And by the smell of it we are going to have a sand storm today,
which means that the people on the borders are already
covered in sand. Crazy weather. Yesterday it rained and today sand.

Only a matter of days ago
journalists wandered in amazement—
Iraqis were still going about their business in the streets,
shops and market places as if nothing were wrong.

Today shops are closed. Not in the usual shut-the-door-and-lock-it
routine, but in a sheet-metal-welded-on-the-front closed,
a windows-removed-and-built-with-bricks closed.

Driving through Baghdad singing along to songs
saying things like “we will be with you till the day we die, Saddam”
is suddenly a bit too heavy, no one gave that line too much thought,
but somehow these days it sounds sinister.

Military presence in the streets remains absent, but is expected.
For now, the odd car with machine guns touring the streets
is enough to make people nervous.

Prices are rising. Not only because of the drop of the Dinar,
but also because supplies have become scarce. The hottest items
after the "particle-masks" are earplugs. They can no longer be
found in shops and have to be pre-ordered.

Gas station line-ups are longer now, hours long,
and some have two police cars posted out front
to make sure there are no problems. A trip to Syria which
once cost $50, now costs $600. People are staying.

Announcements on Shabab (youth) TV are selling
water pumps and tanks, hard helmets, small electrical
generators and Chemical-biological attack protection chambers—
An octagonal barrel laid on its side with two bunks in it.
No prices, just a phone number.

No one inside Iraq is for war (note I said war, not a change of regime),
no human being in his right mind will ask you to give him the beating of his life.
And if you do hear Iraqi (in Iraq, not expat) saying “come on, bomb us!” it is the
exasperation and 10 years of sanctions and hardship talking. We are not
suicidal you know, not all of us in any case.

Zaitoon Street

Today the Ba’ath Party people started taking their places
in the trenches and main squares and intersections, fully armed
and freshly shaven. They look too clean, too well-groomed to
defend anything. And the number of kids— they couldn’t be older
than 20, sitting in trenches sipping Miranda fizzy drinks and eating chocolate.

Zaitoon (the olive tree) Street, is barren.
A girl with straight black hair sits alone on her
front stoop. Sun and dust collaborate to tattoo
delicate patterns on her smooth skin
in the absence of footsteps all around, dust that
once swirled with purpose.

The cities of Rawa and Anna are so full of people now
you wouldn't find a hut to rent. It was pretty safe to be there
during the first war and people who have the money
are renting places there hoping that it will be safe this time.

To the east of her is a building that has been hit twice,
(Desert Storm and Desert Fox). Afterwards they decided to
redesign, though it is still unfinished. To the west,
an area off-limits to Iraqis. The Sijood Palace can be seen
from the other side of the Tigris River, its turquoise turrets
floating above the dust like a mirage.

The worst is seeing and feeling the city come to a halt.
Nothing. No buying, no selling, no people running after buses.
At least inside it does not feel so sad. Stories about the first gulf war
are being told for the 100th time.

The girl’s brother is nowhere to be seen.
He is not sloughing about their neighborhood with friends,
batting stones with a stick in her direction, or sitting
bored in the sun.

Today, on Zaitoon Street, she is not an Iraqi.
Not a sister or a daughter. She is a child of straight black hair
and deep-set olive-black eyes, waiting.

         

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