Trish Salah
Gemmayze
Wake to
I don’t know what
is a room
of no reprieve
Beside itself this city is
not itself
I’m not
of it either
Behind my eyes
the light is continuous
fractures
time’s moment
Outside
hustling bodies
and the rain
I lost the device
long dreamt
could capture
Walking is
good intuition if
thought is not integrated
the foreigner
whose unknown tongue
Climb the solitary steps
excepting the voices
that dream and practice
to sleep
Night brings
music’s envelope
and body taken
how to want
that war
dancing
beyond your window?
Born in Halifax, Trish Salah is the author of two poetry collections, Wanting in Arabic and Lyric Sexology, Vol. 1. She currently resides in Toronto, and teaches in the Department of Gender Studies at Queen’s University, Kingston.