Seasons of Violence

32F. Original writing, photography, and reflections of my life and history with violence. White, Arab, bisexual, disabled (Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, POTS, MCAS, OCD, cPTSD)

[seasonsofviolence]

“When did you last write home to mother?” - Shanghai Tunnels, Portland OR (2017)

[seasonsofviolence]

The Dalles, Oregon (2018)

[seasonsofviolence]

“Uncle George”, date unknown. My Syrian great-grandmother’s cousin George. She loved to ride in the middle seat of his car.

[seasonsofviolence]

Occupied - Original Poem

There’s no room at my in,

Turned away for your sin

Of loving me when I can’t believe you’d even want me as I am

I live in silence, or else I’ll lose you

I starve cause I believe

I should be barren for those who seek

To occupy my body and mind and consume my fertility

I’m not enough, it’s what I’m used to

His body, sacred Eucharist

My body, fodder for rapists

Sins of my flesh though I protest I’m crucified up by my wrists

Who knows sacrifice better than me?

Forgive me my trespasses

I know it may be classless

To forget your name and have my shame lay plain upon my mattress

Let me die here, leave me be

“I was brought forth in iniquity,

and in sin did my mother conceive me”

Is there redemption for gods children or are Eve’s daughters unworthy?

The Fall of Man lives on in me

Is my whole identity

Just violence or is it something

More than what they’ve done to me or is that all I’ll ever be?

Am I to blame, or is it hereditary?

My mama knows what’s best

She says to hide your Arabness

Assimilate to play it safe just to be called a terrorist

Commune with me, with olive leaves

Did my ancestors really flee

Occupation so I’d be

A wanton whore whose body keeps the score as my American dream?

I have failed my family tree

[seasonsofviolence]

Saint George Antiochian Orthodox Church, Portland (2024)

[seasonsofviolence]

Oceanside, Oregon (2023)

[seasonsofviolence]

Portland “Shanghai Tunnels” (2017). Replication of a holding cell for trafficked women. Women would be placed in these rooms for days by white slavers until they “broke” and accepted a lifetime of enslavement into sex trafficking.

Ask me about my time as a volunteer in the tunnels - they are haunted by the ghosts of past and present.

[seasonsofviolence]

May 24th, 2023 12:00am: Consumption

When I think of you I think of consumption and commodity. I think of waste. I think of that feeling of slowly being bled to death. Or a death by a thousand cuts. You consumed every part of me and viewed me through a lens of entitlement to what I could produce or provide for you. It was never about me and who I was. But what I could provide for you. You took my time. You took my virginity. You took my sanity. You took my money. You took that part of me that shown brightly. You took the ableism that I held within me and turned it against me. You took my care and love and baited me into thinking that I was providing for you in a mutual partnership. When the reality was that you were sucking me dry. You used up every last drop until I had nothing left. The water from my well was depleted. Every careful droplet filled with care, compassion, kindness, and love for you was taken from me. Not as a shared gift but as a disposable item. I don’t know if you thought that my well would never run dry. And I tried so hard to replenish it. Every fight and every tear I shed for you drained me but caused me to try and get recentered. I couldn’t risk losing it. I couldn’t risk losing you. But after too long, the well started to get drier. The things I could give freely before in the name of loving you were now given in the name of fear. Fear that consumed and terrified me. Fear that made me scared of the tactics you would use to make me believe it was my fault that my well was empty. My fault that he had to keep taking and that the problem wasn’t that he needed to stop taking. But that I would have to keep producing. Commodity. Item. Made for your use. Yours to take and yours to give up when you’re done. When the well was finally tapped and I had nothing left I begged you for freedom. And you gave me rejection. You told me that you couldn’t change. That you weren’t in a place to stop draining from my well. That in order to stay, I would have to keep producing. I would have to compromise. Always be there for your consumption and comfort.

When I look at you I see my dad. The same shame that he navigated life through. The same patterns of speech. You are a different version of the same man. You break up the constant terror with love and companionship. But only on your terms. You don’t love me. You love the version of me you thought would conform to you. The version that fits within your controlled narrative.

I am slowly falling out of love with you. But I still feel trapped. I still feel that pull that wants you to love me. That pull that wants me to be enough for you. I want to be worth it to you to change. I don’t want it to hurt anymore. And I don’t know if I can have you in my life with the way you’ve harmed me. But I can’t imagine causing you that kind of pain. I feel trapped by this access of myself I’ve granted to you. I feel like I’m punishing you by taking it away. That it’s my fault that you’ll suffer. That I’ve caused this. And now I see the cycle you’ve created within me. And I don’t know how to get free.

[seasonsofviolence]

St. Mary Catholic Church, Mt. Angel (2024)

[seasonsofviolence]

Chinook Winds Casino, Siletz Off-Reservation Land Trust (2015)

[seasonsofviolence]

Umatilla Reservation (2016)

[seasonsofviolence]

“Blow” - Reflections on a mass shooting 17 years later

17 years ago, a classmate of mine was killed in a mass shooting. At 15, I didn't have language to describe the violence I was witnessing in my community. Now at 32, I am letting the thoughts I've kept tucked away come forward and see light for the first time. Working with my therapist through intense EMDR sessions, I wrote this recently as I was reflecting on my anger. Anger I didn't know I had, anger that hasn't had a voice or a place in my world by design. It's now coming out, sometimes in small whispers, other times in the shrillest screams. American violence has branded me and I can no longer hide the marks of it from my skin.

[seasonsofviolence]

Waverly, Iowa (2017)