In Case of Emergency

Abstract

In Case of Emergency Lena Khalaf Tuffaha (bio) Keywords Lena Khalaf Tuffaha, Poetry, In Case of Emergency This is how you open the box when I am no longer here. One of these might be the combination: 1975 The year you were born 1967 The year we lost the rest of our country 1936 The year your grandmother swallowed her gold coins to hide them from the soldiers This is how you keep yourself safe, keep parts of yourself in different boxes Trust no one with everything 1949 The year my father died 1977 The year the checkpoint taught you the difference between your name and your passport 1999 The year the last of our olives were uprooted and the wall obscured Jerusalem [End Page 226] This is how you know it will end: At night, the windows of the city become mirrors, a key recalls the shape of its doorway, the stones of this earth nestle in young hands. [End Page 227] Lena Khalaf Tuffaha lena khalaf tuffaha writes poetry, translations, and essays. Her work has been published or is forthcoming from the Kenyon Review Online, Lunch Ticket, Borderlands Texas Review, Lake for Poetry, Sukoon, and the Taos Journal of International Poetry and Art. Her poem “Running Orders” has been translated into Hebrew, Greek, Italian, Spanish and Norwegian, performed at anti-war protests around the world, and anthologized in Letters to Palestine. Her first collection of poems, Water & Salt, is forthcoming from Red Hen Press. Copyright © 2017 The Massachusetts Review, Inc