Jessica Abughattas is an American poet of Palestinian heritage. From 2020 to 2022, Abughattas was the poet laureate of Altadena, California, and the editor of the Altadena Poetry Review. She is a Kundiman Fellow and a member of the Radius of Arab American Writers (RAWI). She earned a BA in journalism from Pepperdine University and an MFA in poetry from Antioch University.
CINEMA
Jessica Abughattas
The winter I leave him, I ask my parents to consider me
their oldest son. To bend the rules.
I could be a little tree, late to flourish,
focused on my underground career.
I tell them to buy me a house.
They’re 15 years divorced. We’re sitting around
my mother’s kitchen table. My father and I smoke.
My father: Remember, this is the second time.
As though I could forget: I have no use
for houses since I’ve refused
to raise children. I want walls
they can’t touch, tender drywalls of protection.
Still, I was there, pulling weeds to no avail.
When I toil again, I want it to be for me.
When I commit to the cinema
of sorrow, I like to follow
through, stay in my seat
until the end, stand and clap.
I want to know what happens after:
Hard laughter
pouring out of the apartment above
mine, all night.