Day 14: Sidi’s Return Home By Salam Zahr
With one hand cradled in Sidi’s soft, wrinkled palm, the other on the thriving olive tree, Farah is home.
Like the sacred groves
We remain rooted
Stronger together
This land is our home
The shaking of trees! The pitter patter of zeitouns falling like raindrops from a canopy of leaves. First a sprinkle, a shower, then all at once a downpour of pint-sized yellow-green fruits. Olives drum the ground with echoes of resistance.
Farah’s heart dances with each swinging step of the special harvest. The weight of the basket is like Yama’s warm hug, constant and full.
Pale yellow and tea green, oval and round, large and small. Each olive unique, each one beautiful.
“Listen to their stories,” Sidi says, raising one to Farah’s ear.
Like the sacred groves
We remain rooted
Stronger together
This land is our home
Farah wears her family’s faded brass key, the one passed from Sitti, to Yama, to Farah’s heart. It sways, plays, and catches the sun’s rays, as Farah and Sidi breathe in gratitude.
One day, Farah hurries to the grove to find she is alone. Wind roars through branches above her head. Clouds swiftly gather, huddled close so sun cannot peek through. Lightning strikes panic and fear.
“Sidi!” Farah calls, but he does not answer.
As Farah races through the grove, olives shrivel and lose color, bark on trees crackles and burns. Where dreams once stood, rubble remains. Sidi is ripped from Farah like a tree uprooted.
The rain a drought within her heart, Farah wilts without a home. Her tears drip and pour into the earth, a rushing stream forming cracks and creases, like Sidi’s face in sunlight.
Floating in the river of tears, a single olive seed. Its whispers are faint but Farah can hear.
Like the sacred groves
We remain rooted
Stronger together
This land is our home
She presses the key to her chest and thrusts herself upward. In the ground settled by her ancestors, she plants a seed of hope.
Unwilling to remain beneath the scorched Earth, a tiny seedling bumps, pokes, and thrusts itself upward. Soon a tree forms flowers, flowers become fruit.
Farah cradles a single olive, one that tells stories rooted in the land for thousands of years. She hugs the bark of her new tree, and feels Sidi’s wrinkled skin pressed upon her face.
She is home.
Like the sacred groves
We remain rooted
Stronger together
This land is our home
Author’s Note
Through our stories, we solidify the hope and promise of liberation for all Palestinians, and all those living under brutal colonization. Like the ancient trees that have survived for thousands of years, all indigenous peoples will continue to plant their seeds, grow, and thrive. And though the oppressors may destroy Mother Earth as they attempt to destroy our spirits, the strength of our ancestors will renew our roots, and all of us will return home one day, soon.