Rose water,
Rose water,
Why did she have a daughter?
Why not another boy?
Flowers blooming in the water
In a pail for the dead.
Strange these flowers,
Like limp hands;
Rubied like
Old drying wounds.
When the blood coagulates
There will be no more rose water Read More
A couple days ago this story on the closing of popular Books@Café in Jordan slapped me with incredible clarity about many things I’ve been struggling with for a while. When I first read it, I thought, give me a break, that was predictable, another year of the same old confusion during Ramadan.
Then I realized this story comes shortly after this remarkable Jordanian blogger, Ajloun, calls it quits, after seemingly never ending tales of corruption revolving around public officials. This is happening in a country facing political, economic and social challenges all taking a heavy toll, with a local media in a perpetual downward spiral, and an extremely frustrated people.
Brand Jordan is bust. Brand Jordan is in the worse shape ever, it seems. Read More
Perhaps with the mainstream audience’s addiction to reality television and “found footage” movies such as “Cloverfield” and “Diary of the Dead,” Nick Broomfield’s recent ventures into features will finally give him the credit he richly deserves for a genre that he has been a giant in for over two decades.
His ground breaking and often controversial documentaries have been the template for an entire generation of reality drama, most keenly felt in Paul Greengrass’ work on “United 93.” Now Broomfield seems to have once again found a subject that will divide the public and tap into the collective zeitgeist of the moment.
His “Battle for Haditha” is the true story of a small engagement between a Marine patrol and two local men who have been paid 1000 dollars by al Qaeda to detonate an IED. The chaos that ensues after the explosion which kills a Marine Captain quickly develops into a massacre of the local population by the surviving Marines. In all 24 people died, but this is no crucifixion of the U.S. forces or a condemnation of the insurgents, but rather an even-sided account of one terrible day.
In fact, “Battle for Haditha” is an internal struggle of conscience for all concerned; Marines, civilians, and insurgents alike. Read More
I am not a woman who
“Handles the servants well,”
But I do not long for the strange liberty,
Or even the hotly whispered possibility,
Of leaving West Amman.
“Never look back,” Omar said,
But what if looking forward is not an option either?
The only thing you see there
Is the dust beneath your feet.
Anyway, Omar, you still married some idiot: Read More
