free free palestine

free free palestine

free free palestine

free free palestine

i keep studying how the trees send their messages underground

send nourishment, send warning.

how the trees pull up rivers from the ground

and swallow sunlight into their rough skin straight from the air

the trees must show the babies in palestine how to do this

i slip out to the red maple in my yard when i think no one will see me – in case it works and becomes insurgent

i whisper into the leaves:

take this safe bask in sunlight to palestine

and a great lake of fresh water to palestine

take the true rest of peace time to palestine

take the nutrients from my soil to palestine

take the wheat, take every seed that can grow to palestine

bone and gristle, let fat drip to each chin in palestine

green leaves stewed with sumac and oil in palestine

let this za’atar dusted bread fill each mouth in palestine

even here where i have not been bombed one time

while my country was bombing yours

even here where they fight to call genocide war

even here on this corrupt and colonized dirt

even here you are loved

the trees here whisper on behalf of the ghosts

who want to feed you

as i want to feed you

i imagine the mycelial thread praying its blind way through the dirt

coming to the edge of the ocean

burrowing down further into a place unimaginably hot and full of life

and somehow my heart vibrating drum roots across tectonic plates

coming up into that sea i only know from your pictures

coming up through and beyond all barricades

hands full of freedom and food

take this fully formed fruit and vision to palestine

send great plants that can gift good life to palestine

let the flowers bloom into shelters in palestine

let the world see humanity there in palestine

i whisper until i am weeping

and i ask the trees to carry everything to you in palestine

i weep with shame that i and we have not found a way to stop this massacre

we do not yet know ourselves how to survive these bullies

to stop this death cult

i do not yet know how, i don’t know how

but i remember, we are the majority

and our ancestors root around us, in copses of comfort and revolution

maple and olive, birch and pine

i remember: we who want to live have to live together

we who want to live have to live together

i whisper down into the trees to show us a way to hold onto each other

through the fire

through the logging

through the drought

through the rapists in highest office

who make everything a violation

through the hate and cruelty

and then through this awakening, this too slow awakening, to the truth

through the aftermath of the awakening when everyone will say they always knew better

through to the future, the inevitable future

where palestine is free…

i trust the trees more than any nation.

i trust our ancestors more than any leader

some of these trees are older than us, they have always known us

they hold our ancestors like water, like sun

when i sing of palestine to the tree in the yard,

she touches my face,

she takes away my tears,

to make for you

a medicine of life  

free free palestine

free free palestine

free free palestine

free free palestine

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