Nahki Maa El-Hoot (slow decay)

I wonder if the Earth still spins
Or if it’s me, numbed and dizzy, gazing at it
Sahara…devouring my crops, burying the living alive
Sahara…consuming my land as we pray for rain

I wonder why people bring forth children?
To mature amidst the state’s afflictions, the people of the state, and the sewage?
A state… one arsehole departs, another arrives, and yet another returns
A state… quenching the hotels’ thirst, while the land’s owners remain parched
Tell me?

Have you seen the bird that used to migrate to us? it no longer visits.
Have you seen the orphaned palm tree, its springs desiccated and forlorn?
My veins are strain against my skin and my dwelling lies entombed beneath the shifting dunes
Nothing is left from the ancestral heaven, but salt, dust and thorns

We’ve wrought this upon ourselves and those who follow
A mindset of greed and exploitation
Ask those who purchased us, who acquired it all and the baby gazelle
And those who gave up our sahara and our awakening to the Arabian Gulf

Stand and contemplate the quicksand
Arises to bring down the rest of your fate
Rotting in slow decay..
Stand and contemplate the ocean
arises to wash out your hate with the waves
Rotting in slow decay…

I wonder if my words carry any sound
Or if I am adrift in my own sea, conversing with fish
A wave… devouring my shores and burying the forgotten history
A wave… devouring my land, sold to the highest bidder

I wonder why people bring forth children?
To grow amidst the much of the state, the people of mules and the machine
A state… one arsehole departs, another arrives, and yet another returns
A state… exporting fruits and dates and importing the filth of italians

Have you glimpsed the bird that once graced our skies? It no longer graces our shores
And have you witnessed the bird that departs from us? It shall never return
One soul pleads with the angel of death for a fishing rod
While another trawls and scrapes the womb of the sea
Big fish will always eat little fish

We’ve wrought this upon ourselves and those who follow
One day, we will pay for what we did to “the others”
Inferno in Tabarka mourning the thirst of the parched souls
Today marks the final chapter of the ‘Gabes Chernobyl’ book

Stand and contemplate the quicksand
Arises to bring down the rest of your fate
Rotting in slow decay..
Stand and contemplate the ocean
arises to wash out your hate with the waves
Rotting in slow decay…