Tired of the dance

I pack all my things

My purse

My identity card

A few cases of some frozen times,

and I spit times I hate;

novels and stories of cursed times came down my mouth;

I sheltered my child of the hardships between my eyelids,

I called him lion

for I pulled him out of the jaws of the desert fiercest beasts;

and I crowned myself

Queen of the desert,

the rivers, the seas and the people.

I shredded all the silly stories;

As if torrential rain,

Stories poured down my ribs;

One day, I will hang them in the living-room

all condensed in one cubic painting

all that will be kept of the times of dust and estrangement,

are the strokes of the brush and the intersections of sharp features;

The messiah left,

He never bid farewell,

Tears are the medalions of crocodiles

Red-gloss on their ugly jaws

testifies of the cowardice of preys.

No, I will not allow the curtain down,

I will not listen to the opera singer.

I might watch a part of the final act,

I will stealthily whisper in Evita’s ears:

Die dearest,

die!

Truths burry us alive

What were you expecting?

You whored yourself off to be,

You never knew, dear,

That in the altar of politics

Blood becomes cheap

When the whore is a woman.

Evita,

Saint of the whores,

Our song is for the one and only;

The sultan who does not eulogize mirrors,

A thick wall and hardship times

stood between us;

Farewell me lady!

For I am leaving today,

I might see you one day in a line that intersects with the sun;

another painting

that I will hang on the wall of our living-room.

Photography © Allison Goldin

Photography © Allison Goldin

Jamila Ouriour ( J.Ouriour) is an American Arab who has resided in Massachusetts for nearly thirteen years. She participates in several open mic events and writers groups.

Allison Goldin is an artist living in Cambridge. Her work is a collection of spontaneous drawings from the imagination. The most common link throughout her art are the semi-recognizable creatures scattered amongst and bringing together the surrounding doodles. She is currently studying Illustration at The School of Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.