“During a Genocide” by Yahia Lababidi

Image courtesy of gloucester2gaza, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

During a Genocide

You will find that during a genocide
most words lose their meaning —
some sound empty & others strange

Apart from unceasing prayer,
eloquence takes the form
of tears or kindness and solidarity

Even a quiet moan or sighing
is preferable to false words or worse:
a loud and wounding Silence...

“At Gaza Zoo” by Yahia Lababidi
“Minister of Loneliness” by Yahia Lababidi 

Yahia Lababidi is the author of eleven collections of poetry and prose. [His most recent collection is titled Palestine Wail, from which the above poem and this author note is taken.] His aphorisms and poems have gone viral, are used in classrooms, religious services and have been featured at international film festivals. Lababidi has also contributed to news, literary, and cultural institutions throughout the USA, Europe and the Middle East, including Oxford University, Pearson, the PBS NewsHour, NPR, HBO as well as ABC Radio. His latest work includes a collection of his aphorisms on morality and mortality, Quarantine Notes (Fomite Press, 2023), Desert Songs (Rowayat, 2022), a bilingual photographic account of mystical encounters in the desert, and Learning to Pray (Kelsay Books, 2021), a collection of spiritual reflections.