Hussein Al-Dahir, Syrian poet, known for his literary explorations of Syria’s civil conflict, identity, exile, and migration, lived as an exiled writer in Færder, Norway since June 2024.
EACH MORNING I REASSEMBLE MY FACE
Hussein Al-Dahir
Each morning, I reassemble my face—
I find my eye in the ashtray,
weeping silently for the homeland.
I lift it out,
brush off the soot,
and nestle it back into its hollow.
My ear, as always,
sits before the television,
waiting to embrace a rogue word of peace.
I pinch it cruelly by its edge,
then fasten it to my skull.
My mouth lurks by the window,
cursing passersby.
My nose meddles in poetry,
and catches the flu.