i think it will be helpful for you to know el kubenchi, along with el watanabi. el kubenchi is famous for music, a great history and tradition of music, and he has taught all the gray modern singers of the 20th century who came out of iraq. his music has touched me and you will hear it in this poem, 32 beads on a string. i woke from the nightmare of a gutted macom, not because i have not yet bled my life in yellow, but because minarettes looking sky ward. one burly buffalo looking for hooves and hot breath because the skin is not yet numb and the lights are not yet flickering, i will continue to sip at my hot tea and stare at the dust-colored noon. one white dasha screams with the brilliance of red. can you hear them, the melodious intent, the glimmering mood in their eyes. face stitched by seam, a garment i have sewn to my skin. whatever remains of el gubenchi's 1932 cairo studio recording lives between the old cobblestone quarter and my still-warm mahogony ear. i should have gotten up to shake his hand, this uncomfortable tension between me and god. medina, its