There are things this poem would rather not say

2018-11-15 Elana Bell

We ate labneh and bread in your tents

When we had no water

we drew it from your well

Your camels carried the sand to build our houses

you built them–your hands–

Fig-tree prickly-pear human-flood

You were the wasteland we made bloom

–Reprinted by permission of Louisiana State University Press from Eyes, Stones (2012)

Elana Bell

Elana Bell’s first collection of poetry, Eyes, Stones (LSU Press) won the 2011 Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets. Elana leads creative writing workshops for women in prison, for educators, for high school students in Israel and Palestine, and throughout the five boroughs of New York City, as well as for the peace building and leadership organization, Seeds of Peace. She was a recent finalist for the Freedom Plow Award for Poetry & Activism, an award which recognizes and honors a poet doing innovative transformative work at the intersection of poetry and social change. Elana teaches literature and creative writing at CUNY’s College of Staten Island and curates public art installations with Poets in Unexpected Places. You can visit her website at www.elanabell.com.

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Elana Bell