When a wave overwhelms you, you forget your voice and surrender to the void. Tempestuous events have penetrated my being, reaching deep within, hitting that infinitesimal point in a relentlessly throbbing nerve whose beats never cease to haunt me, even when I shut my eyes.

I have been thrashed by momentous waves since 2019; my body pulled and tossed by the events in Beirut. My legs have carried me to the Corniche; my hands have alternated between flipping the circuit breaker and carrying gallons of gasoline. My breathing is busy, drawing in rancid air into my two panicked lungs. We have now all become hunchbacks. My eyes greeted the owner of the neighborhood’s supplier of power with contrived gratitude. How can I not be grateful when he, alone, holds the keys to the propeller for my everyday life. I am estranged from whom I have been prior to this time.