Grand Prize Winner, Adult Category
2005 Poetry Contest

Olives Under Stones
By: Corey Habbas

Flint escapes this land of
Bani Na'im, the flicker
that her eyes once held
when rubbed dim with ash
isn’t me yet.
Who churns the olives now
that caterpillars have ground
the homes to paste and
butterflies don’t dance.
I knew of a
Climbing-tree full of fruit
where blossoms pushed
olive meat out over seed
a black cocoon stuffed
with promise
I could be any woman now
encased within a wall, looking
out through thorny barbs and
metal brambles, a butterfly
not meant to escape
The stones that come
for her from Pene Hever, as
the groves convulse, won’t
welcome her into the gates of
Saragossa
Allah, maintain the peace
in our hearts, that with the olives
they pilfer, show me the path
within my soul that leads
to righteousness
Show me in your nature,
in her harvest, in the twisting
of charred olive branches, the path
to take forgiveness, that caterpillars,
which burnish women to sand
Fly over me as butterflies might
as she casts her eyes to
The Sacred Rock and we will
invite them all into the gates of Saragossa
in the spirit of a
shared Jerusalem.