Memory Pictures #2
Hadeel Abu Johar follows Salma's transition from childhood to loss… and from one bed to another.
A bed that is unlike me
Salma is dancing
Salma is in love
Little Salma is unaware of loss
She knows she has lovely friends
And an ugly bicycle
That she loves anyway.
Salma has grown
She can see the loss for herself
So much that dancing is almost gone from her life
Songs change
The birds she has loved are departing
It took her years of waiting to know they wouldn't be returning.
Salma walks past me
Does not greet me
And for two years I sat facing her!
It seems to me Salma is becoming a bird
So she can leave…
She too changed before becoming a bird
Suddenly she was close to the cats
She liked watching them, calling them, feeding them!
She, who has often declared, "I hate cats!"
She made random statements
Loneliness is poison,
She screamed.