H Sinno

at the beirut port

at the beirut port i took

a ship to haifa.

at the beirut port i took a ship to haifa to meet a boy i had been talking to ever since i was twenty two and those were the last days of myspace and he sent me a picture of himself in bed reading friedrich engels in a tuxedo because he liked my lyrics and i met his parents and they didn’t like me much because they said i spoke too much and i fought too much about too much with too much intensity, but that was fine and everything was fine and everything was a little boring sometimes and we went to the beach and then there was sand in my ears and sand in my butt as we walked around the market to buy kites but instead i spent all the money on cheap candy that didn’t taste like much other than sugar because even the candy was a little boring and then at night we drove to a gay bar in ramallah and i played some songs and read some poems and made enough money to cover the cost of the trip and a year later his parents had warmed up to me because they liked the way i cooked my moloukhieh and they drove up to beirut to meet my mother and ask her for my hand for their son and the wedding was a modest little affair and we prayed in al aqsa and the carpets smelled like feet and no one stole our slippers and then we drank jallab in a little coffee shop close by and because i am “that expat,” the scent of jasmine was so heavy that i felt i could stick my hand and pluck it out of the air and it was the 14th of june and sarah flew over from cairo to join us and she went fishing and came back with dinner and my uncles lit fireworks to celebrate and no one panicked and the sound didn’t make anyone shake and we built a life for ourselves between beirut and haifa and it didn’t hurt to breathe at eid el fitr and it didn’t hurt to breathe at christmas and it didn’t hurt to breathe at pride 

and i never left 

because there was never a 

damned reason to leave and

Hamed Sinno is a composer, writer, performer, and social justice advocate. Their research explores the vocal organ and digital vocality as sites of political negotiation. H writes, and lectures about popular culture as engaged practice. They have been the lyricist and front-person for Mashrou Leila since 2008, agitating conversations around representational politics, free speech, and sexual freedoms in the Middle East. H has a BFA from the Department of Architecture and Design at the American University of Beirut, and an MA in Digital Musics from Dartmouth College. Their debut full-length opera, Westerly Breath, was in development at The Industry Los Angeles, and will open at the New York Met Museum in January 2024.Their solo debut, Poems of Consumption, explores the overlaps of consumerism, mental illness, and environmental crisis. Poems of Consumption debuted at London’s Barbican Centre in July 2023.