Arabic Poems

  Dreams Of The Old Knight أحلام الفارس القديم If we were two waves Pure of sands and seashells Crowned with foam and light Driven in the current From birth to grave In a droning dancing step If a transparent cloud should drink us, And melt under the tender lovely mouth of the sun Then again we become two twin waves Driven by the current In an eternal round From the seas to the sky From the sky to the seas. ....... If we were If we were If we were, Ah how cruel is it to say 'If' My sweet, if we start our conversation with a wish But we... Ah, how cruel to say 'but' The tangled twisted letters betray That we deny what the days have left in our souls We wish to throw the memory off We wish to forget We wish to bring it back to the womb of life But my sweet, I am benumbed Cast away on the way side of the world A world sweltering in delirium and garbage A world which is void of beauty A world that gave me nothing but darkness and melancholy When I fell upon its surf...

    Religion of Love                                               دين الحب Religion of Love                       لقدْ صارَ قلبي قابلاً كلَّ صورة ٍ                فمَرْعًى لغِزْلاَنٍ وديرٌ لرُهْبانِ My heart has become a receptacle of every form. It is a pasture of gazelles and convent for Christian Monks. وبَيْتٌ لأوثانٍ وكعبة ُ طائفٍ،                 وألواحُ توراة ٍ ومصحفُ قرآنِ And a temple for idols and the pilgrim’s Kaa’ba, and the tables of the Torah and the book of the Quran. أدينُ بدينِ الحبِّ أنَّى توجَّهتْ                   رَكائِبُهُ فالحُبُّ ديني وإيماني I follow the religion of Love whatever way Love’s caravan may take. For love is my religion and faith....

                                                 منتصبَ القامةِ أمشي     منتصبَ القامةِ أمشي مرفوع الهامة أمشي في كفي قصفة زيتونٍ وعلى كتفي نعشي وأنا أمشي وأنا أمشي.... قلبي قمرٌ أحمر قلبي بستان فيه العوسج فيه الريحان شفتاي سماءٌ تمطر نارًا حينًا حبًا أحيان.... في كفي قصفة زيتونٍ وعلى كتفي نعشي وأنا أمشي وأنا أمشي....     Marcel Khalife sings the poem  

  Words      كلمات   He lets me listen, when he moves me, Words are not like other words He takes me, from under my arms He plants me, in a distant cloud And the black rain in my eyes Falls in torrents, torrents He carries me with him, he carries me To an evening of perfumed balconies And I am like a child in his hands Like a feather carried by the wind He carries for me seven moons in his hands and a bundle of songs He gives me sun, he gives me summer and flocks of swallows He tells me that I am his treasure And that I am equal to thousands of stars And that I am treasure, and that I am more beautiful than he has seen of paintings He tells me things that make me dizzy that make me forget the dance and the steps Words...which overturn my history which make me a woman...in seconds He builds castles of fantasies which I live in...for seconds... And I return...I return to my table Nothing with me... Nothing with me...except words. يُسمعني.. حـينَ يراقصُني  ...

       إرادة الحياة   إذا الشّعْبُ يَوْمَاً أرَادَ الْحَيَـاةَ         فَلا بُدَّ أنْ يَسْتَجِيبَ القَـدَر وَلا بُـدَّ لِلَّيـْلِ أنْ يَنْجَلِــي        وَلا بُدَّ للقَيْدِ أَنْ يَـنْكَسِـر وَمَنْ لَمْ يُعَانِقْهُ شَوْقُ الْحَيَـاةِ         تَبَخَّـرَ في جَوِّهَـا وَانْدَثَـر فَوَيْلٌ لِمَنْ لَمْ تَشُقْـهُ الْحَيَاةُ           مِنْ صَفْعَـةِ العَـدَم المُنْتَصِر كَذلِكَ قَالَـتْ لِـيَ الكَائِنَاتُ          وَحَدّثَنـي رُوحُـهَا المُسْتَتِر وَدَمدَمَتِ الرِّيحُ بَيْنَ الفِجَاجِ           وَفَوْقَ الجِبَال وَتَحْتَ الشَّجَر إذَا مَا طَمَحْـتُ إلِـى غَـايَةٍ        رَكِبْتُ الْمُنَى وَنَسِيتُ الحَذَر وَلَمْ أَتَجَنَّبْ وُعُـورَ الشِّعَـابِ       ...

        دائرة الطباشير الفلسطينية   طفلٌ يكتبُ فوق جدارْ طفلٌ نَبَتَتْ بينَ أصابعهِ النّارْ أيّتُها الخَوْذاتُ البَيْضاءُ حَذارْ مِنْ طفلٍ نَبَتَتْ بيْنَ أصابِعِهِ النّار مِنْ طفلٍ يكتُبُ فوقَ جِدارْ يكتب بعضَ الأحجارِ وبعضَ الأشجارِ وبعضَ الأشعارْ     omaima khalil sing the poem

  Rain Song                                               أنشودة المطر    Your eyes are two palm tree forests in early light, Or two balconies from which the moonlight recedes When they smile, your eyes, the vines put forth their eaves, And lights dance .. like moons in a river Rippled by the blade of an oar at break of day; As if stars were throbbing in the depths of them . . . And they drown in a mist of sorrow translucent Like the sea stroked by the hand of nightfall; The warmth of winter is in it, and the shudder of autumn, And death and birth, darkness and light; A sobbing flares up to tremble in my soul And a savage elation embracing the sky, Frenzy of a child frightened by the moon. It is as if archways of mist drank the clouds And drop by drop dissolved in the rain … As if children snickered in the vineyard bowers, The song of the rain rippled th...

  Identity Card                                 بطاقة هوية Write it down! I’m an Arab My card number is 50000 My children number eight And after this summer, a ninth on his way. Does this make you rage? I am an Arab. With my quarry comrades I labor hard My children number eight I tug their bread, their clothes And their notebooks From within the rock I don’t beg at your door I don’t cower on your threshold So does this make you rage? Write it down! I am an Arab. I am a name with no honorific. Patient in a land Where everything lives in bursting rage My roots were planted before time was born Before history began Before the cypress and the olive trees Before grass sprouted My father is from the plough clan Not from the noble class My grandfather was a peasant farmer Had no pedigree Taught me the pride of the sun Before teachi...