الساعة: التاسعة صباحاً
التاريخ؛ الرابع من تموز
رأيت سمراء جميلة تعرض علينا جمالاً يحتوي على الاستقرار و الضياع، الهدوء و العبثية، تجمع التضاد معاً و تغريناً بحراً
لا نعرف اصله، سمراء جميلة تجعلنا نحارب لوطناً لا نعرفه و تكتب شعراً يعود بها الى زمناً تحاور البشر بجمال اللغة
سمراء أصبحت ذات مساء قطعة من القمر
سمراء كانت تهذي من شدة السكر
بعيدا جدا عنها, بعيدا عن روحها المعذبة
تبحث عن منزل يراعي مشاعرها
غاضبة جدا تتمنى الزوال عن هذه الحياة البائسة
تنطوي على نفسها مثل نوتة موسيقية حزينة يسمعها الجميع في يوماً بائس شديد الحزن
مشغولين البال تحاورهم الموسيقى و لكنهم منبوذون يحاولون مجاراة الحياة
تلك السمراء موسيقى حزينة
تحاول أن تعيد الى البشر أرواحهم الضالة
تحاول أن تقرأ نجومها و تفهم لما هي غاضبة جداً عليها
لماذا يسخر القدر منها
تحاول أن تغير موسيقى قدرها
أن تكون موسيقى هادئة في يوم ربيعي جميل
كموسيقى الأحبة و العشاق
السمراء الجميلة متخبطة في حياتها
متسرعة في قراراتها
تحاول أن تكتب شعراً تلوذ بها روحها المنعزلة عن العالم
تخفق في نهاية القافلة
تكتب
ايتها الروح المعذبة أريد أن تهدأ
أزيحي التراب عن وجه الأحبة
قودي الثورة الى النهاية
ازهقتِ أرواح الطغاة
و أعيدي أوطانا كانت لآبائنا
أبرقي و أعيدي امجادنا الضالة
سمراء جميلة سوف تحي لنا الحياة
سمراء بلون الذهب الصافي
ستحارب لنا و تعيد الشرف الضال
ستقودنا أمرأة و نفرح بالنصر القريب
سنسمع موسيقى أجدادنا و نكتب شعرنا المسموم
سمراء هادئة تسمع مواء الحزين و يحزن قلبها الصافي
لا تحزن يا قلبها الموجوع
يعيش عالمنا على الاحزان و يستنزف أوجاعنا
و يا ويلتاه على سمراء أن حزنت
أعيدي يا حياة الماسي دموع جميلتنا
أعيدي ملئ بالذهب الصافي
و ما أن حزنتي حتى لا تعود الارض عن الدوران
و ينتهي مجدنا قبل أن يبدأ
و نعود تراب اسود
الساعة؛ الرابعة فجراً
التاريخ؛ السابع عشر من تموز
ضربات خطى صاخبة
تأتي من الأعالي
تهدر معها الأرواح
و تسرق الانفاس
هادئة كبحر لا يعرف العاصفة
سريعة مثل فوضى الكون
خفيفة كنهار صيفي لذيذ
تتساقط الأحلام من عنقها محتارة من أين أتت
وجودنا هي ذواتنا الضالة، نحاول أن نعيد ترتيب ما حدث و نستجيب مع الحياة بعفوية أكثر لكن يستصعب علينا كل شي. ذاتي هنا و ستبقى هنا، وجودي و روحانيتي ستبقيان معي.
الساعة؛ الواحدة مساءً
التاريخ؛ العشرون من تموز
I wish I can belong to a place, I want clarity of my identity, where do I belong?
As I speak a language that isn't my first and struggle with my mother language.
As I introduced myself with no certainty of what I'm presenting.
What country? What language? What identity?
Lived here and there and now after many years of our faithful belonging to a land that never accepted us, we return to our forgotten place, land, home whatever you call it. The hard part will be the adapting, but to what exactly? Is it the language we struggle to speak it, is it the traditions that are so different from what we grew up on? or will we accept whatever hurting us?
As I continue writing this I remember what home is really. Will I call home the new place or the original place?
I can say now that I'm confused. Confused to death and somehow it's starting to hurt my heart, the heaviness I feel about where HOME is.
This will be a journey I'll take by myself, to follow the path that I am destined to walk on. On this journey I'll accept myself and I'll truly fall in love with the beauty of my spirit.
Home is where I'll find my own spirit, where I can say I saw the face of destiny, the path that will lead me to spirituality a forever love surrounding the Mother Earth I'll accept it with loving open arms. My Home is Earth, this planet will hold my body to the ground, will forever cherish this planet, this mother we all have; be grateful for everything she has given us.
