'I Wish I Had a Leg': A New Poem on Gaza
I want to return to our home and have my mom, my dad and my leg with me.
By Vaheed Ramazani
Vaheed Ramazani is Professor Emeritus of French Literature at Tulane University, where he held the Katherine B. Gore Chair in French Studies. He is the author of three books, most recently Rhetoric, Fantasy, and the War on Terror (Routledge, 2021).
Editor’s note: Despite the October ceasefire, Israeli forces continue to kill Palestinians in Gaza—at least 376 Palestinians since the ceasefire took hold, according to Palestinian health officials. Many of them are children, including two young boys—Fadi, 8, and Jumaa, 10—who were killed recently by an Israeli drone strike in southern Gaza while they were out collecting firewood for their family. The Israeli military did not deny the strike, telling CNN in a statement that the children were a threat because they had “crossed the yellow line,” the de facto new border that Israel has imposed over half of Gaza, as part of President Donald Trump’s so-called 20-point peace plan.
“I Wish I Had a Leg”
Ten-year-old Rateb Abu Qleiq was wounded
in an Israeli airstrike in Khan Younis
that killed his mother and brother.
Rateb’s right leg was crushed and had to be amputated.
“I wish I had a leg so I could play with my friends.”
“I want to return to
our home
and have
my mom
my dad and
my leg
with me.”
Because of Israeli restrictions
on medical supplies
and the decimation of
the Gaza health system,
Rateb has no access
to a genuine prosthetic limb.
So he and his cousin fashion
a makeshift prosthetic leg
out of a plastic sewage pipe
they find in the street.
The pipe is useless
because it hurts
Rateb’s severed leg.
The UN reports
an average of ten children lose
one or both legs
every day
in Gaza.
Gaza is home to
the highest number of
child amputees
per capita
in the world.