By SARA ELKAMEL
I am beginning to think about the middle,
and how we should behave in it.
When I say you held me closer than clouds hold birds
you tell me it was coincidence we slept at all.
Of course I want it to stop. I dream every night of a man
with the head of a man and the body of a scary sea creature.
I dream the man is lost so I carry him home. Of course
I mistake water for home and home for water but at least, I try.
In the dream no one searches for me. Awake, I show symptoms
of love, but I cannot say for sure. I keep looking for the
‘remedies for every ailment’ I wrote in Amman in the fall—sitting
by the window infested with doubt. I remember neither ailments
nor remedies. By the ancient sugar mill where there used to be a river,
we were told there was a time they cured everything with sugar.
Sara Elkamel is a poet and journalist living between her hometown, Cairo, and New York City. She holds an MA in arts journalism from Columbia University and is currently pursuing an MFA in poetry at New York University. Named a 2020 Gregory Djanikian Scholar by The Adroit Journal, Elkamel’s writing has appeared or is forthcoming in The Common, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Rumpus, American Chordata, Winter Tangerine, as part of the Halal If You Hear Me anthology, and elsewhere.
