Saadi Youssef

The Porcupine

He lives in his old continent
alone
cramped between the sun's dust and evening grass.
His white stomach taut as a bow string,
his eyes pursue the twitching of ants
and the shiver of water seeping through branches.
They seek to be touched by a child going mad
or what night wears as it goes mad
or what befalls the trees
or what the trees bring his way.
He is taken by the things of his old continent,
this ambusher children once mistook
for a rag ball to play with
and a woman believed was a rock
to massage her feet with,
and the palm snake thought a stiff mouse.
He hides in the great inattention
waiting for someone to enter his hovel. . .

Night begins
in his old continent,
and he moves
slowly,
laugh-eyed,
glad that the earth is full
of these temptations.

Baghdad 1979

The Fence