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| June 1999 |  |
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Dawn Visitors |
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Izzideen Almanasra |
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At the entries to capital cities I met him, distracted and sad, a man with worry lines that weighed him down like a cypress tree, drooping and silent, despite the winds that ruffled him whispering in the evenings- but he would not answer the wind.. At the gates of capital cities-I cannot name them but I sing their Arabic names when troubles reign- I call on the capitals when shells are slaughtering my people's children. I call on them, I scream, but no one answers. They've all travelled west, and north. I wish they'd gone east, I wish they'd become stars in exile, servants to strangers. At harvest time they sang under the pine trees but none of the harvests was theirs.. it is for those hard hearted men who owns the land of exile Don't bury me in any Arab capital, they've all tortured me for so long, giving me nothing but death and suffering and poverty and the martyred neighbors of my grave, those new kinsmen, for every stranger is kinsman to the stranger. No, don't bury me in any Arab capital at the mercy of this ordeal! At the gate of the capitals I met him his head forever bent, immortal as the earth of Hebron, proud as the mountains of Safad. He was soft like old wine when it steeps inside the body. I would have tempted the stars to accompany his beautiful departure, a star to guard him, and one lovely maiden to tend him forever. |
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