Translated from Arabic by Paula Abdul Ahad
Cover by Randa Baini
Cover by Randa Baini
**
TEARS
- Tears, tears, tears..
We're drowning in the tears!
Tears on the pillow
Tears on the handkerchiefs
On the marble like cheeks
Crawling are the tears.
- Leave me.
- Your son died?
But he's my son as well.
- You kept on telling him:
A dead like is the one
Who doesn't have a homeland?
A dead like.
- Why are you still living?
Ever since you lost your homeland
You're dead.
You became soil that lost its land.
- I was a dried fig tree
And they were the yelling monsoon
Throwing fear on the ways.
I was yearning darkness
And they were the stars
Smiling from behind the clouds.
I was the bare rod
And they were the fire
Dancing in the wilderness.
I was the sheep
And they were the meat man
Grinding his knives on promise's rocks.
- And now?
- I became the consciousness.
My heart, which was shivering
Of the mortar's echo
Now is ruthless.
My hands that grew up on clapping
I lopped them off.
My voice, which use to greet,
Yell and salute
Every time it hears a speech
Echo has swallowed it.
My voice has changed
So did I.
**
TALE OF A HERO
-1-
... And they tell tales and stories about a hero
Gift wrapped the truth with hope
And hid soil and brooklets in his heart
Trees bearing for people dates!!
Fortuitously,
On the love hills he was dead
And wasn't found out how he died!!
-2-
He's lost!
They said:
He's lost among the corpses,
Among the bloody tears
And he was evaporated,
Truly evaporated!!
But he's living the tale,
The letter doesn't die.
How lucky is he?
-3-
They said:
He unsheathed his sword and left.
Where to?
No one knows.
And after a period of time, they said:
A little boy dreamt of him
Sitting on the glory's throne
Covered with roses,
With eyes closed.
-4-
The heroes are older than the time,
Greater than the word we want to say.
They're the gold
The rings in boxes,
They're our enduring joy in the nation's bosom.
They're the limits which the hearts are tracing.
They're the unobstructed ways in suffering nights.
-5-
O, word which eyes didn't read before
Cover their eyes with astonishment.
**
TEMPLE'S THIEVES
-1-
Revolt,
Revolt,
What are you waiting for?
Revolt.
Shape a sword out of your nails,
And of your children's moans
A robe that fire doesn't burn its strings!!
-2-
Crash their castles
Their banks.
Let them, by one slap of your palm,
Bow before you
With eyes badly tearful.
-3-
Don't be frightened by them
Don't be frightened.
These are the temple's thieves,
Whom the scourge
On their shoulders traced
By holy fingers
Which beamed the new day!!
-4-
Raise, raise, raise your voice
It may drift the abjectness dam
Which is still depositing the dirt
Of the robberies they committed,
The lies they lied
The gasps that ascended their chests
Every time the night passes by.
-5-
Do not wink or hush up at them
They're the ones that sold your land,
Sucked your blood
And cheered to the dollar when you starved.
-6-
Breastfeed your son malice on them,
Teach him to spell their names,
And hang over his bed pictures of their repulsive faces
Where nose dried out on the cheeks.
-7-
Cast him of the martyrs bones a little gun
Tie him of the cedar branch a crossbow engraved
With revenge verses.
-8-
Save us with your wrist
Save us.
Return us back
We're sick of separation.
The land has forgotten us
And so did our grapevines
Which dust soaked its raceme up.
-9-
We waited to hear the news,
How you intertwined the hands,
How you stepped their hatred barriers,
How you inserted a flag in their hearts
And how you built up the house's stones.
-10
We waited, waited and waited
Up till war took us away
And became the tears in the story's eyes
Which set an oath with you:
It doesn't want to hear of you!!
**
BRING MY SON BACK FROM DEATH
-1-
She stood with dust on her hands
In the midst of that shop
Inflated with bored bodies
And said deadly words:
- Bring my son back from death!!
-2-
Laughters disgusted with them selves,
Words sliced with hatred
Flew out of those people's jaws
Ripped her ears unfearfully!!
Her fingers flicking off their looks,
She stood before them defacing:
- It's you who betrayed my son.
It's you who stole my son.
It's you who killed my son.
Bring my son back from death.
-3-
- Nothing to do with her, don't answer.
Her dress is patched with mud.
