ibram Poetry (27)

She sat with fear in her eyes
Contemplating the upturned cup
She said 'Do not be sad, my son
You are destined to fall in love'
My son, Who sacrifices himself for his beloved,
Is a martyr

*
For long have I studied fortune-telling
But never have I read a cup similar to yours
For long have I studied fortune-telling
But never have I seen sorrows similar to yours
You are predestined to sail forever
Sail-less, on the sea of love
Your life is forever destined
To be a book of tears
And be imprisoned
Between water and fire

*
But despite all its pains,
Despite the sadness
That is with us day and night
Despite the wind
The rainy weather
And the cyclone
It is love, my son
That will be forever the best of fates

*
There is a woman in your life, my son
Her eyes are so beautiful
Glory to God
Her mouth and her laughter
Are full of roses and melodies
And her gypsy and crazy love of life
Travels the world
The woman you love
May be your whole world
But your sky will be rain-filled
Your road blocked, blocked, my son
Your beloved, my son, is sleeping
In a guarded palace
He who approaches her garden wall
Who enters her room
And who proposes to her
Or tries to unite her plaits
Will cause her to be lost, my son…lost

*
You will seek her everywhere, my son
You will ask the waves of the sea about her
You will ask the shores of the seas
You will travel the oceans
And your tears will flow like a river
And at the close of your life
You will find that since your beloved
Has no land, no home, no address
You have been pursuing only a trace of smoke
How difficult it is, my son
To love a woman
Who has neither land, nor home

raise me more love… raise me
my prettiest fits of madness
O’ dagger’s journey… in my flesh
and knife’s plunge…
sink me further my lady…
the sea calls me
add to me more death …
perhaps as death slays me… I’m revived
your body is my map…
the world's map no longer concerns me…
I am the oldest capital of sadness…
and my wound a Pharaonic engraving
my pain…. extends like an oil patch
from Beirut… to China…
my pain… a caravan…dispatched
by the Caliphs of 'A’Chaam'… to China…
in the seventh century of the 'Birth'…
and lost in a dragon’s mouth…
bird of my heart… 'naysani'
O’ sand of the sea, and forests of olives
O’ taste of snow, and taste of fire…
my heathen flavor, and insight
I feel scared of the unknown… shelter me
I feel scared of the darkness… embrace me
I feel cold… cover me up
tell me children stories…
rest beside me…
Chant to me…
since from the start of creation
I’ve been searching for a homeland to my forehead…
for a woman’s hair…
that writes me on the walls… then erases me…
for a woman’s love… to take me
to the borders of the sun… and throws me…
from a woman’s lip… as she makes me
like dust of powdered gold…
shine of my life. my fan
my lantern. declaration of my orchards
stretch me a bridge with the scent of oranges…
and place me like an ivory comb…
in the darkness of your hair… then forget me
I am a drop of water… ambivalent
remaining in the notebook of October
your love crushes me…
like a mad horse from the Caucasus throwing me under its hoofs…
and gargles with the water of my eyes…
add to me more fury… add to me
O’ prettiest fits of my madness
for your sake I set free my women
and effaced my birth certificate
and cut all my arteries…

Your love taught me to grieve
and I have been in need, for centuries
a woman to make me grieve
for a woman, to cry upon her arms
like a sparrow
for a woman to gather my pieces
like shards of broken crystal

Your love has taught me, my lady, the worst habits
it has taught me to read my coffee cups
thousands of times a night
to experiment with alchemy,
to visit fortune tellers

It has taught me to leave my house
to comb the sidewalks
and search your face in raindrops
and in car lights
and to peruse your clothes
in the clothes of unknowns
and to search for your image
even…..even…..
even in the posters of advertisements
your love has taught me
to wander around, for hours
searching for a gypsies hair
that all gypsies women will envy
searching for a face, for a voice
which is all the faces and all the voices…

Your love entered me…my lady
into the cities of sadness
and I before you, never entered
the cities of sadness
I did not know…
that tears are the person
that a person without sadness
is only a shadow of a person…

Your love taught me
to behave like a boy
to draw your face with chalk
upon the wall
upon the sails of fishermen's boats
on the Church bells, on the crucifixes,
your love taught me, how love,
changes the map of time…
Your love taught me, that when I love
the earth stops revolving,
Your love taught me things
that were never accounted for
So I read children's fairytales
I entered the castles of Jennies
and I dreamt that she would marry me
the Sultan's daughter
those eyes..
clearer than the water of a lagoon
those lips…
more desirable than the flower of pomegranates
and I dreamt that I would kidnap her like a knight and I dreamt that I would give
her necklaces of pearl and coral
Your love taught me, my lady,
what is insanity
it taught me…how life may pass
without the Sultan's daughter arriving

Your love taught me
How to love you in all things
in a bare winter tree,
in dry yellow leaves
in the rain, in a tempest,
in the smallest cafe, we drank in,
in the evenings…our black coffee

Your love taught me…to seek refuge
to seek refuge in hotels without names
in churches without names…
in cafes without names…

Your love taught me…how the night
swells the sadness of strangers
It taught me…how to see Beirut
as a woman…a tyrant of temptation
as a woman, wearing every evening
the most beautiful clothing she possesses
and sprinkling upon her breasts perfume
for the fisherman, and the princes
Your love taught me how to cry without crying
It taught me how sadness sleeps
Like a boy with his feet cut off
in the streets of the Rouche and the Hamra

Your love taught me to grieve
and I have been needing, for centuries
a woman to make me grieve
for a woman, to cry upon her arms
like a sparrow
for a woman to gather my pieces
like shards of broken crystal