This isn't poetry or a lovely story with a somewhat nice ending, but rather a true story, progressing. A story about finding a home within.
الساعة؛ منتصف الليل
التاريخ؛ الواحد و العشرين من تموز
اطلب الرحمة و المغفرة من القارئ المسكين كل هذا البؤس الذي يسيطر على ما اكتبة يجعلني حزينة لأجلك لا تستحق هذا اعلم جيداً لكن من منا يعرف طريق السعادة و بدون قليلاً من البؤس
أقروا كلماتي فأنا لا اعلم حقاً لمن اكتبها و لماذا اكتب. أني أبحث عن موطن هذا مؤكد لكن ما الذي سيكلفه عثوري على موطن مثالي يتقبلني كلياً؟!
Loud as he was crying, stabbing his hand letting his heart float
The agony and misery is shown in his face
The world crushed his soul, and will never be healed.
He writes as tears became scars, dark and sorrow are by his side never letting him go
Keep your language dear to your heart
Your identity is within your letters
Write in your mother tongue
Hold your history
Some people are trying to kill the old Land the land of poets with words to warm your heart and lonely souls
Keep your language and gather the forgotten poems
We, my dear, will be gone and earth will die
Write about the sadness of the earth and the death of a language.
______
TEXT:
NAJAH ABDI
SOMALIA
MAMA SITS IN A JERUSALEM FOUNTAIN
the fountain is vanishing under her
bas mama doesn’t move. she holds the stillness
in her palms, she pulls the tides and pours
the water in / out
she rinses the ibrik, sinks my head and hair
under, whispers how to walk softly in rising water,
to honor my disappearing country
in all of its holiness, in all of its loneliness
white stone made from ibrahim’s
hands, we collect clean earth until
it is dripping wet, red atoms in each grain
the universes melting into the shards of earth
i have watched my people remake
all of the holy symbols, the olive trees
and the fig trees, their hands dirty
statues and tombs till the moon collapses
no statue and tomb — they withstand till
their people dissolve in the disappearing country
i do not want to fall in bullet-holes, so i tell my lover
to navigate past the checkpoints until
he can drown me alive
red sea, dead sea, tabriyya, does it matter which?
i ask my lover to drown me, i cannot
bear the loneliness, i cannot bear the holiness.
a land of people, have we been stripped
into nothing but martyrs? take the religions,
i cannot remember what to bow to if not
the sea or the trees, shuf —
the map is spinning, we cannot make it past
all of the checkpoints habeebi,
mama rests on the edge of the fountain
her finjan learns to stand in air against time,
they are vanishing under our palms
what is left for us now?
______
TEXT:
LEENA ABOUTALEB
UNITES STATES
ماندولين • لم ابتعد
ماندولين
أنشودة الصباح
لحنُ شرقيِّ غريب
امتدادُ السماء
وارجوانُ المريميَّة
انطباعُ ريشة
همساتُ المُحبّين
نهايةُ فيريائيّ
عند اقترابِ النجو
لم ابتعد
لم أغرق بعد
لم أطلب النجدة
ولم أتفوه بكلمة
لن تتهشم دواخلي
بعد الآن
لن أنكسر ولا حتى كغصنِ صفصافة
سأدفق دلوَ الماء
واحمي الزيزفون
من أشعة الشمس
بأصابع يدي
لينهلَّ هذا العالم اللاواقعي
كورق الشاي
ويبدو أسهل لنا أن نفهمه
لم أبتعد عن المنطِقِ كثيراً
ولم يقتَرِب هو مني
ولم أعُد أنتظر
هي الشمسُ تعيدُ نفسها في الصباحات
وهو القمر مضياءٌ لعتمة الإنسان
———
TEXT:
SOMAYA M. YEHYA
SAUDI ARABIA
جدتي • أبوظبي
جدتي
Jad’dati
لا زلت أبحث عني
وعن مضارعٍ لواقعي
لقصةٍ روتها لي جدتي
عن فتاة بسني صارعت نفسها
حتى الموت
وعن راحة بالي التي تزعزعت
لأثبت وجود إلهٍ فيني
حدثتني عن براءةٍ أُختلِست
ونسيم واحة
حدثتني عن بلدي
عن بيتي وغرفتي
عن شاطيء
عن روائح العود
والبخور
عن أهلي وأصدقاء قد كانوا
عن حياةٍ نهبت مني
عن هوية، لم تعد
عن ألم الغربة
وعن الغرباء وقصصهم
حدثتني عن هارب، ومُقبل
وأنا كلاهما
حدثتني في منامي
عن أمل وسلام
عن حياةٍ جميلة
عن مستقبلٍ أجمل
عن واقع أليم، و مثمر
عن مئة ألف مهاجر
ترك خلفه بيتٌ آمن
أبوظبي
Abu Dhabi
غربت الشمس أمام كأسي
و الدخان تسلل الى رئتاي
هدوء المغرب و حر أكتوبر
يُذكراني بآخر ايامي
بطفولتي وغناء جدتي
و سيارتي ورائحة البخورِ
بحقيبتي و وداعٍ سطحي
لصديقٍ و غريبِ
و الشمس قد غربت
و اليوم انجزى و حان وداعي
وحنيني لوطني
حبسته بداخل معطفي
و الحر التهم أصحابي وذكرياتي
هربت منهم بهدوء و تئاني
بلا خبرٍ ولا مرسولٍ
لا لأهلي ولا لأصحابي
جف كأس النبيذ امامي
و تطاير رماد سيجارتي
و ودعت دبي و الإماراتِ
ودعت ضحكة أبي
رائحة أمي
و حنين اخواتي
ودعت براءة أبناء اخي
و خجل أبناء اختي
ودعت غرفتي وسريري
وتركت خلفي تلك التي لم تعد انا
و رحبت بنفسي
———
TEXT:
MOUZA SABAIHI
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
NEFSI
You mustn't beg for love.
