Making A Fist

For the first time, on the road north of Tampico,

I felt the life sliding out of me,

a drum in the desert, harder and harder to hear.

I was seven, I lay in the car

watching palm trees swirl a sickening pattern past the glass.

My stomach was a melon split wide inside my skin.

“How do you know if you are going to die?”

I begged my mother.

We had been traveling for days.

With strange confidence she answered,

“When you can no longer make a fist.”

Years later I smile to think of that journey,

the borders we must cross separately,

stamped with our unanswerable woes.

I who did not die, who am still living,

still lying in the backseat behind all my questions,

clenching and opening one small hand.

MARGINALIA

In these last few days that I’ve been so sick, I’ve thought about so many things, but most especially about dying. My body has been made a stranger, and I felt extremely powerless. Time and time again I tried making fists, remembering this poem:

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This poem appeared in    Words Under Words: Selected Poems  by Naomi Shihab Nye  , published by Far Corner Books, 1995. (Available on:  Amazon  •  Bookshop )

DESCRIPTION

“Words Under the Words gathers into a single volume the finest poems by one of the most exciting, accessible poets in America today. This long-awaited collection draws from Naomi Shihab Nye’s three critically acclaimed books: Different Ways to Pray, Yellow Glove, and National Poetry Series winner, Hugging the Jukebox.” ( Source )

ABOUT NAOMI SHIHAB NYE

Naomi Shihab Nye was born on March 12, 1952, in St. Louis to a Palestinian father and an American mother. Nye is the author of numerous poetry collections, including    Grace Notes: Poems about Family    (Greenwillow Bookss, 2024);    Cast Away: Poems for Our Time    (Greenwillow Books, 2020);    The Tiny Journalist    (BOA Editions, Ltd., 2019);    Voices in the Air: Poems for Listeners    (Greenwillow Books, 2018);    Transfer    (BOA Editions, Ltd., 2011);    You and Yours    (BOA Editions, Ltd., 2005) and    19 Varieties  …  (more)

Naomi Shihab Nye was born on March 12, 1952, in St. Louis to a Palestinian father and an American mother. Nye is the author of numerous poetry collections, including    Grace Notes: Poems about Family    (Greenwillow Bookss, 2024);    Cast Away: Poems for Our Time    (Greenwillow Books, 2020);    The Tiny Journalist    (BOA Editions, Ltd., 2019);    Voices in the Air: Poems for Listeners    (Greenwillow Books, 2018);    Transfer    (BOA Editions, Ltd., 2011);    You and Yours    (BOA Editions, Ltd., 2005) and    19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East    (Greenwillow Books, 2002), a collection of new and selected poems. ( Source )

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ENDNOTES

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