On December 7, prominent Palestinian poet Refaat Alareer was killed in an Israeli airstrike on Gaza City alongside six members of his family. Few days before he was killed by Israeli Occupation forcers, Alareer re-shared a 2011 poem anticipating that he might be killed, titled “If I Must Die.”
As of December 21, Alareer and more than 20,000 fellow Palestinians, mostly women and children have been massacred by Israeli forces as part of the Israel's Genocidal War on Gaza.
If I must die,
you must live
to tell my story
to sell my things
to buy a piece of cloth
and some strings,
(make it white with a long tail)
so that a child, somewhere in Gaza
while looking heaven in the eye
awaiting his dad who left in a blaze—
and bid no one farewell
not even to his flesh
not even to himself—
sees the kite, my kite you made, flying up
above
and thinks for a moment an angel is there
bringing back love
If I must die
let it bring hope
let it be a tale.