Her body is sweating demands
Which will never be fulfilled.
-4-
- She's crazy.
Death is obvious in her eyes!!
Her hands dust is scary
It might blind us,
Throw us in seas
Engraved by her voice!!
-5-
- Crazy?!
My craziness is right
Is a candle turning into torches
To burn their infamy dens
In which dimness they’re refuging
which is making their mouths odour worse
And pouring their poison out in our casks.
-6-
- Crazy?
.. My craziness is a revolution
Plowing, Planting, watering tomorrow
Change it..
Make it a feast
Its swings delights at kids
Missed the joy's shrill
Missed the ring and the vale
The daily school's bag
Scented with oregano pastry.
-7-
- Crazy?
.. My craziness is a tale
That revolutionists took as a beginning
To the liberty's dawn that bloomed
And its flowers are continually bloomed
On the solid wrist arteries
Which built the orphans shelters
Decorated it with wind flags
Become to victory a swing.
-8-
- They all, all killed my son
Who never exhausted me.
Whom I raised happily,
Pouring songs in his ears
While he smiles to me,
Brush my hair
And extends with his laughters my life.
For his eyes that will never wilt
I'll never let their life extend.
**
BLIND WORLD
-1-
The world is going backwards!!
It's going backwards!!
Dragging the days with a hair
Tumbling them!!
Stepping on their white pages
And hiding like a lost blind.
-2-
Neither mum is hugging her babies
Nor dads are working and gathering
And the child that hates his school
Of his school bag
Dust is making a swing!!
-3-
.. That governor who mounted the throne
And impressed us with his promises:
- I'll make of my country a tale.
I'll cover neediness with white coverlet.
I'll plant bread in people's mouths.
He betrayed his country,
Betrayed the people
Who worn out
And never let their land see that they had.
-4-
.. Authors whom letters
Should light the days darkness,
They black marketed their letters
Didn't fear coming generation's curse
Rising out of history
Warm heartedness never tasted.
-5-
.. And the altar's servant
Who decided to enter heaven
Stained his hands with money's blood
Stained his mind with his body's lust.
Out of his mouth snakes come out
Splashing their poisons in the thirsty's cups
Who watered themselves with his words water.
-6-
.. Flowers which loved their meadow
Were covered with its soil
And started to increase and propagate
Hated their meadow
And detested its grass
-7-
.. And the sea that since the word created
Let its fish go and come as they please
In his greenish grazing water
And on the free wave's mountains
Started displaying them on the beach
To sell to the first fisherman
Hanging lies on his hook.
-8-
The world is going backwards
And we're erasing its roads
Cheering when it drops up
The drop that causes us the pain
Makes us rub the hands and cry
Not knowing how do we insult it!!
**
SORROWS SEA
-1-
The sea is black!!
The sea is a hydrophobic dog!!
Just bites beaches further than the horizon.
I am a sorrows sea
Sun doesn't know my beach.
Cloud doesn't visit it.
My fish don't swim
They have the same colour of the water!!
-2-
Lucky is the boat with no sail
At least it lives in peace
Doesn't betray
Doesn't swallow
Doesn't bite
The beach is an old man with no teeth.
-3-
Darkness is so disgusting
Looks like a one eyed crow.
Darkness is an ogre
Eats the stars, the cloud and the moon!!
Once, in a dream, I entered its cave
I saw unbelievable things,
I saw a grasshopper swallowing a rock
Greater than the earth!!
I saw two little clouds
Dancing on an apertured drum music!!
-4-
The morning asked me:
Why are you lost in illusive dusts
Like a man suiciding with fear rope
Tears are eating your eyes
And on life's paths
Your feet are wearing off?!
I answered shaking my head
He didn't hear me
He probably forgot that I talk in silence!!
-5-
Of my body's sweat
I watered the eternity
He got drunk
Started laughing hysterically
And tossing the destiny higher than highness!!
The eternity is a drunk
Why respect it?
Let's strike it off our minds.
**
GIRL OF MY HOMELAND
-1-
I'd love to dally with your eyes
Purer than wine,
Finer than diamond waiting in it's pit
And with a magic brush
I want to draw you my sighs
And hang them on paths
That never wears out of your feet.
-2-
I'd love to burn you my incense
And in your hair pin my life flower
Picked of boon orchard
That dangled around you.
