A Haven Unfailing to Its Seeker

In the company of a costly cup of coffee

In the vastness of the sea and its mesmerizing scenery,

Amid a crowd of faces, none of whom I know,

At sunset—when the sun calms after its midday fury—

I’m sitting in a destination that I didn’t plan.

After walking roads for the first time, without achieving any goal

Having traversed half the distance, I turned back when I was closer.

I was following in the footsteps of the city’s people,

A city that reminded me of my own.

In the hubbub of merchants and passersby,

I listened to the driver speak of Gaza

I found myself paying attention without thinking.

As if he were speaking of a part of me,

Of a hometown that had become so hard to reach.

He spoke as if it had become a city for ghosts to inhabit

Calm, save for the echoes of loss,

Secluded, as though in another realm.

Do I ask him more about it?

Or remain only a listener, not to interrupt his words?

I roamed the city, asking for my way

I always asked to know, yet found myself asking strangers like me.

The answer paints in his eyes: I’m like you

As If he comforted himself as much as he was comforting me,

In his state of loss and a destination not set yet.

And I’m here between the sky and the shore’s sands,

My eyes reflecting the redness of the sunset,

The rhythm of the waves.

As I sip my coffee, Keep a close eye on the time

To calculate the rest of the beauty—the rest of the coffee,

And The time before the sun dips completely

Hoping to pause the time, to keep watching,

To keep drinking coffee, leaving everything beyond my back.

Yet even if my course strays from its path,

The compass will be pointing to one:

To a haven that never fails those who come,

That listens to the unspoken,

That gives without ever taking—

A retreat with the sea—and a scalding cup of coffee.