Destination Unknown
Illustration by Alyazia.
I’m knitting every thought onto my body
Thickening my skin after all the shedding
Sitting in an hourglass of decay.
The grains trickle through my hands
I remember our time at the beach
Elsewhere, far away from today
15 years ago, to be exact.
You sat sheltered under the shade
My body was folding salt.
I go back to 20
Nearby the Mediterranean Sea,
Here I reek.
Disney princess in the Middle East
All the villains live in Beirut;
They lure you into the city with red apples
Glowing orbs of hope
Possess you with a genie’s bottle.
Do you know what we do with empty bottles?
We fill them with letters and send them out to sea
Each letter migrates far away;
You don’t hear back.
The shade
Mama is the queen of the electric light-up floor;
Covered all the songs, swiftly danced through every level.
She sits in the shade at the beach now
Far away from the waves, the groove
I feel the beat in my toes
Sitting next to the ocean too close
I’m engulfed by the rhythm.
My body sweats in purgatory
The screen counts down in front of me
1,2,3, the music starts. Round 1.
Foot massage
Did you know that moms fumble on their feet? Mama missed a step today; the beat was off. It reminded me of that time when the wave wanted to carry me away. I’m thankful mama pulled me back. Who pulls her back? When does she rest her feet?
Teta’s embroidery
Teta knits until her wrists hurt
She knows all my cousins’ sizes
I tried to mimic the turn of her hands
The accuracy of her fingers
Going through one loop after the other
I have her thick skin.
She pricked her finger times and times before
Growing numb, growing resilient
These patterns are all she knows
So, she dresses us up with her cloth and wool
And we sweat in this heat.
The scarf will feel snug once I’m in Europe.
Perfume
Ever used mawared (ماء ورد) to soothe a sunburn?
Teta dabs my red cheeks with it and all of a sudden, the scent drags my nose
I’m littered with nostalgia that doesn’t belong to me.
On every other day, I reek
Smells stick just like salt does
A mixture of sewage, exhaust, and skin shed
But in that little bottle resting in the kitchen pantry, rose water cleanses me
It dilutes poison
I shake the last drops down, squeeze the petals
Pat my cheeks and know it’s time:
When the bottle’s empty, we send it out to sea… ◆
Celine Aljamil is a Lebanese writer and creative, studying Media and Communication at the American University of Beirut. She founded Documented Experiences in 2017, a creative network, outspoken platform and web magazine. Celine writes her stories in the form of prose and nonfiction under the penname Tonguetied Writer. She has explored people and places through intimate journalism pieces, published with Watchdogs Gazette, Kalaam Banat, and Home Magazine. Find her on Instagram.