The Desert, Pt. 1

"The Desert" Verses 1 – 20
THE DIARY OF BEIRUT UNDER SEIGE, 1982
by Adonis (Ali Ahmad Said)
English translation by Abdullah al-Udhari

My era tells me bluntly:
You do not belong.
I answer bluntly:
I do not belong,
I try to understand you.
Now I am a shadow
Lost in the forest
Of a skull

I'm on my feet, the wall is a fence —
The distance shrinks, a window recedes.
Daylight is a thread
Snipped by my lungs to stitch the evening.

All I said about my life and death
Recurs in the silence
Of the stone under my head ...

Am I full of contradictions? That is correct.
Now I am a plant. Yesterday, when I was between fire
and water
I was a harvest.
Now I am a rose and live coal,
Now I am the sun and the shadow
I am not a god.
Am I full of contradictions? That is correct ...

The moon always wears
A stone helmet
To fight its own shadows.

The door of my house is closed.
Darkness is a blanket:
A pale moon comes with
A handful of light
My words fall
To convey my gratitude.

The killing has changed the city's shape — This rock
is bone
This smoke people breathing.

We no longer meet,
Rejection and exile keep us apart.
The promises are dead, space is dead,
Death alone has become our meeting point.

He shuts the door
Not to trap his joy
... But to free his grief.

A newscast
About a woman in love
Being killed,
About a boy being kidnapped
And a policeman growing into a wall.

Whatever comes it will be old
So take with you anything other than this madness — get ready
To stay a stranger ...

They found people in sacks:
One without a head
One without a tongue or hands
One squashed
The rest without names.
Have you gone mad? Please.
Do not write about these things.

You will see
Say his name
Say I painted his face
Stretch your hand to him
Or walk like any man
Or smile
Or say I was once sad
You will see
There is no homeland ...

There may come a time when you'll be
Accepted to live deaf and dumb, and perhaps
They'll let you mumble: death,
Life, resurrection —
And peace be upon you.

He wears Jihad uniform, struts in a mantle of ideas.
A merchant — he does not sell clothes, he sells people.

They took him to a ditch and burnt him.
He was not a murderer, he was a boy.
He was not ...
He was a voice
Vibrating, scaling the steps of space.
And now he's fluting in the air.

Darkness.
The earth's trees have become tears on heaven's cheeks.
An eclipse in this place.
Death snapped the city's branch and the friends departed.

You do not die because you are created or because you have a body
You die because you are the face of the future.

The flower that tempted the wind to carry its perfume
Died yesterday.

The sun no longer rises
It covers its feet with straw
And slips away ...