She Left Her Mark Poem by Sadek Mohammed

It's Friday.
The quiet cups of silence/ the silence of the cups,
the dirty anguished table/ the table of dirty anguish,
the brimming ash/ the ash on the brim,
the empty packs of cigarettes/ the cigarettes in packs of emptiness,
The leaning shelves/ the shelves of the leaning,
the open mouth of the window/ the window of the open mouth,
the long journeys of the mind/ the mind of the long journeys,
the river of impending dying/ the impending death of the river,
the death of the city/ the city of death,
the loss of a woman, the woman of loss.

It seems she has left her mark.
I told you that.

'Be honest! '

The noun is a ladder. The adjective is a well.

That ladder invokes a well.
The well invokes a ladder.
The ladder. The well.
The invocation…

You know you have to be honest.
You are not real, you know that.
When you stumbled upon the bed, she carried the baby.
Most women carry babies.
The man carries his stick. Most men carry their sticks.
When the Imam says, 'Be honest! '
He does not mean Hamlet killed his woman.
He simply means it's Friday.