"Revolution 2.0 (We weep with you, Wael Ghonim)" audio recording

Revolution 2.0 by FoxThePoet

Revolution 2.0
By Christopher Fox Graham

type, type, send
type, type, send
the revolution begins not with a bang
but with a text message

Wael Ghonim on DreamTV, Egypt, on 9 February 2011.

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
you did not sign a declaration
shoot a gun
nor take an assassin's bullet
you ran a Facebook page

Egyptian secret police held you blindfolded for 11 days
promised you would be buried nameless, anonymous


as a Facebook event,
your ghost of Khalid Said,
brought down a dictator

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
you unintentional revolutionary,
you sob as the names of boys fallen
crawl across the bottom of the screen
as Mona el-Shazly asks you to gaze up
swallow the Facebook images and off-kilter photographs
taken at parties
or late-night on-the-towns

images become epitaphs,

of boys like us
who before January 25
just watched girls pass
traded albums
downloaded music
called their mothers on thieir birthdays
and never thought their country
would ever be theirs

if we could stand with you, Wael Ghonim, we would
embrace you as man to man
wrap arms around you to hold you standing
convince you to believe us
that your hands are clean
your soul is unstained
the blood of brothers and sisters on them
wasn’t spilt by you
use it to paint flags
touch it to your childrens’ foreheads
and tell them “this was shed for you,
by men and women who gave more than we did,
it is why you now have a voice
why 'freedom' is more than a noun”

wash it off in the Nile
let it taste of the mother river
swim upstream to the sources
and down to the Delta
tell all of Egypt
from Luxor tombs
to pyramid shadows
to the library halls of Alexandria
that your country is free
shake the earth
so dead pharaohs wake trembling
and living tyrants flee from their thrones

Egyptian Christians protecting Egyptian Muslims from pro-Mubarak
counter-protestors during their prayers in Tahrir Square, Cairo, Feb. 10.

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
we stood with you in Tahrir Square
we were the breath of bravery
you felt beside you
when the enemy rode in on camels
we stood beside you
five times a day
when you knelt to pray to Allah
we,
atheists, Christians, Buddhists
Hindus, Sikhs, and Jews
we watched your back
stood guard in silence
we were the ghosts you felt
assuring you the world was listening
we don’t know your prayers
but understood each word because
“freedom” never needs translation
it feels the same
no matter the shade or age of skin,

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
because your tears are too heavy for one man
let us carry them for you
permit us bear their weight
because we could not physically stand alongside you
allow us sing our lullabies in 1,000 languages to your children
let us tell them our words for "liberty"
so no matter where they travel
we have that in common

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
because you are not alone
you never were

                  now,                 sleep,

guiltless

weightless

and free

Wael Ghonim is an Egyptian computer engineer and head of marketing of Google Middle East and North Africa who was living in the United Arab Emirates. He ran the Facebook page that organized the Jan25 movement to protest Egyptian President and dictator Hosni Mubarak. In January 2011, Ghonim persuaded Google to allow him to return to Egypt, citing a "personal problem." Planning only a six-day visit for the protest, he was captured by Mubarak's security forces and held blindfolded for 11 days and the protests swelled in Tahrir Square, Cairo. The day he was released, he appeared on a DreamTV program hosted by Mona el-Shazly.

On 9 February, Ghonim addressed the crowds in Tahrir Square, telling the protesters: "This is not the time for individuals, or parties, or movements. It's a time for all of us to say just one thing: Egypt above all."

On 11 February, Egyptian Vice President Omar Suleiman announced that Mubarak had resigned as president and transferred authority to the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces.

"Revolution 2.0," March 31/31 Project

For Doc Luben's March 31/31 Project
No. 3

Revolution 2.0
By Christopher Fox Graham

type, type, send
type, type, send
the revolution begins not with a bang
but with a text message

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
you did not sign a declaration
shoot a gun
nor take an assassin's bullet
you ran a Facebook page

Egyptian secret police held you blindfolded for 11 days
promised you would be buried nameless, anonymous


as a Facebook event,
your ghost of Khalid Said
brought down a dictator

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
you unintentional revolutionary,
sob as the names of boys fallen
crawl across the screen
as Mona el-Shazly asks you to gaze up
swallow the Facebook photos and off-kilter photographs
taken at parties or late-night on-the-towns
images become epitaphs,
boys like us
who before Jan25
watched girls pass by
traded albums and downloaded music
called their mothers on birthdays
and never thought their country
would ever be theirs

if we could stand with you, Wael Ghonim, we would
embrace you as man to man
wrap arms around you to hold you standing
convince you to believe us
that your hands are clean
your soul is unstained
the blood of brothers and sisters on them
wasn’t spilt by you
use it to paint flags
touch it to your childrens’ foreheads
and tell them “this was shed for you,
by men and women who gave more than we did,
it is why you now have a voice
why freedom is more than a noun”

wash it off in the Nile
let it taste of the mother river
swim upstream to the sources
and down to the delta
tell all of Egypt
from Luxor tombs
to pyramid shadows
to the library halls in Alexandria
that your country is free
shake the earth
so dead pharaohs wake trembling
living tyrants flee from their thrones

