In Jaffa, my grandmother Takouhi Zakarian

cut white cambric, pierced it with leaf shapes,
buttonholed raw edges and linked the widest spaces
with fine cotton rungs, and then embroidered flowers.

How many thousand stitches did she leave behind?
Was it her life’s work to heal the frayed?

Over the heart and below each hip she cut a rectangle
and filled it with a grid, like the grille between harem
and house. She stitched deer, flowers, leaves.

When I wear the camisole I see my skin through the spaces
she left and feel her young, warm, ready for my grandfather.

Imagine him waiting to be acceptable to her, changing
himself, letting go of ghosts. I imagine the oasis of her,
waiting, embroidering messages of purity and faith.


The world makes way for people who know where they’re going

              (Poster in a West Jerusalem fashion store, 2017)
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