Sixty Years and Counting!

Commemorating sixty years of the Palestinian Nakba (catastrophe)

By Saed Jamal Abu-Hijleh
May 2008, Nablus, Palestine

Sixty years and counting,
Anger in my being is mounting.

Sixty years and counting,
The child in me is shouting:
I want to run, to fly, to sing, to cry,
To walk, talk, write on the blackboard with a chalk:
"End this bloody occupation..."

Sixty years and counting!
Nablus the city of goodness,
A wounded witness to this “bloody occupation...”

No need for wake up calls,
The tanks come on time,
Go on time,
And leave you no time to plan your time…
But can these tanks kill the thyme… of Ebal and Jirzim?

Kneel to these monsters they tell us everyday,
But only to Allah we kneel when we pray,
Another sixty thousand years will not change what I say.

Tanks do not grow on mountains but olives do.
Tanks do not grow on mountains but Palestinians do.
I am an olive and my blood is oil,
My flesh is this sacred soil,
My breath the wind of the Mediterranean,
My eyes make the sea blue.

Sixty years and the fascist can go to hell,
The mosque will say Allah Akbar,
The Church will ring its bell.