A Tissue of Lies
The next punter is unlikely to wear a suicide vest,
won’t be a person-borne IED, unlikely to carry an AK,
or launch a complex attack for kidnap or death.
Eating with friends, back to the room, perfectly
at ease, mostly, a few times I wished my back
was to the wall, that I had clear sight of the door.
The backpack I use to take packed lunch to work
has slowly morphed into the grab-and-run bag—
everything not in the bag becomes left-behind,
discarded, sorely missed, because suddenly gone,
too big, not needed, not urgent, replaceable. The bag
itself becomes lifebuoy, touchstone, home.
Sparked by the latest news from Gaza, a moment
of recognition taps my shoulder: everything
we assume is written on tissue, life is disposable.
At night some wraith voids assumptions
of safety, of care, that water and power will
continue to flow, that we can walk the streets.
The nightmare insists—it’s a lie! it won’t continue!—
and will flow into the rest of the world’s uncertainty,
the precarious state that’s the true human condition,
stripped of meaning, resources, ease, working systems.
These days, I’m unprepared, I’m out of condition,
not ready to run, and wouldn’t know to where,
and can’t decide if it matters, and if I should stick
with comforting illusions, or live within the fragility
the West visits on the rest of the world’s people.