Remembering Galali in the small hours

Thinner than a needle’s eye, sharper than

its point, the blade of moonlight cuts the lane
without white markings, no signs, nothing urban
just the growing sound of an aeroplane
overhead, preparing to touch down
its lights winking, the sea is a black pane
of glass, nothing else for miles around
one huddled island, some huddled humans
melding into the vastness of earth and oceans.





Galali, and more generally, Bahrain has been on my mind recently, along with friends I made there.  All of us have moved on, Galali is no longer the same, I left Bahrain almost a decade ago, and my friends too, now settled elsewhere, many continents away from the nights spent plane spotting.