<\/div>\n\nKalbasi\u2019s poetry is generous and abundantly human, passionate and compassionate — Jimmy Santiago Baca, award winning poet, and author of Immigrants in Our Own Land<\/p>\n
Here are two of the poems from the book.
\n—————
\nNothing <\/b> <\/p>\n
Nothing is all I am,
\nNothing overloading nothing,
\nClosing the doors,
\nOpening an extra into an empty space,
\nNothing ensues but a further war.<\/p>\n
The bombs, lights that blind and Damascus,
\nBurning after Tehran. Sisters calling in despair,
\nBrothers ambivalent to the arms of infidels. Nothing happens,
\nBut children die, and journalists are filming for a deadline.<\/p>\n
Nothing comes after nothing but I,
\nKneel, cry for nothing,
\nand still the shepherd birds do not burn in flight.<\/p>\n
Nothing happens. I walk by the Central Park,
\nNext to nothing, and the no-fly zone is
\nJust nothing yet throat slides over throat,
\nBullets shoot and blood drops. Here nothing happens
\nBut I write to keep nothing from overloading nothing. <\/p>\n
\n5.7 <\/b><\/p>\n
I don’t care if you are you and I am I. I am not some exotic flower. Whatever coat you have on, I will put it on to warm me… and the shoes however small… I will walk in them to balance our height difference. You don’t need to convert for me; I have already converted to you. You see I never had a religion to begin with. I was born naked from all religions but your love.<\/p>\n
I know that was not the point. I know there is no conversion. There is no coat, no balance, no shoes but the naked truth of me finding you first, not you finding me. You, whom will never know who I was when I was sitting on the white sheets.<\/p>\n
Y o u, not b e s i d e m e.<\/p>\n
And the words that are already written. The words that are already said, are already felt, and are already gone.<\/p>\n
And I try to take them back into my empty bowl of hands. To put my hands on the chest. The chest into rest. The rest in to the heart. The beat back to the soul. The soul, back to what it was before you. <\/p>\n
Alas! I am 5.7
\n——–
\n can order this book from:
\n Amazon.con and Barnes & Nobles<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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