Mar
22
2010
A Man’s Nature
A man needs one minute
to love a woman
and centuries to forget her
…Nizar Qabbani
Translated by L. Jayyusi and C. Middleton
In The Summer
In the summer
I stretch out on the shore
And think of you.
Had I told the sea
What I felt for you,
It would have [...]
no comments | tags: nizar-qabbani, photography, poetry | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
Jun
25
2009
Language
When a man is in love
how can he use old words?
Should a woman
desiring her lover
lie down with
grammarians and linguists?
I said nothing
to the woman I loved
but gathered
love’s adjectives into a suitcase
and fled from all languages.
…Nizar Qabbani
1 comment | tags: linguistics, nizar-qabbani, photography, poetry | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
May
19
2009
Perplexity
I had no wish to be stone-hearted
and drive the dreams from her eyes.
Desire urged me to wake her
but my hand shrank from reaching out to her.
She seemed to find joy in her eyelids
and would not depart from them.
Woe to my heart! How was it not destroyed
by the sight [...]
no comments | tags: Ibrahim-Tuqan, photography, poetry | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
Apr
2
2009
A Woman Walking Within Me
No one has read my coffee-cup
without divining you’re my love,
nor studied the lines of my palm
and not discerned four letters of your name,
everything can be denied
except the fragrance of the one we love,
everything can be concealed
except a woman’s footsteps moving within us,
everything can be debated
except your femininity.
What will become of [...]
1 comment | tags: arabic-literature, nizar-qabbani, photography, poetry | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
Mar
29
2009
Every Time I Kiss You
Every time I kiss you
After a long separation
I feel
I am putting a hurried love letter
In a red mailbox
. …Nizar Qabbani
Translated by B. Frangieh And C. Brown
no comments | tags: arabic-literature, nizar-qabbani, poetry | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
Mar
23
2009
My lover asks me:
“What is the difference between me and the sky?”
The difference, my love,
Is that when you laugh,
I forget about the sky.
…. Nizar Qabbani
2 comments | tags: arabic-literature, nizar-qabbani, photography, poetry | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
Feb
28
2009
The One who Laughs and Laughs and Laughs
You are the echo when my body calls
tree of abandoned houses
the one who picks for me the words I also pick
at the mention of whose name I lose my words
You are my yearning and my finding out
bride of the soul and instincts
and [...]
5 comments | tags: arabic-poetry, literature, photography, Unsi-al-Haj | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
Feb
20
2009
I love You
I love you more than human heart can bear
More than a poet dreams or lover feels
You are the perfumed cloud from heaven sent
To rain upon me your enchanted dew;
I feel your heart, your veins flow into mine,
No gap to let the impure world creep in;
My heart confronts [...]
no comments | tags: arabic-literature, literature, Llyas-Abu-Shaaka, llyas-abu-shaka, photography, poetry | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
Feb
13
2009
Overture
Who can open the door
of the green river,
of the golden clouds,
of my heart?
…Zubur Dixon
Translated by P. A. Byrne and
Salma Khadra Jayyusi
Zubur Dixon, Iraqi poet born 1933. Largely self-taught, she draws on the strong poetic tradition of Iraq and reflects a suppressed emotionalism related to her position as a woman in [...]
no comments | tags: arabic-literature, poetry, Zubur-Dixon | posted in Arabic, literature, photography, poetry
