some days
caught between clamping down on
processed food or not eating
at all; ferociously demanding rights
or considering the futility of change
in front of this page
I am a sell-out
ashamed of my faltering
words, the aftermath of a burnt out mind
I am a sell-out
these are not the words
I meant to write, but i can't
stop them
from escaping their confines
I cannot halt this exodus
some days I recklessly spew things out
or repeat
sayings from other giants
but at times my words are empty
blurted out in haste
or by means of melancholy
that washes over everything
on those days nothing counts much,
everything a question
existence a mistake
& my purpose banal
what keeps us all from jumping?
death, war, death, death, war
in coping we're devolving
and our resource scarcity
is our own doing
the elderly hide
their sorrow-laden faces
they wished for better than this
the real tragedy is that
in due time, the final wave
will overtake us
by then, the mountains
will have shrunk, the moon eclipsed
by darkening skies;
the dried out ocean floors
& our greatest minds
will be mere carcasses fit for our
putrid existence.
Hanna Abi Akl
Hanna Abi Akl is a Lebanese-born English writer. Hanna lived in Beirut before moving to France at the age of 25. He writes contemporary poetry and prose. When asked to define his writing style, he says the main ingredients to his works are "music, paintings and a little bit of literature". Hanna's writing continues to be heavily featured in literary magazines, poetry journals and anthologies. He published his first novel in 2017 and has since published another and two volumes of poetry.