Ten Minutes
by Mohammed Moussa

You have ten minutes for evacuation.
Ten minutes to rub out your memoirs,
the offerings,
the family photos,
your favourite books
the last Diwan (volume) you read,
the letter from your exiled brother,
the smell of the bed,
the ring you bought for your wife,
your old dress,
your favourite teacup,
the stories of your little girl.

They ask me who am I
by Mohammed Moussa

A kid from the camp I reply,
the largest refugee camp,
still they don’t know but they
know well the boy who saved the fish
when his house was destroyed
from the largest open-air prison.

But why am I
explaining myself
to the one who put me in a camp,
inside a large prison
with open spaces
and tiny graveyards,
I am from the camp

and nothing I want more than a homeland,
unrestricted birthplace,
no fences of tyranny,
no walls of oppression,
no checkpoints to undress my fears,
with clouds heavy enough to carry my soul.

We Must Choose Our Words Carefully
by Mark Kirkbride

We’re doing this again, 
are we, watching the bodies
wrapped in the white sheets, the large,
the tiny, which must be held 
with care in the backs of carts
rocking between bombed buildings 
by whoever’s, randomly,
left, a dazed man
or keening woman,
but we must choose our words
with care too, calibrate 
our response, because
we wouldn’t want anyone
to think badly of us
or accuse of us something
that simply isn’t true, 
so we must pretend 
we’re fine with it and smile
and choose our words
as carefully as they handle the dead.

Urchins Hawking Dead Roses
by Omar Sabbagh

The breath of the street
in all its dilapidated glory breathes
and seems to gather-in its voice
like a batch of swept autumnal leaves
to break a cunning silence.

Brittleness tells a tale.
So much brimming surge of talent
and so much for the brimming that must 
come-up against a wall,
blocking passage-through to the other side, where

an outward thing might just meet
firing desperate wishes.  And I cannot call
you brother, friend, until you have met
and made your peace with your enemy,
and the cadence of your fall

grown large enough to be choiceless
and more, more – readied to fall again.
The street’s filled with wraith-like whispers
about the grim and sullied ways of men;
no more glamour left for the rose of crossed innocence.

Voicemail from Palestine
by Ruth Aylett

When you go will you
send back a letter? Text me 
the address, photo-message
the view into the distance?

A small wind from the hills 
in the warm night,
scent of aromatic shrubs
pine, tamarisk, marjoram.

Suruh no more Suhmata no more
Qumya no more Tarbika no more

The world shrinking,
trees shrieking as the 
fire takes them, 
the saws fell them.

Subtracted hilltops glitter, 
the horizon walled,
walking forbidden,
children spat upon.

Barqa no more Dimra no more
Jaba no more Qannir no more

A slap on the roof,
round the ears, the 
punch to the gut coming,
the house falling.

When you go will you
send back a letter? 
I need to see some view
into the distant future.

Amqua no more Nuris no more
Sufla no more Kasla no more.
No more, no more.

Postage Stamps
by Mark Paffard

Beige and purple, the dull shades
of a bruise by which no-one is appalled

on the British Mandate stamps
which are almost as thin
as a single layer of skin
and from which there was money to be made
by some light-fingered scamp
since before the Naqba they were all recalled

as the new Jewish state began its rougher trade
pendant to the end of colonial philately.
Imitation being one form of flattery
many a Muslim militia turned round

to punch and pummel the Israeli:

though when peace almost beckoned
one stamp showed Yasser Arafat with John Paul the Second.
In Khaled Jarrar’s design
the true State of Palestine
takes its place among the nations.
Sunbird on a yellow background.

In one glowing sheet the little perforations
are perhaps as many as one day’s bullet-wounds.

In the absence of a Palestinian State Khalid Jarrar’s design has
appeared on some German postage stamps

Khalas/Enough
by Patrick Jones

“We are afflicted by an incurable malady - hope"
Mahmoud Darwish

This desolation
appropriation
Isolation
Occupation Demolition Forced migration Their violation
Exploitation Dehumanization

No condemnation     Or conversation
Representation      Or recognition

This zionization
Dispossession
Segregation Colonization Demarcation starvation
Militarization Annihilation 
This immolation 

Where is the mediation
De-escalation Solutions Revolutions Prosecutions?

There has to be
Sanctions
Resolutions
A cessation
A constitution

To build
A coalition
A foundation for emancipation
Self actualization and self determination
Co operation
And transformation
For this brave battered and beautiful nation

Mohammed Moussa grew up in the Jabalia Refugee Camp, in the north of Gaza. He lives in exile in Turkey. These poems are taken from Salted Wounds (Drunk Muse, 2024). All proceeds from his book sales go to the Gaza Poets’ Society, see: mohamad1967.wordpress.com 

Mark Kirkbride lives in Shepperton, England. He is a poet and novelist, see: markkirkbride.com 

Omar Sabbagh is a widely published poet, writer and critic.

Mark Paffard is from Arberth, Dyfed.

Ruth Aylett and Patrick Jones are poetry co-editors of The Morning Star

Poetry submissions to thursdaypoems@gmail.com