<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div dir="auto" style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div dir="auto" style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div class="">From the Diary of an Almost-Four-Year-Old </div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Tomorrow, the bandages</div><div class="">will come off. I wonder</div><div class="">will I see half an orange,</div><div class="">half an apple, half my </div><div class="">mother's face</div><div class="">with my one remaining eye?</div><div class="">I did not see the bullet</div><div class="">but felt its pain</div><div class="">exploding in my head.</div><div class="">His image did not</div><div class="">vanish, the soldier</div><div class="">with a big gun, unsteady</div><div class="">hands, and a look in</div><div class="">his eyes</div><div class="">I could not understand.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">If I can see him so clearly</div><div class="">with my eyes closed,</div><div class="">it could be that inside our heads</div><div class="">we each have one spare set</div><div class="">of eyes</div><div class="">to make up for the ones we lose.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Next month, on my birthday,</div><div class="">I'll have a brand new glass eye,</div><div class="">maybe things will look round</div><div class="">and fat in the middle —</div><div class="">I've gazed through all my marbles,</div><div class="">they made the world look strange.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">I hear a nine-month-old</div><div class="">has also lost an eye,</div><div class="">I wonder if my soldier</div><div class="">shot her too—a soldier</div><div class="">looking for little girls who</div><div class="">look him in the eye—</div><div class="">I'm old enough, almost four,</div><div class="">I've seen enough of life,</div><div class="">but she's just a baby</div><div class="">who didn't know any better.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Hanan Ashwari</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="" style="border-left-style: none; color: inherit; padding: inherit; margin: inherit;"><div class=""><div id="article" role="article" class="system exported" style="text-rendering: optimizeLegibility; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><div class="page" style="word-wrap: break-word; max-width: 100%;"><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Dr. Hanan Ashrawi has been a central player in the struggle for a Palestinian homeland. A tireless campaigner for human rights, she has distinguished herself in both the academic and political arenas. Her academic expertise has played a vital role in the development and recognition of Palestinian culture, while her longstanding political activism on behalf of the Palestinian people has contributed greatly to the establishment of an independent and self-governing Palestine.<br class="" style="max-width: 100%;"><br class="" style="max-width: 100%;">Dr. Ashrawi received her Bachelor and Master's degrees in literature in the Department of English at the American University of Beirut. After earning her Ph.D. in Medieval and Comparative Literature from the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Dr. Ashrawi returned to her homeland in 1973 to establish the Department of English at Birzeit University on the West Bank. She edited the <i class="" style="max-width: 100%;">Anthology of Palestinian Literature.</i> She is the author of <i class="" style="max-width: 100%;">The Modern Palestinian Short Story: An Introduction to Practical Criticism; Contemporary Palestinian Literature under Occupation; Contemporary Palestinian Poetry and Fiction;</i> and </span><i class="" style="max-width: 100%;"><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Literary Translation: Theory and Practice.</span><br class="" style="max-width: 100%;"></i></div></div></div></blockquote></div></div></div></body></html>