Excerpt #1

Leaving Lebanon because of the menacing drones is tense and confusing. Am I being a coward? If Lina lives happily here, why am I so precious? My legal name has been Arabic for more than half my life. I have been consumed by Arab art for forty-five years. If the generosity of the Arab people is always lifting and caring for me, then surely I should be willing to face the same dangerous fate they face. It feels unfair that I have a get-out-of-jail-free card because of my heritage, passport, and fair skin.

Since my days when Jordan and Syria felt like home, much has happened: the bombing of Baghdad, ISIS, AlQaeda, the Gaza genocide, the demise of Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Tunisia, and Yemen ... and the discovery of my trauma, followed by cancer. I fear cancer revisiting, I fear more trauma memories resurfacing, and I fear another bombing in the Middle East. My mind is spinning.

Excerpt #2

I never paid much attention to my solo performances with the company. I thought of them as filler for when the dancers needed a costume change. There was never time to choreograph my solo, so I would usually improvise and hope for the best. But performing in the same theater as the National Ballet of Canada and other international ballet companies inspired me to be better prepared this time. It felt like a thrilling explosion inside me when my bare feet touched this important stage, with my dear friends behind me playing the qanun, oud, violin, darbuka, qatim, and riqq, and Najwa singing the words of Oum Kalthoum. I soaked in every molecule of air, every ray of light, and every dust particle through all the pores of my body. I felt that if I died later that night, I would be happy having accomplished all my dreams.

Excerpt #3

I was at a Tibetan Buddhist center soaking up the sun atop a small grassy hill. A monk in his burgundy robes stood beside me, chanting in that low bass rumble while rolling his Mala beads. I felt movement around my feet and looked down to see several snakes start their way up my legs. With dancing, smiling eyes, the monk quietly said, “Sh, Nagas.” In Buddhism, Nagas are sacred serpent-like wisdom beings. So I became one with the chanting sound and the sensation of many gliding ropes winding around me. Soon, I was covered all the way up to my arms. Then, a woman at the bottom of the hill screamed. I stiffened, and the snakes fell off, disappearing back into the hill.