Wave it down for the rush it gives
or the places you discover together.
Don't look for neighbors in your silence
for that noise that distracts from the breathing of your own life
though it's sleepless as a nightingale.
You shouldn't yearn for eight arms and longer breath underwater,
for the small silver smiles that expire tomorrow.
Never bow your head to loveless duties,
those mirages you were taught to chase alone
while others walked their path.
You mustn't pine for a love
you can nurse like a wound,
trace back the life in its scars,
confide in and still look after in your mind.
You mustn't mine for love or petrol or diamonds;
tend to the wealth and splendor in your laughter,
be selfish with your love.
Stock, simmer and seal it in jars for winter, all year long.
Keep your love.
Be thankful of its scent on walls and sheets,
in pantries lather in your love at home
before you decide someone else is more deserving.
Whisper "Nefsi" as you hang laundry,
feel love spread on your shoulders.
* Nefsi is an Arabic word which has a double meaning: Nefsi means ‘my soul’ and ‘my own self’.
———
TEXT:
K. ELTINAÉ
NUBIAN/SUDANESE
HOMESICK • DANDELIONS & FIREFLIES
HOMESICK
Can the mind grow so immune to pain
That it constantly searches for wounds
To rip
So it can get some sense of consistency or feeling that it’s functioning properly?
Mine’s been too hazy for the past few days// if I’m not lying couple of years
I keep running back to the same old wound digging my nails deep within
Hoping maybe if I claw a little deeper than the previous time I’ll find a new way to cope with what I have been through already
It’s nearly turned purple
as the night falls
And the trash can fills with bloodstained tissues
Which nearly aren’t red as the anger I have for myself
My fingers are tired and I’m thinking of leaving this incomplete
But my brain wants to flush out the emotions my body isn’t capable of
Storing/it knows my heart is tired just like my fingers
And my arms long for a belonging in any form of recognition/ be it love/death/appreciation
They want to belong somewhere not in pain/not in black and white/not in colors/words/ they are incompetent/ they can’t fight the yearning of my arms
There a growing madness within my lungs grasping my throat like flames
How can I say that I’m home when my body feels like it belongs elsewhere
Home in form of another person
How I have stained papers with ink describing what home feels like in countless metaphors
Only to realize it’s a sense of belonging I have never had/ until I tasted it/& now my neurology is panting for more
How do I tell it? Every time I try to make love/ his face is the only that plays on loop in mind
How do I stop my fingers from trembling and stop lying to myself calling it love?
I’m homesick of a home
I have never lived in
Homesick of eyes those have
Never met mine
Reminiscent of a belonging
That I have never felt before.
DANDELIONS & FIREFLIES
It’s winter
I want to write about
The dandelions
The fireflies
And the rusty fire escapes
The gloomy nights
Escaping into
Rushing tail lights
Into blithering smoke
Grey kisses
And your raspy crimson tongue
There’s a certain
Sadness to the cold
That I have missed
And have somewhat
A special bond with
It isn’t the hot chocolate
It’s the wind
Collusively talking
Me into considering
Lies as memories
Like a deer pledging allegiance
For being hunted
Calling for his own death
I have missed the cold
Touching me beside my ribs
I have missed the smoke
From burning wood
Making its way inside my body
Calling it home.