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
we stood with you in Tahrir
we were the breath of bravery
you felt beside you
when the enemy rode in on camels
we stood beside you
five times a day
when you knelt to pray to Allah
we, atheists, Christians, Buddhists
Hindus, Sikhs, and Jews
we watched your back
stood guard in silence
we were the ghosts you felt
assuring you the world was listening
we don’t know your language
but understood each word
in your prayers because
“freedom” never needs translation
it feels the same
no matter the shade or age of skin,

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
because your tears are too heavy for one man
let us carry them for you
permit us bear their weight
because we could not physically stand alongside you
allow us sing our lullabies in 1,000 languages to your children
let us tell them our words for "liberty"
so no matter where they travel
we have that in common

we weep with you, Wael Ghonim,
because you are not alone
you never were

now, sleep,
guiltless
weightless
and free


Wael Ghonim is an Egyptian computer engineer and head of marketing of Google Middle East and North Africa who was living in the United Arab Emirates. He ran the Facebook page that organized the Jan25 movement to protest Egyptian President and dictator Hosni Mubarak. In January 2011, Ghonim persuaded Google to allow him to return to Egypt, citing a "personal problem." Planning only a six-day visit for the protest, he was captured by Mubarak's security forces and held blindfolded for 11 days and the protests swelled in Tahrir Square, Cairo. The day he was released, he appeared on DreamTV, where I first saw him.

The video is below. The last five minutes will bring anyone to tears.



On 9 February, Ghonim addressed the crowds in Tahrir Square, telling the protesters: "This is not the time for individuals, or parties, or movements. It's a time for all of us to say just one thing: Egypt above all."

The scholar Fouad Ajami writes:
"No turbaned ayatollah had stepped forth to summon the crowd. This was not Iran in 1979. A young Google executive, Wael Ghonim, had energized this protest when it might have lost heart, when it could have succumbed to the belief that this regime and its leader were a big, immovable object. Mr. Ghonim was a man of the modern world. He was not driven by piety. The condition of his country—the abject poverty, the crony economy of plunder and corruption, the cruelties and slights handed out to Egyptians in all walks of life by a police state that the people had outgrown and despaired of—had given this young man and others like him their historical warrant."

Freedom in Egypt

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak stepped down today after 30 years of autocratic rule and 18 days of street protests. There is joy in the streets.


(I don't speak or read Arabic, but I think I have the right word for "freedom" on Horus' eyelid. If you speak Arabic and I'm wrong, let me know.)

Christians protect Muslims as they pray during Cairo protests

This photo fills me with joy:
This photo, tweeted by Cairo resident Nevine Zaki, who wrote, "A pic I took yesterday of Christians protecting Muslims during their prayers."

For the last three weeks, I've been watching the street protests in Cairo online, mainly on Al Jazeera English, which often has streaming coverage from Tahrir Square and great coverage for non-Arabic speakers. I've seen and heard about acts of heroism from everyday Egyptians, from army officials who refuse to interfere with the peaceful protesters to volunteers who set up checkpoints to prevent bombs and weapons from entering the square, and internationals who've left Sweden, England and the United States to join the crowds in solidarity, but this image is my favorite thus far.

The human shield of Coptic Christians protecting their Muslim countrymen returns the favor -- thousands of Muslim Egyptians kept a candlelight vigil outside churches as Coptic Christians celebrated Christmas Mass on Jan. 10.

Since the street protests began in Cairo on Jan. 25, Egyptian Copts and Muslims have protected each other. Pro-government mobs attacked demonstrators before the Egyptian Army created a buffer between the two groups.

Egyptian police have also used water cannons on Muslims during prayers in the streets:

Now, I'm an atheist and no fan of organized religion ... but you don't fuck with someone when they pray.

Egypt’s Muslims attend Coptic Christmas mass, serving as “human shields”

“We either live together, or we die together,” was the sloganeering genius of Mohamed El-Sawy, a Muslim arts tycoon whose cultural centre distributed flyers at churches in Cairo Thursday night, and who has been credited with first floating the “human shield” idea.

