.

memories, longings
waking hours & dreams blend
with the daze of the weak

outer and inner are unclear
--this overcast sky
or that hangover

With no end in sight
beginnings called into question:
did we, always, live this way?

Wait, did you hear that;
are those birds chirping
or am I going mad?

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Yahia Lababidi, an Egyptian of Palestinian background, is the author, most recently, of Learning to Pray (Kelsay Books, 2021) a collection of spiritual aphorisms and poems as well as Desert Songs (Rowayat, 2022) a bilingual—English/Arabic—poetry collection and photographic account of mystical experiences in the desert.

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