for Yehuda with apologies

Salaam
Adunis

I see you from across
the river
the living breathing
poem in Paris
safe from Syria
where poems were
tortured and hanged
the meter draining
from their stanzas

You are safe
Adunis
as I once was
fighting while writing
for Jerusalem
“where wild stones
bay at tame
walls”*

You are still there
Adunis
while I sit across
the river
my unwritten words
chained to my legs
And I say to you
Adunis
the you still free
even at 93
to see
to say
what you need
to release yourself
from Paris
in peace

 Until then…

Say it all
Adunis
Say how dictators
of sand
betray every grain
beneath their
Oxford-shod feet
Say how rabbis and imams
and priests
bleed cities
of freshly loved prayers
How they hold sway
over days
over bread
over heads
over vaginas hiding
but biding
their time in the dark

Say it to Gaza
To Rafah
To Shebaa
To the Knesset
To Damascus
To Tehran
Say if for Kyiv
to Moscow
then hide
from the drones and missiles

Say it to Florida
to Texas
to Georgia
to parents of censored children
for convicts strapped in death chambers
needles fucking their arms

Say it to New York
which you “shaped like a pear
or a breast”**
to LA to Chicago
to London
anywhere
 with a park or a square

Say it all
Adunis
Though your hand and mind and soul
may tire
Paint every breath with passion
punctuation
premonition

Say it for me
Adunis
from an old and dying poet
for an old and dead poet

Say it for me
Adunis
Say it as a favor
Say it for you
Say it for me
Just say it

                                  *taken from “Mayor of Jerusalem”
                                    by Yehuda Amichai

                                **taken from “A Grave for New York” 
                                    by Adunis