PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

This is a translation of parts of my long Arabic poem. Excuse any mistakes as I found it very hard to translate.

Till we return

 By: Mariam Alammuri

 (1)

 Grey shadows desecrate the submissive sky

 A frowning sea tucks harm in the corners of the boat

 Nothing in the sunset but sobbing seagulls,

 There, behind the barriers comforting our loneliness in the midst of the ocean and the center of the glacier

Standing, we eye the moment of the end perhaps when it appears our life will begin.

Standing, yet nothing around us but the dull mist

***

***

(2)

Eid is sneaking past the warder’s gaze

 Stirring a deep wound in our hearts that oozes sorrow and blaze

We look at him with a loving eye:

Oh Eid, if you just once don’t come to us 

There is not a span in our bodies for a new sorrow

He goes away yet we beg him to return

He comes back yet we beg him not to return

We come to him with our every concern and our every apology and mow between his hands:

“Oh Eid, have compassion

Blame not, because we truly love you

We love your mornings, hems and hue

We love your echo among the kind doves

On top of the minarets, light flirts with you, with the call: God is Great

We love your breaths dripping with sweet praises

We love your roses distilled in the palms and the heat of hugs, like perfumes lulling with the winds

We love your laughter among the swings reaching high, raining joy on our thirsty hearts

Everything becomes alive with your call: “God is Great”

*****

*****

(6)

Oh seagulls, take our souls, Don’t leave them alone this night imprisoned behind our thinning ribs

Despite their weakness, fractures and faults

Take our souls encircled with songs, wrapped with love and chanted lilies

Immersed in longing, in a concert of scented kisses

Take our souls to its residents, as they are the only ones who can understand the meanings and the intentions

Take them (our souls) and bring us their passion so we can have air, mornings and sweet letters

***

(7)
Over the deep horizon, our voices crash, and crack the silence

Entering with all the longing into our eternal love

As we preach her

We rattle the surface with delicate songs

Calling upon her with all our homeless hearts:

Oh Palestine, our life, our love

Do you hear us?

Did they tell you about us despite the distances?

Do you know that you are the light that comforts us with certain answers?

Do you know that the dreams of meeting you are the provenance of our believes?

And your chanted name is our sanctuary?

Do you know?
May God water your heart with our longings

Oh goddess of love

Oh source of all suns

Oh smile of kind people

Your name is our everything that is left in this stingy time

(8)

Promise to remember us even once every Eid

And if the cold ocean intrudes our shattered bodies,

 Promise to contain our love, our remains and our wondering array
as there is no heaven on sea but you

 And no ultimate existence but you

***

(9)

Yes we will return

 In any form!

 In the shape of love we will submit to your arms

 In hopes to grant us your immortal sash

 Yes we will return

To kiss your palms every morning and night
And flutter, as little birds should, in your endless heart

Filling us with unparallel songs

Sheltering us in your kind eyes as we fall asleep,

Covered with your nightly eyelashes

A forest of poems and scents and Oud

This is what you are in us, our paradise

This is what you are in us, and more

Oh dream

Sprinkle your promises on our droughty exile

till we return

till we return