Munafiq منافق - Tamer Said Mostafa

-after Ada Limón

I’ve grown too comfortable with the word,
its guttural stop that revokes all primitive
hope. Last night, I chased vodka with halal
lemon jello while mourning another fractured
friendship, and the flush of color to my skin
fought the inhibition for a short minute. Is there
such a thing as a good hypocrite? Long ago,
scholars asked if they could prove deviance
was nothing more than a soothsayer’s whoosh
tearing apart a serpent at the teeth. Hypocrisy,
they heard, was a falsehood on fire, the person
who ironed our flowers into the earth, and forgot
how to be made human by the dust. In Istanbul,
I accosted a non-Muslim for dragging his sneakers
across the Blue Mosque’s carpet, and celebrated
the reverence with cheap wine and potato chips.
Chances are, much of our triumph is consequential
because we satiate punishment like a cistern
repudiating moisture the moment it feels pure
heat. Down here, those who deny wander empirically,
or get stuck in the substance that makes us ricochet
beyond the bellows. Maybe, I am grieving a savior
free from bigotry and past times, but not trustful
of anything more optimistic than doubt.