A poetry film, performed live
Directed by Rayan Zrein and Written by Celine Aljamil
Participated in a workshop and art competition organized by the Asfari Institute for Civil Society and Citizenship in partnership with UN Women and UNDP with the support of the Canadian Government, the interdisciplinary workshop and art competition sought to harness the transformative power of creativity in redefining women’s political engagement.
The Sun part 1
You came back, and you saw the world for what it is. Maybe it’s good to be away, in your escape. Maybe its good to pursue what’s out of your character, to remind yourself of how it should be.
The lively city responded, and you asked yourself: Is it me? is it where I go that brings so much promise?
Would you have the courage to belong? I think you need to get the fuck out if you’re staring the sun in the face and wishing it went dimmer.
You told me scrapers touched the sky with or without me and cabs were ready to take me anywhere. You trained your eyes to catch pace, to gloss over.
I wish I had more time to see if I would be promised anything different.
But was it? A matter of time? I want to make sure.
We are all promised the same sun lands apart, but its not the same.
You sit across from me and the sun is in your throat.
I sit across from you and the sun is in my lap.
The Sun part 2
I ask you: do you want to drink anything? Can I hold you? Would you have the courage to belong?
You won’t believe me, the sun is in my lap and it makes my limbs stretch like rubber
Stretch for my friends, stretch for the strangers and their stories with voices you and I both know
Voices you can sit in, seats that have memorized your curvature.
Where have you been? I miss you. Do you want anything to drink?
The Sun part 3
I came back. To a nest I’ve been kicked out of, a bird with a broken wing, surely something must be wrong for me to return to my mother’s nest.
The city a lover warned about, it must be something in the water, it washes the sun, faces slowly melt into my lap.
Where is the sun?
My lover thinks its him,
Or he might cough it up
Or choke on it.
Where do you tuck the sun? don’t lose it.
Don’t lose it, if you do it will rise from the other side as a sign of ending times and the water will flood the desert and the concrete and the scrapers will not withstand.
People will melt,
But the government wont have the funding to rebrand.
I need to escape this.
You say this all to me, I say you should go and
I will stay.
The Sun part 4
I stayed in a city that is pushing me out
I fear its streets
How have people been?
I ask like they owe me a summary, I’m standing at the door and demanding, I came back.
My travel bag sat out for 3 days after I had arrived, with its belly out, no appetite to unpack, wishing I carried less, less of myself
Body,
Body slumped stacked compromising
I’ve always been compromising of my own time, of my own account.
I think a lot about insulation in public spaces
How I can roll my car window up to a familiar face to block them from asking for a change of life
How suffocated the space is between bodies in vans and buses.
I let my eyes fall wherever they want and
I learned that they are invasive.
There’s nothing that binds you to the other in this sardine box except that you’re all sardines.
I tell you of all of this,
and you say: how will you make sense of the world if you’re viewing it in between distractions?
I’ve always struggled to make sense of waiting periods:
There was a week and a couple of days separating you from your homecoming,
the promised dream.
Your uncle came back, with debt, he gave up, he resents you, because he’s steps away than he hoped he would be.
He prayed that you would struggle, because look at how laid out life is for you.
So you portioned your food and wasted your time,
To save your money.
The Sun part 5
Hop on,
Someone is coughing in my ears
Hop off.
Hop on,
I forgot my earphones this time
Hope off.
Hop on,
My eyes relax and they go to the back of someone’s head
This old lady’s arm is too close to my rail
Hop off.
Hop on,
I am balancing my body
I am on my feet, they’re asking me to dance
We’re all dancing, on this moving bus
Stops away from our homecoming.
I have a coffee date with you,
Sun in my cup, sun in my throat, sun in my lap
Hop off.
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