Your
five-star hotels,
and
few good swimming pools.
Your
improvised discotheques,
and
lullabies l o
s t in the heavy sound of
traffic.
Your
old and
new
r
u
i
n
s.
Your
invisible walls,
and
all too visible sects.
Your
potholes,
and
run-down coffeehouses.
Your
fashionable soap-operas,
and
dying theaters.
Your
population explosion,
and
inefficient hospitals.
Your
ethnic minorities,
and shaky
sovereignty.
Your
emigrants returning
from
all
over
the
world.
Your
cathouses,
and
underground casinos.
Your
ultra-rich,
and
ultra-poor,
(both
equally contemptible).
Your
highway accidents,
and
children
of
corrupt government officials.
Your
blackhole of a vulva
sucking
in
one
and
a
l
l:
Neanderthals,
Assyrians,
Greeks,
Romans,
Persians,
Arabs,
Turks,
English,
French,
and
visiting Russian
advisors
and
prostitutes.
Can’t
you ever say
“no,”
Damascus?
Can’t
anyone ever learn how to
keep
you
faith
ful?
Ever?
Where
are you in all this,
Damascus?
The
Consummate
Victim?
Or
The
Consummate
Whore?