The Arabic Poetry Night | ليلة الشعر العربي
"At a Brooklyn poetry reading, she recites verses that make him remember everything. He's the audience member who approaches after—and never leaves."
The Arabic Poetry Night
ليلة الشعر العربي
The café hosts Arabic poetry the first Tuesday of every month.
Twenty people, microphone, words from centuries past. I've been performing for three years.
Tonight, someone listens differently.
I'm Dalia.
Forty-one, Palestinian-American, teaching Arabic literature at NYU. Poetry is my prayer.
He's in the back row, crying.
After my set, he approaches.
"Your recitation of Mahmoud Darwish—" He can't finish.
"It's about home."
"I know. I'm from Gaza."
His name is Youssef.
Forty-five, came to the US during the First Intifada. Engineer, successful, lonelier than he admits.
"I haven't heard Arabic like that since my grandmother."
"That's the highest compliment."
"Can I buy you coffee? To thank you?"
"You don't need to thank me."
"Then to continue the conversation?"
We talk until the café closes.
About poetry, politics, the particular grief of Palestinians who left.
"I feel like I know you," he admits.
"Poetry does that. Opens doors."
"You opened doors tonight. Ones I've kept locked."
"What's behind them?"
"Everything I've tried to forget. And now I'm not sure I want to forget anymore."
We start meeting regularly.
Poetry nights, dinners, walks through Brooklyn. Words flowing between us.
"I'm falling for you," I say one night.
"I've been falling since Darwish."
The first kiss is in his apartment.
Arabic books everywhere, art from Palestine. He tastes like coffee and memory.
"This feels like home," I whisper.
"You are home."
He undresses me surrounded by his mother's embroidery.
Thobes from a village that no longer exists. History witnessing present.
"Beautiful."
"Youssef—"
"Let me show you what words can't."
He makes love to me like poetry.
Rhythmic, meaningful, each movement a verse.
"Ya hayati—Dalia—"
"Right there—"
"Let me hear you—"
I come reciting Arabic.
Not consciously—just words spilling out. He says it was the most beautiful thing he's ever heard.
"I love you," he says.
"Ana kamaan."
Two years later
We're married now.
Poetry nights are our thing. He reads to me; I recite for him.
"Happy?" he asks.
"More than any verse could capture."
"Then we write new verses."
Alhamdulillah.
For poetry that connects.
For cafés that gather diaspora.
For words that become love.
The End.