-3-
You, who's more charming than oasis,
More reviving than the water drops
And more merciful than the palm's shade
In a desert envious of the light
Glaring of your eyes.
-4-
When the forest bird heard me
Singing a folk song to your name,
They contended me,
Because they couldn't learn it by heart
And pour it all in your ears.
-5-
You, the comfort for my body and thoughts.
In sorrow moments steeling my life
And dropping me on your paths
Like the orphans
Who sensate their mums smell
In your robe's pleat
And you cheered and delighted
When they ran to you cheerfully.
-6-
Hide me in your bosom, hide me.
I aged, and still don't know
The secret of the torment in your chest,
The look that's hiding things
And the trembles in your hands.
-7-
Let me cache in your hair
And hide from my suspicions trend,
Lean on your shoulder
Imitate these fondled stars
Leaning on my mountains shoulders.
-8-
Draw me as your prince charming,
Strengthen me with your shield
To return the strikes
And take the oppression nightmare
Away from my people
And radiate nights with my sword.
-9-
What's the point of my life?
And you are beyond my stretched arm,
Harder than my dreams
That aged between my imagination's pages.
-10-
Let me cling to you
To the floating hair plaits
Like the baby who desires a swing ride
And fears the blasts
The clouds that could reach him
Every time he swings high.
-11-
O, you greater than a word said
When we were roving,
Counting the kids,
Running with then
To conceal them of the traitor's dogs eyes.
-12-
O, you the tenderness tears,
The heartbeat of a father
Awaiting his son's return.
I loved you without a story,
You the story of my homeland,
And the pain's scripture
That made me hate myself!!
-13-
I loved you, girl of my homeland,
With all your suffering,
With all the bruises
They instilled on your wrists,
On the breast
Purer than all the holy books they read.
I loved you
Till you became the wedding ceremony
That I'll never let it escape my mind.
**
EXPATRIATION SEA
-1-
Expatriation sea is extensive, extensive!!
He has lips!!
He has eyes!!
His nails are merciless swords.
I wish the land calls me.
I wish the past comes back to me.
In the expatriation sea I poured my tears.
-2-
Why does delinquency pinch us,
Hide us in its night's darkness?
Why the death,
The black death,
The curse endless death plays with us
And into its disgrace field drags us?
-3-
We were, when we were:
Pictures, a child scribbles
Dreams, in wakefulness originate.
We were, when we were:
Wider than the cardinal points,
Older than the history,
Greater than the dead ones glories.
We were, when we were:
Creating fact,
Eradiating present,
Drawing our future on the universe's walls.
-4-
They played with us
Thinking we're chess!!
And went this is gone!!
This is dead!!
And so many died
Half of the ones who stayed!
And the ones who stayed
Became pawns in their hands!
-5-
They played with us
Thinking we’re drawing
And started erasing the watchful eyes
Voiding the willing to talk lips,
Cutting the raised hands
Against the growing oppression,
Against the hunger that's gathering us.
But forgot..
Out of this exploding blood
We originate a new generation
That can draw walls, windows,
That can scribble nations,
That can void all the graves
The earth is holding.
**
THE FATE IS A LIAR
-1-
I kneeled praying to a God
Who doesn't have heaven!!
Night is asleep.
The owl has opened his eyes,
The owl is the darkness evil.
I kneeled praying,
Between the lips moans
The voice is lost
And the wind is warming
By the trees gasps.
-2-
The myth says:
As a basil with its roots in the water
When I was a little child
I used to spin the days with my legs,
I used to sing to the eternity
And today I'm lost
Among the paths and the roots glooms.
The echo's eating me.
-3-
.. And the spring showed up,
The myth says,
Carrying the laughter to the doleful lips,
Bringing presents:
Narcissus, basil, thistle, blackberry.
I like an unbloomed burgeon,
Don't be scared,
The fate said,
Stretch out your arm behind your back
And pick it.
The bees won't see you that way!!
He died, died..
The fate is a liar,
The fate is a criminal.
-4-
I'm a saint,
My finger lights in fate nights.
I carried the earth,
With my blow I quenched the sun,
With my fingers I caught the moon.
A breeze,
A thunder is my age,
Who said I have age?!
-5-
I covered my face with my hands
And started walking to attain
And I don’t attain.
The goal is a mirage,
A shadow,
A bunch of imagination in a crazy mind.
This world has no end,
Has a start..
