"You were first created out of love, so carry nothing but love"
Passing over and mending wounds with gauze
The Sea (1887) by Jan Toorop, original from The Rijksmuseum
Not Just Passing
by Heba Abu Nada
Yesterday, a star said
to the little light in my heart,
We are not just transients
passing.
Do not die. Beneath this glow
some wanderers go on
walking.
You were first created out of love,
so carry nothing but love
to those who are trembling.
One day, all gardens sprouted
from our names, from what remained
of hearts yearning.
And since it came of age, this ancient language
has taught us how to heal others
with our longing,
how to be a heavenly scent
to relax their tightening lungs: a welcome sigh,
a gasp of oxygen.
Softly, we pass over wounds,
like purposeful gauze, a hint of relief,
an aspirin.
O little light in me, don’t die,
even if all the galaxies of the world
close in.
O little light in me, say:
Enter my heart in peace.Â
All of you, come in!
Translated from Arabic by Huda Fakhreddine via Mizna and Arab Lit
The writer and educator Heba Abu Nada was killed by an airstrike on her home in Gaza on October 20, 2023. She was 32 years old.
Creative Invitations
Is there a little light in you that does not ever shed nor waver, even when you are devastated or angry? Imagine the pitch black—then add speckles of light to it. Add your particular light. What does your light look like?
Create an altar for the light that is always present but also needs remembering.
Remember your brothers and sisters who will always exist as light. Remember those we lost this month who will always exist as light. Light a candle for them.
How terrible that the light from this bright shining star was extinguished so soon and in this darkest of ways. Thank you for bringing her light to us. I will add a candle for her to my ever growing altar.
What a beautiful poem, and ever so poignant to learn of her tragic young death