WHEN THE VEIL SHIVERS

When you feel days slide like a silk veil over which nothing can be etched.
When you sit on a bench by the creek watching tall cattails stalks swaying 
When half-awake you recite lines of what you think are memorable poems 
When you feel the rustling of words draw faces from the chaos of dreams
When you sense the willow’s lower branches pierce the muddy waters 
When once-loved ghosts wrap themselves around you in an ink wash 
When you enter a two-way mirror intruding on your own split image
When you are no longer haunted by a constantly receding horizon. 
When the veil between waking and dreaming shivers like ripples 
When you don’t need a mirror to witness the ravages of time 
When you yearn to merge your center within the tree’s roots  
When you try to listen to the language of arrowheads
When algae’s glaucous hair glimmers under sunrays
When you’re impervious to the change of seasons
When you know this is where you belong

Hedy Habra is a poet, artist, and essayist. She has authored three poetry collections, most recently, The Taste of the Earth(Press 53 2019), Winner of the Silver Nautilus Book Award, Honorable Mention for the Eric Hoffer Book Award, and Finalist for the Best Book Award. Tea in Heliopolis won the Best Book Award and was finalist for the International Book Award and Under Brushstrokes was finalist for the Best Book Award and the International Book Award. Her story collection, Flying Carpets, won the Arab American Book Award’s Honorable Mention and was finalist for the Eric Hoffer Award. A seventeen-time nominee for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the net, and recipient of the Nazim Hikmet Award, her multilingual work appears in numerous publications. https://www.hedyhabra.com/