Similarly I have missed
Your cold finger
Entraining their way in circles
Behind my back
It felt cold yet warm
a paradox
Your fingers unsure
And
My back
So certain
Like they were
Awaiting for your arrival
The winter has come
And the sadness too
But all I feel now
Is just
Absence
______
TEXT:
MOHAMMED HUSSNAIN
KUWAIT
ABUELA'S RECETA FOR GOOD DAUGHTERS
grandmother’s recipe for good daughters
boil water till it more or less tells you all the things you've done wrong/ add the cinnamon/ let it burn up/
let it decorate the room in its fragrance/ cover the scent of the fire before the neighbors pick up on it/ add
in the rice/ let it soak up what's left of a soul/ say it's for a good cause/ this is motherhood/ her remnants
are our nature/ stir in the whole/ the evaporated/ the coconut/ the condensed/ this is our shot at nurture/
this is birth/ the giving of a life made less of a sin/ our daughters smell like cinnamon/ we rarely stir in
raisins/ flavor is not the purpose/ as long as it is sweet and filling/ they/ warm or chilled/ fermented/ made
to sit/ diluted/ coagulated/ their bellies swell easily/ they are ready to be served to the world/ sustenance
trapped in famines eye/ heritage & culture/ struggle & machismo/ is what takes the best seat at the dinner
table/ pretty suffrage makes for an elaborate display/ gets home/ country/ through destabilization/ divorce/
poverty/ pregnancy/ guerras/ wars/ gets hunger through the night/ and the shy hours of the next morning
that creep in through the window/ the warmth on the bed sheets/ remind men there's a day’s work ahead
but something that will fill them when they come/ home
———
TEXT:
CARINA MILENA MACEIRA
KUWAIT / MEXICO
ON WRITING
The superior act of writing, the act of bending down and crawling on all of your eight thin legs, stitching the strings together to articulate all that is holy of ideas in a written form, is perhaps exactly that and not at all.
Writing perhaps is not that noble of an act. Writing perhaps is not that great of a pursuit. Perhaps it does not have to carry the burden of saving humanity or expressing your petty heart.
Perhaps it is, simply, the opportunity to be an invisible man, to blend with the air and the earth and everything that is above, underneath and in between.
Writing perhaps is about witnessing one insignificant moment, and embodying the insignificance. That perhaps is what so significant about writing.
Oh holy insignificant act of writing.
______
TEXT:
SHAIKHA KHALIFA
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
IMPOSTER SYNDROME
"i know you're lying" the Israeli border officer spits at me. 4 hours in and i'm still trapped, got one foot in Jordan and one foot in Settler Colonialism (somehow on the wrong side of both), and her venom finally starts to strike.... am i lying? do i belong in the land she’s guarding? my blood’s running cold but it’s still mixed. Shami, Falasteeni, French and Irish. i want to cry while she stares me down. maybe if i scream loud enough "I’M NOT REALLY ARAB" it'll free me from her glare. Use the imposter’s language and maybe they’ll believe you. her eyes are green, the same as my mom's and i'm reminded that this officer and i could be related somewhere back in history. she still spits at me, this time in Hebrew so i don't understand, and my heart starts to break for her. when did they tell her family that they didn't belong, just like she’s telling me now? when did her relatives give up on life and succumb to that disease she’s spreading to me? when did birthplace become displaced in her ancestors hearts? we're victims of the same power, i think quietly, and as she yells at me with one hand on a semiautomatic i'm tempted to embrace her. it's ok, i want to tell this border guard. You belonged There. your politics lied to you. and now they're killing us both. i want to hold her hand so we can heal each other’s wounds and i don't have to play Fake Arab to survive and her ancestors can live historically, happily, in their European homeland. i want this so much it makes me sick, but she wants me gone. 4 hours later and she deports me away from the place my ancestors reach when they finally come Home.
______
TEXT:
ALIA TAQLEDDIN
UNITED STATES
"WORDS WITHOUT THOUGHTS NEVER TO HEAVEN GO"
I think there’s a
language barrier,
between Him and I.
How can
He understand
my butchered
Arabic? Mis-
communication misled
Ibrahim, to try
and sacrifice
Ismail on the rock.
Or was it Isaac?
I don’t remember
the verse, I thump
the rhythm
with my tongue, dis-
chord reverberates
to replicate
some resonance—
and play the song,
strung by cursive
threads on a page,
black and white
like infidel and believer,
but when I read out
loud, the more
I confuse:
مُسْلِمِيْنَ and مُشْرِكِيْنَ.*
*old Arabic; مُشْرِكِيْنَ [mush-ri-kiin] heathen / مُسْلِمِيْنَ [mus-li-miin] one who submits.
———
TEXT:
FARAH YAHYA
MALAYSIA