by Naomi Shihab Nye
A gash of movement
a spring of flight.
She saw them then
she did not see them.
The elegance of the gazelle
caught in her breath.
The next thing could have been weeping.
Rustic brown, a subtle spotted hue.
For years the Arab poets used “gazelle”
to signify grace,
but when faced with a meadow of leaping gazelle
there were no words.
Does one gazelle prefer another
of her kind?
They soared like history
above an empty page.
Nearby, giant tortoises
were kissing.
What else had we seen in our lives?
Nothing better than 19 varieties of gazelle
running free at the wildlife sanctuary . . .
“Don’t bother to go there,”
said a man at our hotel.
“It’s too far.”
But we were on a small sandy island,
nothing was far!
We had hiked among stony ruins
to the Tree of Life.
We had photographed a sign that said
KEEP TO THE PATH in English and Arabic.
Where is the path?
Please tell me.
Does a gazelle have a path?
Is the whole air the path of the gazelle?
The sun was a hot hand on our heads.
Human beings have voices—
what have they done for us?
There is no gazelle
in today’s headline.
The next thing could have been weeping . . .
Since when is a gazelle
wiser than people?
Gentle gazelle
dipping her head
into a pool of sliver grass.
From 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East
by Naomi Shihab Nye
2005, HarperTempest
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