Marking Three Years Of Genocide In Gaza: Hug Machine by Eman Basher

• Now, there will always be someone sending me your poem, “Let It Be a Tale,” pushing the white kite into my sight, asking me to read it aloud—but I won’t. I can’t. That one line—“you must live”—sticks in my throat: too heavy, too unfair. What if I don’t want to tell your story? What if I want to let it rest, to let it fade quietly instead of becoming a tale told time and time again? You always found poetry in pain, but maybe that’s why I resisted it—I knew one day it would demand more from me than I could give. It would ask me to carry you, to keep you alive through every line, even when all I want is to let you rest.