Among those shields were movie stars Adel Imam and Yousra, popular preacher Amr Khaled, the two sons of President Hosni Mubarak, and thousands of citizens who have said they consider the attack one on Egypt as a whole.

“This is not about us and them,” said Dalia Mustafa, a student who attended mass at Virgin Mary Church on Maraashly. “We are one. This was an attack on Egypt as a whole, and I am standing with the Copts because the only way things will change in this country is if we come together.”

In the days following the brutal attack on Saints Church in Alexandria, which left 21 dead on New Year’ eve, solidarity between Muslims and Copts has seen an unprecedented peak. Millions of Egyptians changed their Facebook profile pictures to the image of a cross within a crescent – the symbol of an “Egypt for All”. Around the city, banners went up calling for unity, and depicting mosques and churches, crosses and crescents, together as one.

The attack has rocked a nation that is no stranger to acts of terror, against all of Muslims, Jews and Copts. In January of last year, on the eve of Coptic Christmas, a drive-by shooting in the southern town of Nag Hammadi killed eight Copts as they were leaving Church following mass. In 2004 and 2005, bombings in the Red Sea resorts of Taba and Sharm El-Sheikh claimed over 100 lives, and in the late 90’s, Islamic militants executed a series of bombings and massacres that left dozens dead.

This attack though comes after a series of more recent incidents that have left Egyptians feeling left out in the cold by a government meant to protect them.

Last summer, 28-year-old businessman Khaled Said was beaten to death by police, also in Alexandria, causing a local and international uproar.

Around his death, there have been numerous other reports of police brutality, random arrests and torture.

Images of solidarity as Christians join hands to protect Muslims as they pray during Cairo protests

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 5:46 PM on 3rd February 2011

Striking photos of unity have emerged from the chaos in Egypt as Christian protesters stood together to protect Muslims as they prayed.

A group of Christians joined hands and faced out surrounding hundreds of Muslims protesters left vulnerable as they knelt in prayer.

She shared the images over Twitter, writing, 'Bear in mind that this pic was taken a month after z Alexandria bombing where many Christians died in vain. Yet we all stood by each other.'

The suicide bombing, shortly after the New Year's Day, killed 23 Coptic Christians, who make up 10 percent of Egypt's 80 million population.

Muslim radicals have been blamed.

One Colorado resident posted an email online that he received from his mother, who is Cairo visiting her daughter, the poster's sister.

She described a scene like those captured in the photos.

'Some Muslims have been guarding Coptic churches while Christians pray, and on Friday, Christians were guarding the mosques while Muslims prayed.'

الى طغاة العالم ("Ela Toghat al Alaam" or "To the Tyrants of the World") by Aboul-Qacem Echebbi

الى طغاة العالم

"Ela Toghat al Alaam"

"To the Tyrants of the World"

By Aboul-Qacem Echebbi

This poem was written in the early 1900s by the Tunisian poet Aboul-Qacem Echebbi during the French occupation of Tunisia. It has found new meaning for Egyptians rebelling against dictator Hosni Mubarak.

ألا أيها الظالم المستبد
حبيب الظلام عدو الحياه
سخرت بأنات شعب ضعيف
و كفك مخضوبة من دماه
و سرت تشوه سحر الوجود
و تبذر شوك الاسى في رباه
رويدك لا يخدعنك الربيع
و صحو الفضاء و ضوء الصباح
ففي الافق الرحب هول الظلام و قصف الرعود و عصف الرياح
حذار فتحت الرماد اللهيب
و من يبذر الشوك يجن الجراح
تأمل هنالك انى حصدت رؤوس الورى و زهور الأمل
و رويت بالدم قلب التراب اشربته الدمع حتى ثمل
سيجرفك سيل الدماء
و يأكلك العاصف المشتعل

To the Tyrants of the World...
You, the lovers of the darkness...
You, the enemies of life...
You've made fun of innocent people's wounds; and your palm covered with their blood
You kept walking while you were deforming the charm of existence and growing seeds of sadness in their land
Wait, don't let the spring, the clearness of the sky and the shine of the morning light fool you...
Because the darkness, the thunder rumble and the blowing of the wind are coming toward you from the horizon
Beware because there is a fire underneath the ash
Who grows thorns will reap wounds
You've taken off heads of people and the flowers of hope; and watered the cure of the sand with blood and tears until it was drunk
The blood's river will sweep you away and you will be burned by the fiery storm.

The Devil’s Gardens

The Devil's gardens was the name given by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, commander of the German Afrika Korps during World War II, to the defensive entanglements of land mines and barbed wire protecting his positions at El Alamein in late 1942.

