Rumpus Original Poetry: Three Poems by Marwa Helal
intimacy v. isolation xixi.
trees grow towards each other
as much as they do the light
in another morning on America
the dogs walk the people while others ride
in strollers
what is whitey doing with all that yoga and
meditation
in the racial imaginary
muse is an invention from the sexist 1920s when
women couldnt have
societally accepted jobs
someone tell nasser pan-arabism happened
on the internet and now it is called SWANA
im asking the world to give north africa back to
africa im asking the world to give the world back
my greatest strength is my willingness to seek
help look at you emailing me at night the
most european thing
about you is your disappearance; i mean your
fear of
me. i really dont think you understand what im
going through
i was asking for the ocean and i got a grain of
sand
heard your latest cause was tryna free yr new
girls nipples on instagram
a grain of sand holds all of eternity
i can spin this all day: abdul rahman ahmed is
105 years old.
he was born into the ottoman empire. he hasn’t
had teeth
for 42 years. “my wife took them out
with her kisses,” he says.
im working with found material
q: how do you go from the MoMA to
Temptationz Sports Bar?
a: you take the stairs not the elevator
black heart emoji *and, earlier, by newton,
who maintained: “each particle of space is
eternal, each indivisible
moment of duration is everywhere.” (principia, III, 42).
not all transgressions merit punishment i feel.
[…] being this way will likely
produce eventual results that feel like
punishment.
let me count the ways your soul spliced
bluets was alright
once i put a tortilla on my shoulder and sent it
to the man who told me i had a chip on my
shoulder
but nudes are cute
for how long will you reenact the scenes of your
childhood abandonment:
u know who u r
(yep, you!!!)
does no one else think it’s funny there is a
disorder
called borderline? or is it just too obvious?
even as i kiss you i keep the language i pray in
far from your reach
the apocalypse isnt loud explosions it is wearing
headphones and avoiding eye contact as we
endlessly scroll into an abyss wearing polo shirts
marked
STAFF driving each other from gig to gig in
ubers vias and lyfts while we take deep drags
out of vape pens
this future can be prevented if we all read fanon
you should really confide in your friends and
family.
that’s what we do. you should try it.
we? who is we?
why i dream of horses…
really interesting that you think yourself in a
position to give me advice
easier to tell me what to do than
to take responsibility for the pain
your behavior is unwelcome. that’s the point.
it’s still going badly. but i intend to make the
most of my time.
im retiring as a human and becoming a parrot
where i only repeat men’s lies (salary:
commiserate with experience): it was caused by
my own pain and
cowardice and fear of the love that i felt growing
inside cowardice
and fear of the love i felt growing inside me
caused by my own pain and cowardice and fear
of the love
slow motion for me is this what you meant
when you said you needed time to get back on
your feet?
dont confuse anger for obsession or the erotic for
rhetoric
you all think youre eartha kitt now asking for
what for what
coz you found a .gif
who is the muse now?
what if i were the night sky? what if i were the
night what if we hadnt been born
at the same time
intimacy v. isolation ixix.
he aint the one if youre asking yourself if he’s a
vampire feeding off of the pictures with your
head cut off silky smooth with a perfect kick of
contrast in the highlights
the downturn in the tantric attention economy fall
back in the gauze of a sodden june afternoon
glowing
i said i loved you and i wanted music / in the
man’s car next to /
i said i loved you and i wanted i wanted
justice under my nose
i said i loved you and i wanted i wanted
just us under my nose
Good morning. you called again a few times
while i was sleeping?
my phone was on the other side of the room i
couldn’t get up and get it without going thru my
back pain again and the pills had just kicked in.
next time i’ll just
what you know about love?
what you know about life?
what you know about blood?
pish you aint even my type
intimacy v. isolation xx.
miya hee miya ho miya hu miya ha-ha
miya hee miya ho miya hu miya ha-ha
miya hee miya ho miya hu miya ha-ha
miya hee miya ho miya hu miya ha-ha
ay… this a special whats happenin to all my
all my soldiers over there in i raq
er rybody right here what you need to
do is be thankful for the life you got
yknowmsayin? stop lookin at what you aint got
start bein thankful for what you do got
me n T.I. we two amreekans
sing the same lyric and mean different
soldiers
in the fourth grade we penpal gulf war the
teacher pairs me with my best friend’s uncle last
name majers this is how i learn of god’s humor
he writes me of the brave egyptians fighting
alongside [them] he means bought and put the
sold in soldier egyptians i invite his niece to a
community picnic at sharon woods she never
shows next day at school says they couldnt find
us but i watch the news and learn to see what her
parents saw thru their car window before they
drove away i didnt say what community
this poem is for tabonbon tellin the boss at the
job a nine percent raise is great but it isnt enough
to do a whole white man’s job
you say youre making an archive for future
generations but you dont even have an original
thought you say youre making an archive but
your manager is telling you to lie about how
those prints you sell arent even on archival paper
ill tell you this: the archive will not be curated
the archive will not be curated the archive will
not be curated the archive will be an outgrowth
im comin atchyou live from the light unobserved
im sayin il dunyah lissah b’kheir ya
wardeh and im whistling thru every film set
absorbing all the
wattage for my own ways and means necessary
im so anti-imperial im unwedable
im citing my sources: nile delta parker and said
with a 3
there go the vultures feeding [on] my heart again
skkrrr skrr skkkrr oh oh im laughin at the man
who sees me as me skrrr skr nature was beautiful
before the internet
in arabic bride and doll are the same word
so i am a long way from making a truce with
reality you dont have to be dead to be
dismembered
im sorry for your loss i hope we are in each
others lives for a long time i didnt mean to put
you in this position is this how you want to be
immortalized i ask in my best okoye voice
self defense is intelligence until it becomes
autoimmune: “a system of reality which compels
them to, […] must be insane to attack the system
to which [he] owes [his] entire identity”
{baldwin, of course}
all ur favs still operate within the hegemonic
demonic white supremacist capitalist
patriarchy™
im slidin thru to say even oprah is pro-i—–i i
wonder how many people diagnosed with
ADD/ADHD are really just good at dissociation?
and how some might call that grace. structural
humility is inherited and no one talks about the
mutation that occurs in children who migrate
some pages are omitted from this book preview i
recommend letting the mind rage instead of race
