She
says: when are we gonna meet?
I say:
after a year and a war
She
says: when does the war end?
I say:
the time we meet
These
brilliant lines are from the Palestinian poet, Mahmoud Darwish (1942-2008). Born
in a village in Israel, Darwish and his family were considered 'internal refugees'
in their own homeland. He spent most of his later life in Beirut and Paris. Majority
of Darwish's work reflects his
unhappiness about being considered 'an outsider' in his own land. His poetry is
rich in imagery, lyrical and passionate. Displacement, denial of identity and
the yearning to go back to his own home forms the soul of his writing.
His
poetry outpours his immense inexplicable pain and longing for his home and for
the end of war. His poem I Belong There from the book "Unfortunately,
It Was Paradise " is a beautiful composition for his homeland :
I belong there. I have many memories. I was born as
everyone is born.
I have a mother, a house with many windows, brothers,
friends, and a prison cell
with a chilly window! I have a wave snatched by
seagulls, a panorama of my own.
I have a saturated meadow. In the deep horizon of my
word, I have a moon,
a bird's sustenance, and an immortal olive tree.
I have lived on the land long before swords turned man
into prey.
I belong there. When heaven mourns for her mother, I
return heaven to
her mother.
And I cry so that a returning cloud might carry my
tears.
To break the rules, I have learned all the words
needed for a trial by blood.
I have learned and dismantled all the words in order
to draw from them a
single word: Home.
Another poet with family roots in Palestine, Naomi
Shihab Nye describes Darwish as 'The Essential Breath of the Palestinian people, the eloquent witness
of exile and belonging, exquisitely tuned singer of images that invoke, link,
and shine a brilliant light into the world’s whole heart. What he speaks has
been embraced by readers around the world—his in an utterly necessary voice,
unforgettable once discovered.'
In another poem To a Young Poet, Darwish's imagery is
magical as can be seen in the appended excerpts :
If you want to duel with a falcon
soar with the falcon.
If you fall in love with a woman,
be the one, not she,
who desires his end.
................
................
The road is long like an ancient poet’s night:
plains and hills, rivers and valleys.
Walk according to your dream’s measure: either a lily
follows you or the gallows.
................
................
Don’t think, when you melt in sorrow
like candle tears, of who will see you
or follow your intuition’s light.
Think of yourself: is this all of myself?
The poem is always incomplete, the butterflies make it
whole.
His
love for humanity and peace is timeless and in his short lifetime of 66 years, every
stanza he wrote and every poem he composed, exudes his eternal optimism and
hope for a better world and a home for all, which he longed passionately each
day of his life.
And I say to myself : A moon
will rise from my darkness
(P.S. Darwish's select work is translated
and edited by Munir Akash and Carolyn Forche with Sinan Antoon and Amira
El-Zein in a book published in 2003 named Unfortunately,
It was Paradise)