During the 'break-in' phase of the battle, British commander Lt General Bernard Montgomery planned for engineer troops supporting infantry brigades of 2nd New Zealand Division to clear lanes through the minefields along which attacking formations would pass into the Axis positions.

Engineers using hand tools were supplemented by Scorpion tanks equipped with rotating flails to explode anti-vehicle mines.

These did not work as well as had been hoped and manual methods of clearing had to be resorted to.

This would have been more difficult, had the minefields not been sown with relatively few anti-personnel mines.

An estimated 3 million mines were laid before the battle, most of which remain in position to this day, becoming more unstable as the years pass and injuring local people who use the area.

The Devil’s Gardens
For Soultan Saad, Faiez Fadiel, Mastour Moftah and thousands of other landmine victims in Egypt and around the world

"Allah, most gracious, most merciful, hear my prayer"
"Allah," the name of God in Arabic
"Allah" is pronounced with the flip of tongue over vowel
"Allah" is the only word she can still speak without sounding funny
she wonders if Allah will hear her prayers if he can't understand them
she can still pray to Allah,
but acknowledging his prophet
"Muhammad, peace be upon him,"
leaves her lips strained to wrap around the consonants
so she prays once extra time each day to compensate,
hoping that if he can't hear her,
he can see her faithfulness
and have mercy

"Allah, most gracious, most merciful, hear my prayer"
beneath sand it waits
it waits for the Desert Rats
a rattlesnake of tin and steel hate
wrapped around patriotically packed powder
fuses primed to strike for King and county
it waits for Nazi jack books to pound the soil
it waits to leap into the air
become a momentary burst of sun
suicide itself into oblivion and save Egypt and the Empire
it waits for an enemy offensive that never came
it waits still
alongside 16 million brothers

but the Nazis never came
exhausted, depleted and running on fumes
Field Marshal Edwin Rommel retreated from El Alamein
and Gen. Bernard Montgomery chased him to the sea
but the explosive fortress wall lurks
buried in the sand
ever vigilant
ever alert

From Egypt to Tunisia
shattered tank carcasses are unmarked coffins
for rival imperialists
the Saharan sand buried burned and shot soldiers
swallowed their tanks, guns and shells
swallowed them alongside the swords
of Crusaders and Saracens,
Romans and Carthaginians
the Saharan sands believe in no deities
the sand were here before them all:
Allah, Yahweh, Jehovah, Zeus, Ra, Amon, Tanit and Ba'al Hamman
the sand will outlast them as it always has
it swallows the monuments, the tombs, the names
the sand covers all

Noora al-Hayiz knew this
before Allah, her family prayed to different names
the Bedouins changed names with the times
but the sand was always the same

"Allah, most gracious, most merciful, hear my prayer"
Noora knew these sands were dangerous,
predators will stalk your goats,
her father warned,
hyenas and jackels will hunt them,
but not you,
her father gave her a gun,
taught her to shoot to scare,
her mother said
the only men you'll find out there beyond the hills
are other Bedouins,
and if they do not know you,
they know your father,
and Bedouins can be trusted

beyond the hills,
Noora knew the stories
her father's fathers had scavenged the scrap from tanks
his father's fathers had found the bones
of nameless Turks and Christians, Greeks and Phoenicians
who fought the sands and lost

she knew the Nazis turned here
and the British chased
but who they were or why they fought
made no difference
the Bedouin have faith in the sand
and the sand never changes

"Allah, most gracious, most merciful, hear my prayer"
was all she remembers
all she could scream out to the desert wind
when the landmine leapt to its purpose
detonated into a starburst
gave 68 years of pent-up rage release
from a war ended decades before she was born

"Allah, most gracious, most merciful, hear my prayer"
the mine cleaved foot from ankle
left her limping in the sands
to walk six miles back to her camp,
the mine
scarred her face with shrapnel
left her unable to speak Arabic poetically
left her unable to smile
left her unable to properly pray

Noora gets on her knees to pray
six times a days
her mother doesn't understand why
her father can't bear the sight of her
his broken jewel of daughter

"Allah, most gracious, most merciful, hear my prayer"
military historians don't include her name
in their essays
no monument inscribes her name into the final tally
Noora is another casualty,
another body added to the numbers of those who fell at El Alamein
68 years after the battle
65 after the peace
the nations who fought have buried their enmity
only memories and mines remain
Noora asks Allah for mercy
but knows he will not answer

instead, she asks the sands
to swallow the mines
she asks the sands
to let the mines find peace and sleep
alongside all those unnamed soldier
alongside all those unprayed-to gods
who still lay buried and nameless
find peace and sleep until they, too,
dissolve into the sands and blow away