This is false.
We're the start and the end!!
**
I LOVE TO CHANGE THIS WORLD
-1-
You, with beautiful eyes planted in flame.
On the evening's stones
Your hand has written me and erased me.
Your looks threw me in unseen things,
But delightful.
People told me about you,
People talk about themselves.
They said you're an infertile wheat.
They said you're an ice cube
Dropped in a mountain's shelter.
A flower that bees flee from,
They said.
-2-
Your venue,
As far as I walk, I wont reach it.
My feet wore midway
And the house That is hanging
On the cloud's shoulder
Still hanging there,
Neither wind nor the eagle in the sky goes near it.
You're the baby who was born on my hands,
You're the tremble that lies in all my veins
My lips crave the fresh lipstick.
My days and the time is flying,
My poems and the mind is lost,
Kneeled and prayed for you
And lit a forgotten candle in abhorrent corners.
Why is there abhorrence wherever I go?
Wherever I walk I see it like a giant,
Like an oppressive leader,
Like the hangman that each neck kneels before.
People have gone crazy,
People have become atheist,
God became a bad dream for them.
God, God where are you?
Where are the thunderbolts
That rift the darkness
And build a cornerstone for a new day,
That hit and toss heads full of deep grudge
Don't deserve to live?
-3-
Your pardon,
Your almond-shaped eyes pardon.
It would've been better if I held my tongue.
It would've been better
If I bit the wound and hushed.
But my wound is like the people
If I don't talk it will,
If I don't repine it will.
Amazing..
The one that doesn't want to die
Now is asking God for it.
The afterlife is here
And the start was difficult,
The friends left
And abandoned the heart they lived in.
The means justifies the aim these days
And the means destroy people with no aim.
How lucky is your pure heart
Like the virgin sea,
The one that neither boats nor skiffs crossed,
The one that fishermen never threw their nets in,
The one that guarded fish
As you guarded your purity
In a time full of hatred and abhorrence.
-4-
You beautiful..
I'd love to change this world
And I can't.
I'd love to plant people and pick people
And I can't.
I'm a human
My weakness is greater than me.
-5-
It satisfies me
To be a bird nesting in your roof,
So I'd love you all the love
Escaping the deep grudge steps.
**
KIDS, WHAT DO I DO?
-1-
I flew above mountains
Higher than imagination
Where inconceivable hatched
The kids saw me,
They yelled: Aladdin, Aladdin
And started jumping in the air
And clinging to me to drop me!!
-2-
I flew
And my wings are featherless,
My body is covered with the days dust
And on my neck
I'm hanging a magic lamp
With six, seven sand pebbles!!
.. And they cling to me to drop me,
Kids, what do I do?
-2-
How?
I don't know how?
Like the despair they showed up.
I cried and my tears are a mirage
And my eyes caves are door free.
-3-
God,
O God,
My voice is lost, evaporated,
Swallowed by deaf ears.
The voice is a sword.
Really?
Provided that it's heard in this world.
-4-
God,
O God,
My back is broken,
I became humpbacked!!
My crutch is pain, distress, tears,
And they're laughing at me,
Poor they are,
It's hard for them to reach me,
All the magic is in my finger,
My name has written on the wind's lips
And they still, unfortunately, desire clinging to me
And dropping me.
Kids, what do I do?
**
THE BLIND ENVY
-1-
They unclothed me
And left me shivering!!
They didn't flick an eye on me
And not a pure word they said!!
With the blind envy's scourge
Their eyes whipped me
Till the scourge dropped dead,
My bones emerged
And my bones are ashamed of becoming visible!!
-2-
They heard me singing
With a voice that drop a high bird
And praise the Lord.
They started sprinkling dust in my face
Till they blinded my eyes,
Dried my throat,
Got me lost
And the voice in my chest lost with me!!
-3-
Your name is ostracized, they said,
For you're different of us,
You walk as if you're flying
And like an aged curse we walk!!
You stand in the sun with invisible shadow,
But with a deep shadow
That scares a kid on a street we do!!
-4-
You better leave tomorrow, they said,
Or with thorns your paths will be planted
And the tremor on your lips
Will sprout and beam!!
They blasphemed me
And with the blind envy's scourge
They whipped me,
Which made me a lost and confused!!
