Your Parents’ House

Your parents grow older, perhaps
old. The same conversations,
yellow like the walls,

not all the walls, do not
exaggerate. Repetition, yes,
is a woman with curly hair,

you find her there, hands in her lap.
The scent: you wonder
how something intangible could

hold. You like the certainty
of the old sofa and cooked yoghurt,
of garlic and dry mint leaves.

You like the little girl in your room
biting pencils, drawing
circles in the air.

Zeina Hashem Beck is a Lebanese poet with a BA and an MA in English Literature from the American University of Beirut.

Listen to Zeina Hashem Beck and Jaydn DeWald discuss “Your Parents’ House” on our Contributors in Conversation podcast.