rock flight by Hasib Hourani
hold your breath, where’s that box you made? put this book inside and close the lid. when you need to come up for air, open the box and keep reading.
Where to begin with this one? I include the above quote from page 26 of this book-length poem because it was at this point that I realised I was already holding my breath. In an author’s note published at Giramondo, Hourani shares, “The book is cheeky and combative. I want the reader to smirk. I want them to scrunch up a piece of paper and throw it across the room.”
I think that’s a good place to start.
Split into seven parts, Hasib Hourani’s debut work is described as “an epic poem and a moving testament to the displacement and dispossession of the Palestinian people.” For anyone who hasn’t turned away from the current devastation and genocide being wrought upon Palestinian people and lands by Israel, it could almost read as a devastating ‘companion guide’, as sorts – a reminder that what is happening now dates back long before October 7th 2023:
My grandparents flee the beauty. it’s 1948. they are on foot until they reach the refugee camp in aleppo and then they meet. they have five children and they’re all born stateless. myself and my cousins are born stateless too refugees by inheritance.
Hourani shares that they finalised the book in September and October 2023, before Hamas’ assault on Israel on October 7th, resulting in the ongoing devastation of Gaza, adding in his author note that “the words and stories in rock flight aren’t new. References and accounts date as far back as 1799. I wrote a contemporary poem that contains centuries of history, and fossilised within that graft is something eternal.”
Combining personal experience, family history and factual references, Hourani blends the dire reality with personal grief and dares us not to look away:
we cannot live like this but it can
i want it to not be able to live like this either
i want it to say give me back my oxygen
i want it to say something needs to change
i want it to do the changing
At the end of each section, Hourani offers instructions that, at first glance, seem benign, even fun, but in actuality signpost the ways Palestinians have suffered – and survived: ‘How to Make a Rock’, ‘How to Hold Your Breath’, ‘How to Make a Box’, ‘How to Make a Throat’, and ‘How to Make a Sling’.
Accompanied occasionally by diagrams, Hourani creates an interactive element for the reader. They tug us into the narrative and then remind us of the confines with which we are engaging with their experience – the limits of the square page and the mental compartmentalisation required to continue to live through them.
israel is rejecting 7.2 million palestinians the right of return i am part of the 7.2 million and together we are two thirds of all palestinians in the world. zahra flees the living in 1971 and the beauty is still in her name but her sons can’t go back and claim it.
Hourani uses vivid and subtly repetitive imagery throughout the work – rocks, birds, flight and movement, and suffocating – tapping into the deep restlessness that comes with being dispossessed. Their fatigue is heavy on the page through sleeplessness, layers of dissociating, or physical illness:
i have tonsillitis and it is affecting the way i breathe and swallow
watching a bird fly across the screen in an israeli settlement and i say
“huh a metaphor”
Deeply rooted motifs bridge lived experiences with the history of Palestine in a way that feels both intimate and urgent. This work effortlessly dissolves any boundary between art and politics, drawing readers into its world with clarity and conviction.
Hourani’s writing will move through you. It is an invitation to touch his own pain and grief – and all Palestinians’ pain and sorrow – and it is something we have to give ourselves over to. Not just to know it intellectually but emotionally, and in that knowing act.
eat a date
keep the stone
put it in your pocket
Further resources to support Palestinian liberation
*This list is a starting point and by no means exhaustive. Your local state Palestinian support networks are a great place to start if you want to find other ways to act – connect with them where you can. Look after yourself and each other.
Elaine Chennatt is a writer, educator and psychology student currently residing in nipaluna. She has a special interest in bibliotherapy (how we use literature to make sense of our lives) and is endlessly curious about the creative philosophies of others. She lives with her husband and two bossy dachshunds on the not-so-sunny side of the river (IYKYK). Find her online at wordswithelaine.com.
