 This evening. I will share three poems with you The first one is entitled inside your own short story as told to you by me from US-British led attack on Iraq and Dedicated to Palestinian writer artist activist Rassan Kanafani Hassan Kanafani assassinated inside your own car Inside your own short story blown up driving a niece to college two lives too rich to perish into unfading ashes Selfish secret assassin Ogled and darted Freedom fighter assassinated inside your own short story Resistance poetry will set you free Occupiers still have our motherland never still in the night Daily raids kidnapping children by night swoop boys up like mythical wing dragons Rocks nestle in pockets and close to hearts Freedom fighter assassinated poetics by candlelight Newspapers underground Stillborn babies tear-gassed nonviolent protesters Shot at nonviolent protesters rubber bulleted Nonviolent protesters imprisoned political prisoners Nonviolent protesters and some still looking for our Gandhi More than an intifada skulks about nowadays Jabbing and jerking among immortal cacti An incessant people's revolution this intifada Literally a shaking off Fire in the hearts Stones cracked and crumbled for freedom weapons possessed against the david Children of the stone age intifada Kipped with their marbles and rocks soul survivor alongside immortal cacti A 450 palestinian villages flat lined Look rossan look down see ripened prickly fruit Loosen stones underneath deep rooted base Lean your ear listen to loosening rocks Swishing through the air hurled by boys who will wane in a cell for decades for such exploits Without a rock in sweaty palms listen to prolific cacti Listen to calls and moans of mothers and then the 90s presented us Horrors akin to Hiroshima in iraq and onward our cradle of civilization Everyone's mesopotamia Shukran It's good to see you all here. Thank you for being here The second poem I will share with you this evening Was inspired When my daughter visited raza twice on humanitarian missions This was in the 208 209 massacre Entitled coping Death once has a way of coping Catastrophe or nakba of 1948 Steel heavy sadness steel and rubber bullets chronic loss Mothers mourning each dawn loan survivor yearning for notice among ashes Shrines in the hollows spirits rising wailing Death circadian wanton genocidal Palestine goddess mother Morning each dawn mother of mothers mother of me She dies she rises she dies daily this way of dying more than once leaves one without a way to cope This way of dying is clandestine. So many are guilty in the tangle So many are guilty So many are complicit in the game. So many are selfish in their ways So many are crafty in their lies Leave my mother alone At peace at home For a rebirth and invite us Invite me to her baptism in the jordan river Shukran This poem Has uh experienced about three revisions. I think this is the final one It is entitled I actually revised it today This entitled the more I love me me the palestinian The more they hate me their convenient ugly arab the more I love me me illustrious palestinian The more fictitious villains and bogeymen women me Trolling their myths and propaganda for covetous gain Feeding their sharp steel teeth for imperialist industrial military complex and illegal hilltop colonizers The more they label me terrorist and them not The more I share me show me write me read me the more they demonize me Bind me gag me kill me the more I cook maklube and mujaddara for partaking The more they portray me perpetrator criminal Liar the more I play marshal khalife and bagdad blues The more they label me foolish refusing substantial offers and not partner for negotiation Unwilling to compromise the more I recite mahmood darwish Ghassan and fadwa the more they laugh out loud mock me block me say I'm Serving it to men and their ubiquitous laws and canon the more I brave independence power womanhood The more they bomb and bomb and bomb and bomb and bomb the more I parade truth Humanity goodness prominence the more they violate international law than spin spin spin I made them do it massacre indiscriminately in self-defense Committing mass murder minus impunity not even a flinch from leaders from sea to sea From soil to sky and so the almighty occupiers grin and sneer Carry on dropping white phosphorus on babies cradled by mothers The more that die and die and die without a trace Outer utterance the more I persevere to protect what is left of humanity The more land home and orchard they pilfer from me the more I thrive with less And yet still I have more The more of me they slay in shatila sabra hebron Jeanine raza the more living and fallen angels appear before the good Restoring and empowering vision breath Compassion valour The more they hate me their ugly arab And indoctrinate others to hate me the more I love me me the palestinian Thank you. Thank you