Nur Turkmani

This Old War, Again

A Found Poem After Etel Adnan’s “Sitt Marie Rose”

My spine is like a
twisted, stunted,
fallen tree,
disappearing.
I go out on the balcony.
The birds return.

The port burns.
I read the eulogy
for the anonymous
and the known.
Beirut is a port.
It glitters
on the asphalt.
When it rains
it’s the same,
the roots of a tree
split open.

To discover a truth
is to discover
a fundamental limit.

Time is dead.
I have no illusions.
I want to say
forever and ever
that the sea is beautiful.

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