Baksaria

I wrote this short poem many years ago about a poor northern Syrian village sitting in the foothills close to the Turkish border. I visited the place in 1971 and stayed there a short time. Today this area has been subject to incursions by the Turkish army, and I wonder about the fate of the friendly long-suffering people I met there.

It is paired with a painting by Michelle Daisley Moffitt: Mountain Village. 

BAKSARIA 

In these foothills
again and again

beasts are broken
to the plough or

yoked to the grind-
stone plod 

around and around
the dusty floor.

And the women here
are yoked to their men

and the men here
are yoked to their God.