It’s a notebook!

I write down poetry in it

well, disjointed verses

some pointed words

a metaphor to set off the fuse

self-lighting liquidating liminal alliterations

verging on wanking.

Poetry-propelled grenades.

Is that dangerous?

Is it banned on your national airline?

Is it because my Arabic scribblings

carved with a pen knife

carry semitic semtex traces

and live cursive wire

and my French fanatic love verses

the residues of obsession

my Italian ramblings too leftist

and all my Maltese writings,

ah, my Maltese writings

- from Malta — is that a country? -

making you doubt

if my passport

is just a forgery of a fake island

an invented entity

not ‘enemy’ enough to be on your black list

suspicious enough to make me pass twice

through your cowardly X-ray machine.

You can only deal with me

from behind a screen.

Fucker.