I'm sorry you don't know how lovely you are...

Simple kiss on the cheek and baby, I’m blushing like crazy. Soft and crazy. I’m not one to go parading my love to others, but even without me saying it, they just know that I’m mad about you.

I'm mad about you…

It’s more than the kiss, although that made my day, (15 hours later, and it still makes me smile, something crazy) it’s more than the kiss. It’s you not finding me grotesque, it’s you being my friend, so obviously and regardless, it’s you trying to give me the kiss of the century, but holding yourself back because you know we shouldn’t.

We shouldn’t…

It’s a strand of hair left on my couch, that I know ill keep forever. It’s having you near my lap, my fingers running through your hair, close enough to smell, and realizing that we use the same shampoo. It’s you looking up at me and smiling, God, you're just so beautiful…

You’re just so beautiful…

It’s you, sitting there, looking like a baby, your cheeks filled to the brim with food, you smiling with chicken in your teeth, the smile the size of the world, the smile I cant forget, even if I wanted to. It’s you thanking me, with that soft kiss on the cheek, treating me like you’ll just never let me go. You act like I’m the best thing ever, the most beautiful girl in the history of the world. But you're it. You're the best ever. You see the best in everyone that you meet. That’s you. The love-struck wanderer who just cant see anything bad in anyone else, because you’ve got a heart of gold.

Yes, you’ve got a heart of gold…

They call you a romantic, cause that’s the only word they know that will fit. But you're more than that. Romantic sounds too bland and dry for you. Romantic sounds like, oh anyone will do. Oh, anyone is good enough. It’s all about lust and love and all the rest of it. But you, you're more than that. You're the most amazing in the world, because you’ll never allow yourself to settle for second best. Which is why sometimes I wonder what you're doing with me. I’m nothing but a love good, myself. Actually, I’m nothing without you…

All is nothing without you…

Israeli Songs

here i go loving you with my heart spread all over the east coast of another continent with you on the line in one hand with my fingers tapping my cheek on the other hand trying to catch inevitable tears as you feel me with memories which i try not to remember and i didnt think that i could feel this lonely with so many people surrounding me and i didnt know that i could want to cry even when everyone else is laughing and i didnt know that you were the only thing i smiled for for the past 10 months and i didnt think that this hour long phone conversation would make so much of a difference but it did

"i kissed you on the cheek that day, remember? to thank you. to thank you for the music you gave me. remember?"

i remember and i remember and i remember and i cant believe you remembered. i remember every time you kissed me on the cheek to thank me and every time we would play football and you would chase me and im kenyan and im fast and you couldnt catch me but when you did you would pounce on me and tackle me on the ground and id tell you it hurts and youd say i know but stop being a sissy and i would say sissy my ass youre a sissy and we would fight and fight and id say something like i love you or ich liebe dich and youd say what and id say you heard me and youd kiss me on the cheek and wed keep running and fighting until we both got tired then wed go to my flat and id make you a sandwich and wed watch friends or football on the sitting room couch until we both fell asleep

"you know that every time i pass by your old flat in shifra i look up at your bedroom window and sigh?"

no i didnt know but you tell me that and i seriously start to cry and i say man i miss you and i say youre my best friend and youre more than my friend youre family and i cry and cry and you beg me to stop being a sissy but i know youre crying too because i how your voice crackles when tears are running down your face because way back before all this i love you business when we were regular best friends and not best friends with benefits you were talking to your cousin and you missed her so much that a tear rolled down your cheek and your voice changed so i can feel it and i can feel you and i can feel your tears on the line and i tell you that its not human to miss anyone as much as i miss you and you say

"well i guess im not human"

and you remind me of the time we went to the mall and all the boys were looking at me probably because i was african and strange but you thought it was because of my tits and ass and you swore youd never go to the mall with me again but you went with me every week after that and every time a boy looked at me youd wrap your arms around me and glare at him and now you cant even go to the mall because you say no one shops like me and you remind me of the time we went on the sherut and as usual people stared but all you did was wrap your arms around me and tell me that my hair smelled like baby powder and roses and you breathe hard on the phone for a minute

"r!tah man i cant believe im still sane without you"

and i choke on my saliva and i come to the realization that all this time i knew that i liked you and i knew that i loved you and i knew that you were my best friend but it never ever crossed my mind that i wanted to spend the rest of my life with you as your wife but at that very moment with you whispering those few words with you saying them softly so that your nosey roomate doesnt hear as you i realise that every day that ive lived for the past 10 months i have lived for you and that i love you i love you i love you and that i know that im not sane without you and i cant wait to see you again and have you wrap your arms around me and glare at boys who glare at me and tell me my hair smells like baby powder and roses and give me those sweet butterfly kisses on the cheek and love me and love me and love me like in all those israeli songs

Sweet foresight lingering in my toes

Memories of Bahji will make me nostalgic, as the place has become my home. The decent exposure to the fruits of God, the scent of angelic flowers blossoming beneath my feet...
My world has become so small, so small that I can barely imagine. My heart has become so soft, as cloudy and soft as a pillow would be, able to contain a love beyond my imagination, I never thought this to be possible...
Memories of Haifa will make me fall to my knees and weep. A year of wettening the Threshold with my tears, of laughing until I could laugh no longer, of sadness I could not control, of prayer, incredible prayer which always made me believe more in the Unknowable.
Memories of the wonderful souls around me will make me happy, inexplicably happy. Days when my overwhelming loneliness was biting at my heart, when a friend would come and make me laugh so easily, so gently, with all the sincerity in the world, with so much love that I could feel it in my veins.