Third World

Consider this
A nation drugged with
numbness,
Bombs of sarcasm on our border
Humans with crocodile smiles
Roads of crammed cars
Sounds of the night
Just like every other night

I could not but join in the celebration
We have become pathetic, we have adapted
to war
This is not a light thing to say
We have adapted to being the laughing stock
of our neighboring countries

We have grown fond of death and killings
we have been psychologically conditioned
to become desensitized
to what “progressed countries” call
“an unstable nation”

Wait,
I forgot the patriots
I pity them, those whose souls
are strong, on an individual level because
most have lost interest in “hope”
Props to you and your unheard voices
whatever keeps that heart of yours beating
well…inject more,

project to progress

We’ve become a selfish nation
each striving to perfect that blueprint
of his illusion called “future”

YOU ARE ALL DELUSIONAL

I join the mental protest
towards progress, I join the
rivers of ambition that lead to the waterfall
with the rocky bottom
I join the walk towards
that fucking idea of “success”
then I pause
I halt in the middle of all that commotion
“then what?”

I still live in this country, I still have this crummy
apartment, I still don’t have water, I still don’t have electricity
I still plan on leaving, everyday
I still .. still
I still get drunk on ideas, on feelings
on alcohol on tangible moments
on psychological satisfactions
on the idea of WE instead of ME
AND vice versa when needed

“Shuffled Sheets”
I woke up, my nostrils dirtied
by the polluted air that I so willingly breathe
I am hosting this weakened body
that has become programmed
to follow routine
to react to any action
to just push through the next sunrise
I light my cigarette to compliment the fact
that I am awake, I am still alive
on an empty stomach growling
for something new

Ah what a paradox

I stood on my balcony, resting on that rusty
railing of mine, I look across to see how
the buzzing bees of Beirut, cease to
acknowledge the infesting corruption
that is slowly feeding off of their humanity
like parasites on unaware hosts

I see them, I can hear them
I disagree with
and all I can do is exhale that
cancerous smoke and join in
the
corrupted
celebration
well…
for now!

Then I took another look
at the messy view
colored by laundry rails
old wooden shutters
cheap paint and LCD advertisements
and I saw you standing there
on your porch with your head
stuck in your own cigarette smoke
leaning and looking straight
back at me

See

I see her from time to time
walking on those streets
either morning or night

We live in the same vicinity
So visual bumping is bound to occur
She’s covered in colors
a reflection of her thoughts or
a result of a hungover morning?
I wonder

I have walked back and forth
with the mornings and sunsets
I have replayed the same songs in my head
I have counted my steps
and yes I have seen her 
from the corner of my eye
the jumble of colors 
walking to the rhythms of the beats
in my ears
She smiles, I am curious and 
clueless as to the reason 
but it suits her

Mornings and sunsets,

Suddenly you find yourself
having drinks during the week
with your comfort group

the table was covered
with filled ashtrays. colorful
drinks, to each his own 

I was there, with my drink in front of me
I saw her come in, making her way

She had her own group
But I as intoxicated as I was
I let down my guard 
to my thoughts that is
I unchained them, 
and let them loose
since my body was catatonic

However at the end
I abdicated to my mind,
I gathered my limbs and walked towards her

She looked messy but it’s beautiful
she portrayed a mosaic of pulchritude
different pieces of different colors

“I see you pass by everyday
Hi!”
She giggled, “you do?” As she took a drag
from her cigarette
I felt she was examining me
Her eyes scanned my face,
stripped me to the bone
but the beauty of it is that she did it
so innocently

She raped me innocently
Fuck who can say that!
Anyways

Then I found myself at a loss for words
Her vision scan has erased my vocabulary
my mental capacity to engage in small talk
“wtf is small talk anyways”
As I tried to articulate something worthwhile
to give value to my presence next to her
I found myself frozen

“What do you do?”
I used those four words as an excuse
for her to look at me and talk,
giving me the chance to feast
my eyes at her, I do know her

Her hand gestures
her giggles
Her candy wrapping truly does hide
a lot,
hard candy with a soft chewy core
I just figured
that this confident person
with no care in the world
shields herself from the bullshit
around
She has fortified her being
by ingesting every bullshit factor
and morphing it into something beautiful
no matter what

Every time she took a drag from her cigarette
Her eyes would divert from me and into the crowd
She would just look at them
I could see the gears in her head twisting
I could see what her eyes were doing
she didn’t say much, she listened
but she also listened with her eyes
she watched every woman and every man
She OBSERVED
It gave a her rush, they seemed to be the strings
to which she would weave stories about
they seemed to be characters and her joy
was to read, strip, create, generate, replace,

