A Dream of Kuwait

There is a boat on top of the bookcase, wooden
with a flag that reads Kuwait, reads
not of deserts, but something of sailing.

Habibi, I never went, but was told through others
of orb-like towers, built for water, and the streets
grown so hot, you feel a great weight hovering over you, pushing
like two hands folding the earth.

Binti, you would call, little one, and we would lie close,
and you pointed over waters and waters as though to find
that far away coast, where we could watch
the great eye close, and a final surge
of solar perplexity and vague mystery
as green light broke the waves.

This is how I love you: a green burst
among the waves, and every night
when the great eye closes, and again when it awakes.
We are as heavy as an endless summer, and as thick
as stars spread in the wilderness, where I looked
at sand for hours seeing only your face.