Tara Mesalik MacMahon | Beyond the Sounds, How to Say Quran
Somewhere outside of Baghdad and his acoustic Quran,
my old father gifts me, for you, an English-Arabic Quran.
We’ll observe branches, submits my uncle, count blossoms
until the sun yawns and sleeps, his smooth-quiet Quran.
Spell it ghazal, sing it guh·zl, a song or a few words for a beloved—
from my father, rare as an east-west valley, my English-Arabic Quran.
Sometimes the heart dries, wans with age, lonely for nothing.
Lovely for some things—cardamom, chrysanthemum, grandmother’s Quran.
The darkness seldom needs us, though the clean-up man lowers a star.
Follows me, my father hops on, and I join him—me and our test-the-waters Quran.
Across the moons, we trace faces, face traces—father’s three sisters, two brothers.
I place kisses—first one, then another, three more atop my English-Arabic Quran.
To the forgiven, cants my uncle, all return—even the fierce orchids.
Yet what is fire, a moment of lost trust? Dueling Qurans?
Muslim by accident, father? Muslim or accident? No, Habibti, thanks God.
Are these my hands?—leafing pages, my English-Arabic Quran.
