Eid in فلسطين was never just a day. It was waiting stitched into the dawn. It was longing dressed in our best clothes. It was my mother packing Mamool before sunrise while we prepared to visit our aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends across villages that felt both near and impossibly far. But under occupation, even joy was controlled. So many Eids began with my uncle saying the same sentence: "The checkpoint is closed.” As a child, I wanted to shake this “checkpoint,” to break it open with my...

"The Grape Vines" I spoke to my uncle this morning while he stood on the land, tending to his grapevines. He moved among them like wild sage carried by the wind, like someone in quiet conversation with something that knows him back. Every year, he grows grapes not only as harvest, but as continuation. As a message to self. As memory. As something of himself. We began with the ordinary check in. Daily updates. I asked, did you make sage tea on the fire today? He smiled and said yes, turning...

When I was a boy, winter meant going to the fields with my family to gather لوف (Palestinian arum), a wild plant that grows in Palestine during the cold months. Its leaves resemble grape leaves, but they are larger, a deep and vibrant green almost defiant against the rain. Back home, my grandmother, wrapped in her embroidered thoab, its threads carrying stories older than time, would layer the leaves one upon another with quiet precision before stuffing them with rice and meat. The kitchen...