Light

On the 18 bus from Ramallah to Jerusalem with a Palestinian man born in Baghdad. He's asking the man next to him - is that a settlement? Is this the Arab part of town? It's his first time in Palestine and he's on his way to Haifa today. He seems a complete man here, a man with a tiny bit of satisfaction, a man who wants to know his land. I understand where he's coming from. We diaspora Palestinians have the same mythical sense of this land. Some folks who live here resent that about us. But it makes me sad to think about people all around the world who are not allowed to live where they want to be.

I get off the bus and head to work. I am filled up with that feeling I always have here - a mix of opposites. I pass a group of women having an intense conversation, trying to figure something out among themselves. There's the guy who sells ca3k and gigantic Jerusalem style falafel, which is stuffed with sauteed onion. I get to Bab el Amoud (Damascus Gate) and for a moment, I get this sense that all is well. It came and went in a split second, as if I had a peek into the past, maybe the future. Two boys kicking a soccer ball back and forth as the morning sun shines down on them. A Franciscan monk stands looking across the street. People are going about their business...the scene wasn't much different than everyday, but in that tiny slice of time

the universe opened up, enter a parallel universe
dark clouds parted
pierced
by a persistent shaft of light