We're Still Here

We're Still Here

            Thought.

I don't think we have ever celebrated your birthday. It's a shame really. Do you think it's too late to start? We could celebrate it there, if they aren't killing some more people next December.

            Memory.

I still remember you with your banner, and your red polo shirt telling me to meet you by KFC. I don't think it was there that we became so close, maybe earlier. I don't remember.

            Desire.

I don't want this to be just rambling, I want it to be a "beautiful text" like you say. But the more I think of how beautiful I want it, the more difficult it gets. So I will just write your own testimony, I don't have one of my own. My only testimony is that I'm still breathing – but that's human biology.

Tahrir November 2011

Your phone call wakes me up. You're there, I know you are. You ask me and I tell you – unashamed – "in bed". You're worried. You ask me breathless, with the sound cracking behind you, "is this right?" And in our own way, which is like leaves falling into the pages of a book, I understand. I tell you "Yes, it is. There is no other right" but you already know that.

Tahrir December 2011

You stand between the people, mesmerized by the warmth they give. Stupefied by the heat of the blood. The clock becomes 12 and another day has passed. I count the days, I add new ones, days with you around me. "He was turning 23 this month," you say, "like me". I shut this sentence out, I keep on counting days.

Tahrir January 2012

"Why don't we die? Why are we still living?"

I have no answer. I look at you and change the subject.

Testimony

We are still living because I do not know what to do with days without you.  That's my only explanation.