Psalm of Palms: For Davoud

Photo collage by Gabie Yacobi

Glimmers of violence, hope, brotherhood, and belonging grace this poem by Gabie Yacobi about her father's coming of age between Iran, Israel, and California.

winds met at the edge of a field

cut by laughter and the strike of small feet

my father’s magen david

pounding against his chest

the shaking of the net sends

little hands into the air, each one

worth more with every skinned knee

blood against blood

the taste of salt and iron on their tongues

a star scraped raw

the clatter of a crown, slammed

against hard ground, startling

birds, wings flashing against a deep sky 

as balmy afternoons turned to late

nights by the border, hands reaching

toward lebanon and cigarettes

smoked in the breeze of a foreign ocean

giving way to a sea of milk

and honey off the coast

sweet fruit split between brothers

throwing muscle and bone, 

blood against blood,

bound by the same star

gleaming in eyes welcomed

home

iridescent dreams of the pond

where once-flighted birds would trip

and the fish scattered in fractals

beyond the sea, under palm fronds

without the same sweet dates