When you start shooting
I leave you to your no man’s land
Arcane and insupportable
Setting on a heinous hedonistic throne
Flesh and bone
Where the muddy trenches of your soul
Extend their lifeless nerves
Down the lower layers
Of lies, illusions, vanity and ancient fear
The touch of dream between your fingers and eyelids
Your lips and time split
That scuttles your life
Fills you with brine and stale foresight
Drink up your wine
No one would say that you betrayed the glass
That reduced sharp feelings
While rows of the dead take their way to the cemetery
At the outskirts of Baghdad
With ghosts overhead
On their lethal flying carpets
Metal Jinnis
Long time ago, dead
Say if you were in Baghdad
Before the thousand nights
Come to an end
You would have lighted a candle
To add a bit of shine
To the delirious fever
Hovering over the river
The leaning houses
Blood and fright
To make that city look a little more bright
Z. Azzabi