**
WE ARE THE KINGS OF LOVE
-1-
Silently,
Walk with me silently,
I don't want the wind to know this.
Careful,
Careful don't step on the night,
It might scream
And wake the sleepiness up.
-2-
The stars don't sleep!
But, I don't mind,
I'll peel my skin
And knit it a spread
In the colour of the darkness
And spread it on you.
Stars can't see in the darkness!
-3-
Hold to me,
To carry you above the clouds
Up to the Lord's throne,
God love the lovers.
If we feel hungry there
We can eat the dreams!
-4-
We are the kings of love,
The world is obeying us
And the fate is a sculpture
Like army on our palace step
And the eternity is a mendicant
Begging the days of our lives!
**
YOU ARE THE WORLD
-1-
Don't run,
I'm afraid you may fall
And that will wreck the earth's fate.
The earth is hanging on your dress buttons!
-2-
Don't laugh,
I fear that of continuous laughing
The moon's clothes will rip.
The moon's clothes are unrolled
On your lips!
-3-
You are the world.
What do you think the world is?
Sea, sky and a handful of soil?
No,
No,
A smile on lips,
An eye blink,
A bit of dalliance,
This is the world!
**
SLEEP AND I'LL SING TO YOU
-1-
Sleep on my arms,
So I'll sing you silently.
My voice limit is narrow:
A throat and a tongue!
-2-
Sleep and abridge the world in a nap.
Let sleepiness, with a needle, knits the dreams,
Builds castles,
Decorating them with lightning
And takes you to a remote sky
As far as the wake and the sleep!
-3-
Pillow of roses
And a mattress spun with scent,
You and me and the night,
Sleep and let your hair rain softness
On my face.
Your hair is a blonde cloud!
**
REMEMBRANCES
-1-
All the beautiful songs
That you sang,
People memorise
And wrote in your name!
-2-
All the brilliant shows you performed
We remember, one by one,
Whenever we glanced your features
Fortuitously!
-3-
With the purity fountain
Running in your body's pasture
You watered the alienation roses!
-4-
You held people's hands
And escorted them,
Like a waking,
To the land you're devoting
Your name,
Your feature,
Your body,
Your blood!
**
MOTHER TERESA
-1-
She's desirous!
Sure, she's desirous to the redeemer,
To the heaven's paths,
To her singing angels!
She turned her face kindly
And raised her hand,
Her engagements in this world are over!
They offered her a bunch in Calcutta,
Its flowers picked from their fields.
They offered her the glow in their minds,
Loved to rise her, but couldn't.
She died!
She died!
Teresa, the mother and saint,
Died!
Died!
A convent is her palm!
A chapel is her heart!
They folded their statures and broke,
Their folly outcries exploded
And when they buried her in their eyes,
They felt they were buried!
-2-
They stood in line,
Their hands waving,
Like shadows with no strength!
They missed the one, who has pity on them,
The one, who planted God in their eyes,
The passing dream,
The rose,
The ever lighting candle.
Mother of the gutters
Died!
Died!
The Virgin's daughter
Died!
Died!
With their dreams' cloths they wrapped her
And with tears, they erased their days.
-3-
Agnes has chosen a difficult life,
A life that impressed the impossibility!
She got tired, sick, tolerated expatriation,
Her cross is never been carried before!
The Voice was telling her: Keep going,
Your suffering will establish your abbey.
She died!
She died!
The poor people's tears are wildly agitated.
She died!
She died!
Their voices sob and ring:
We're Albania, meet us.
Your mum and dad lived in us.
O you saint, whom we never forget,
Wherever you lead us, we go.
What are we without you?
Sick,
And your love is healing us,
Without knowing how to protect you!
Poor,
But, you love us,
In your eyes' abbey you hid us.
In this world that doesn't know its devoutness,
We'll be suffering without you.
**
WHAT OCCURRED
-1-
What occurred?
So the thunder's voice
Which use to rumble in the rain
And deprive the people's eyes of the sleep,
Has become hoarse!
-2-
What occurred?
So the sun,
That the ancients called in their prayers
And drew its picture in front of their eyes,
Has set!
-3-
What occurred?
So the nights hearing has abated
And stopped hugging
And sheltering the lovers' whispers
And says: Welcome!
-4-
What occurred?
.. And a baby mumbled
A wisp of talking:
"The bliss died on the ravage night"
And looked at my face and cried!
**
