Thread by @gautambhatia88

Devastated to learn about the passing of Mourid Barghouti.

"I Saw Ramallah" is one of the most beautiful pieces of prose that I have ever read in my life.

Ave atque vale.

https://twitter.com/zeinabeck/status/1361022387861524485

"Memory is not a geometric shape drawn with instruments, mathematical decisions and a calculator, an area of glorious joy next to an area of pain."

"... through its form, poetry can resist the content of authoritarian discourse. By resorting to understatement, concrete and physical language, a poet contends against abstraction, generalization, hyperbole and the heroic language of hot-headed generals and bogus lovers alike."

"And since we cannot wash the polluted words of hatred the same way we wash greasy dishes with soap and hot water, we the poets of the world, continue to write our poems to restore the respect of meaning and to give meaning to our existence."

"On the pillow I collected the days and nights of laughter, of anger, or tears, of foolishness, and of marble monuments for which a single lifetime cannot suffice to visit them all with an offering of silence and respect."

I have pages and pages of handwritten notes from his writings.

What a gift he was.

What a desperately sad day.