I could see that,
As she exhaled her smoke
She smirked
For smiling to her
was too precious to give away
so easily she diverted her

minute attention to me
She grabbed my hand
got closer to me
My heart…

Got closer to my ear
she whispered

“I see you too”

Those 4 words sent
ripples of
insecurities
it’s like I’ve been stripped
of the last tiny bit
of sober confidence I had

I have
never
felt
so
naked
and infected
with her colors

Scarf

She rubbed her hands together
Her skin was so cold that friction gave up
Thoughts swirl around her head
like wine in a connoisseur’s cup

She observes the world outside
and you observe her
she giggles, in solidarity
her perspective
has swung from side to side
it doesn’t seem to like stability

You marvel at this creature
Her lack of self containment
Her ability to say anything
whenever, wherever
Her magical power of being real

Is there something wrong with her?
Is her scarf tied too tight around her neck?
Is her head too weighty to carry?
Is it filled with ideas, deep secrets, much love,
a dark side, a dash of insanity?

Can someone be that real today?
Her real-ness is so rare, it glows
like a long lost gem in a tombstone
somewhere in Egypt

Her realness is so surreal
She isn’t afraid of being the person
she is at home, with you,
She isn’t scared to tell you what she is thinking
at the moment
Isn’t that wonderful?
She left her
sugar-coating in the past, she’s on an
all natural diet, she’s into this REAL thing
she has discovered it, after she realized
that changing for someone actually dimmed
a bit of her glow.
She realized that this Real thing,
is actually who she is

You try to look into her soul
you concentrate on her eyes
those windows
they smile back, they glisten
The collision of colors carries
you into that trip, where you have no control
literally ..

You feel warm, she is real!
You feel rewarded with that gleeful feeling
that you have found something actual in this world

You revert back, you take a deep breath
You light a cigarette and sit there
Her messy curls, harvest the golden
stories of many pasts, her pasts
her golden locks love dancing with
the crisp cold wind, on long
alcohol infused cruises,
You know, because she told you
and you undoubtedly and blindly trust her
She’s genuine and she’s there

For curiosity’s sake, you reach out
You want to touch her red cold cheeks,
She messed with your head, you want to feel
that all this is REAL

As you reached out, she paused,
Your warm fingers landed on her
cherry red cheeks,
she blushed and went on
about her own world in that bubble
of hers
With those hand gestures
those curls that dance with the wind
those windows to the soul
concentrating on yours

You smiled in content
Satisfied
You leaned back
took a drag
tilted your head backwards
exhaled it upwards

Then you straightened up
Your wobbling head
fixed itself
on that woman
in front of you
with
the
Scarf!

Her scarf carries her head!

VS.

You wake up
You know your routine by heart
Your body carries you mindlessly
into your outfit
Eyes still fighting the urge to widen

Your legs with great effort walk
to the kitchen to get your dose of caffeine ready
You sigh, it’s early alright
the weather is almost dreary

You still look at your empty bed
messy sheets, trace yester-nights movements
with that steaming coffee in hand
and your mind torn between
“should I?” vs. ” I MUST not”

You take your crumpled pack of cigarettes
You open the shutters,
The sun rays laser their way through
teasing your eyes with daylight
“You must wake up” vs. “let me hug my pillow tighter”

You sit on that balcony of yours
Overlooking the cookie-cutter buildings
The illusion of a view, for some reason
rests your eyes, you’re still home.

You look to your side, the other chair sits there
with droplets of rain slipping slowly,
It’s vacant vs. its antonym
“You take a cautious sip of coffee silently” vs. asking “how’d you sleep?”

You light that cigarette to compliment your morning
You embrace that toxic smell, you see
the smoke dance, your eyes trace its motion
You artistically observe the smoke
“You grin” vs. “I love sleeping in the rain… next to you”

You lost yourself for a second there
You frantically look at your phone
As much as you want to stay
and fence with your thoughts of
Alone-ness vs. Loneliness
You delight in the thought
that the latter is far fetched

You enjoy the thought
that your alone-ness
is actually a state of mind
where you go realize, weigh, and respect
your true self

You embrace your alone-ness
Fuck it, your falling in love with it
It’s seducing you on a daily basis,
it’s slowly feeding you self respect
and you are mind blown
from realizing your
self worth .. FUCK wow!

You run into that social world
With an aura of glowing confidence
You must make money,
Rent is due!

Realizing your true self worth and beauty!