Nous marchons à nos lendemains, sûrs du soleil dans notre passé Mahmoud Darwish, Fi Dimashq. . In Damascus, the doves fly behind the silk fence two . . . by two . . . B. In Damascus: I see all of my language written with a woman’s needle on a grain of wheat, refined by the partridge of the Mesopotamian rivers C. In Damascus: the names of the Arabian horses have been embroidered, since Jahili times and through judgment day, or after, . . . with gold threads D. In Damascus: the sky walks barefoot on the old roads, barefoot So what’s the poet’s use of revelation and meter and rhyme? E. In Damascus: the stranger sleeps on his shadow standing like a minaret in eternity’s bed not longing for a land or anyone . . . F. In Damascus: the present tense continues its Umayyad chores: we walk to our tomorrow certain of the sun in our yesterday. Eternity and we inhabit this place! G. In Damascus: the dialogue goes on between the violin and the oud about the question of existence and about the endings: whenever a woman kills a passing lover she attains the Lotus Tree of Heaven! H. In Damascus: Youssef tears up, with the flute, his ribs Not for a reason, other than that his heart wasn’t with him I. In Damascus: speech returns to its origin, water: poetry isn’t poetry and prose isn’t prose And you say: I won’t leave you so take me to you and take me with you! J. In Damascus: a gazelle sleeps besides a woman in a bed of dew then the woman takes off her dress and covers Barada with it! K. In Damascus: a bird picks at what is left of wheat in my palm and leaves for me a single grain to show me my tomorrow tomorrow! L. In Damascus: The jasmine dallies with me: Don’t go far and follow my tracks Then the garden becomes jealous: Don’t come near the blood of night in my moon M. In Damascus: I keep my lighthearted dream company and laughing on the almond blossom: Be realistic that I may blossom again around her name’s water And be realistic that I may pass in her dream! N. In Damascus: I introduce myself to itself: Right here, beneath two almond eyes we fly together as twins and postpone our mutual past O. In Damascus: speech softens and I hear the sound of blood in the marble veins: Snatch me away from my son (she, the prisoner, says to me) or petrify with me! P. In Damascus: I count my ribs and return my heart to its trot Perhaps the one who granted me entry to her shadow has killed me, and I didn’t notice . . . Q. In Damascus: the stranger gives her howdah back to the caravan: I won’t return to my tent I won’t hang my guitar, after this evening, on the family’s fig tree . . . R. In Damascus: poems become diaphanous They’re neither sensual nor intellectual they are what echo says to echo . . . S. In Damascus: the cloud dries up by afternoon, then digs a well for the summer of lovers in the Qysoon valley, and the flute completes its habit of longing to what is present in it, then cries in vain R. In Damascus: I write in a woman’s journal: All what’s in you of narcissus desires you and no fence, around you, protects you from your night’s excess allure S. In Damascus: I see how the Damascus night diminishes slowly, slowly And how our goddesses increase by one! T. In Damascus: the traveler sings to himself: I return from Syria neither alive nor dead but as clouds that ease the butterfly’s burden from my fugitive soul
Posted on: Tue, 18 Nov 2014 12:32:33 +0000