Say this city has ten million souls,
Some are living in mansions, some are living in holes:
Yet there’s no place for us, my dear, yet there’s no place for us.
Once we had a country and we thought it fair,
Look in the atlas and you’ll find it there:
We cannot go there now, my dear, we cannot go there now.
In the village churchyard there grows an old yew,
Every spring it blossoms anew:
Old passports can’t do that, my dear, old passports can’t do that.
The consul banged the table and said,
“If you’ve got no passport you’re officially dead”:
But we are still alive, my dear, but we are still alive.
Went to a committee; they offered me a chair;
Asked me politely to return next year:
But where shall we go to-day, my dear, but where shall we go to-day?
Came to a public meeting; the speaker got up and said;
“If we let them in, they will steal our daily bread”:
He was talking of you and me, my dear, he was talking of you and me.
Thought I heard the thunder rumbling in the sky;
It was Hitler over Europe, saying, “They must die”:
O we were in his mind, my dear, O we were in his mind.
Saw a poodle in a jacket fastened with a pin,
Saw a door opened and a cat let in:
But they weren’t German Jews, my dear, but they weren’t German Jews.
Went down the harbour and stood upon the quay,
Saw the fish swimming as if they were free:
Only ten feet away, my dear, only ten feet away.
Walked through a wood, saw the birds in the trees;
They had no politicians and sang at their ease:
They weren’t the human race, my dear, they weren’t the human race.
Dreamed I saw a building with a thousand floors,
A thousand windows and a thousand doors:
Not one of them was ours, my dear, not one of them was ours.
Stood on a great plain in the falling snow;
Ten thousand soldiers marched to and fro:
Looking for you and me, my dear, looking for you and me.
He stands watching steam rise
from the boiling water of the open pan
He clasped his hands together
to catch a cloud of steam somehow
And it is moments like these
men in their madness dream
of measuring the weight of clouds
He stood his mouth wide open
and tried to catch a cloud of steam
And it is at moments like this
that large bellied men scheme
to measure the weight of clouds.
A black blind owl sits in a tree
listening with care to the words of the man
standing above the boiling pan
This wise bird could clearly hear
each movement the man made
to grasp and gather a cloud of steam
And it is at times like these
that earth becomes more dangerous.
On the mountains top
the child lies on his back in the grass
watching clouds stream past
the effortless changing forms
and sees too the time ahead
when ice a mile thick
will cover the land again.
Men stand watching steam rise
from the boiling water of the open pan
and see nothing, hear nothing
not even the sound of time
breathing hot breathed
at the back of their necks
And it is at times like these
that earth becomes more dangerous.
With the largest number of migrants the world has ever seen – 244 million in 2015 – people who are displaced by exile, violence, poverty and environmental issues resulting from climate change, it’s hard not to think of poets like Darwish who lived or live large portions of their lives in exile from their homelands.
“. . . he says I am from there, I am from here, but I am neither there nor here. I have two names which meet and part… I have two languages, but I have long forgotten— which is the language of my dreams” Mahmoud Darwish’s farewell to Edward Said (1935-2003), professor of literature at Columbia University, a public intellectual and founder of the field of postcolonial studies. Said was educated in the Western Cannon. He was a Palestinian-American born in Mandatory Palestine and a citizen of the United States through his father, Wadie Saïd, a WW 1 U.S. Army Veteran
Born in Mandated Palestine, Mahmoud Darwish has been called a poet of peace in times of war. He was regarded as the Palestinian national poet. Darwish used Palestine as a metaphor for the loss of Eden, birth and resurrection. He wrote of the anguish of dispossession and exile. He has been described as incarnating and reflecting “the tradition of the political poet in Islam, the man of action whose action is poetry.”
You can hear the lovely lilt of Arabic even in the English translations of this internationally know and recognized award winning poet. His awards included the Ibn Sina Prize, the Lotus prize from the Union of Afro-Asian Writers, France’s Knight of Arts and Belles Lettres medal, and the Prize for Cultural Freedom from the Lannan Foundation.
—Jamie Dedes
I Didn’t Apologize to the Well
I didn’t apologize to the well as I passed by it.
I borrowed a cloud from an ancient pine and squeezed it
like an orange. I waited for a mythical white deer.
I instructed my heart in patience: Be neutral, as though
you were not a part of me. Here, good shepherds
stood on air and invented the flute and enticed
mountain partridges into their traps. Here, I saddled
a horse for flight to my personal planets, and flew.
And here, a fortuneteller told me: Beware of asphalt roads
and automobiles, ride on your sigh. Here, I loosened
my shadow and waited. I selected the smallest stone
and stood wakefully by it. I broke apart a myth
and got broken myself. I circled the well until
I flew out of myself to what I’m not. And a voice
from deep in the well spoke to me: This grave
is not yours. And so I apologized. I read verses
from the wise Qur’an and said to the anonymous presence
in the well: Peace be with you and the day
you were killed in the land of peace and with the day
you’ll rise from the well’s darkness
and live…
“And Caesar’s spirit, raging for revenge, With Atë by his side come hot from hell, Shall in these confines with a monarch’s voice Cry “Havoc!” and let slip the dogs of war, That this foul deed shall smell above the earth With carrion men, groaning for burial.”
Julius Caesar Act 3, scene 1
we have need of gods an ancient irony
like blood that needs heat
to sweat out the mysteries
to rage in revenge
to reconcile sacrifice
to repel condemnation
to simmer our gratitude
for the many wonders
as misunderstood
as all the horrors
relieve us we pray
in our righteous moments
from the sins of others their guns, their bombs their swords of hate
lives and livelihoods cut short
in genocides renamed –
semantics play large
in wars of loathing and
vile justifications
relieve us we pray
from children killing children
from executions in the street
from brothers killing brothers
from sisters unleashed
like the dogs of war
like a belly full of cancer
like an aorta bursting
our gods cry ‘Havoc!’
in traps set by rulers
by teachers at schools
and in places of worship
by parents at dinner table
our legs immobilized
like wolves ensnared, we chew off our feet
attempts at freedom cripple and break us
and everywhere
mouthing lies
groaning in denial
bowing to gutter rats
scraping to vultures
the false gods of our making
Now we will count to twelve
and we will all keep still
for once on the face of the earth,
let’s not speak in any language;
let’s stop for a second,
and not move our arms so much.
It would be an exotic moment
without rush, without engines;
we would all be together
in a sudden strangeness.
Fishermen in the cold sea
would not harm whales
and the man gathering salt
would not look at his hurt hands.
Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victories with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.
What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.
Life is what it is about…
If we were not so single-minded
about keeping our lives moving,
and for once could do nothing,
perhaps a huge silence
might interrupt this sadness
of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with
death.
Now I’ll count up to twelve
and you keep quiet and I will go.
Extravagaria : A Bilingual Edition
by Pablo Neruda (Author), Alastair Reid (Translator)
Noonday Press; Bilingual edition (January 2001)
ISBN: 0374512388
it must be painful for them to write, those poets in tough-times and hard places
where blood and tears and poverty contaminate the air, stain the sidewalks, and consume the people
the blood must be soul-sick and rusted and tasting of acid, not salt,
and the poems meant to heal the writer and stroke the cheeks of the wounded,
to dry their eyes and gently kiss their gray heads
to poem in such places must be like walking shoeless on glass shards
perhaps the most sacred thing in the dream-time meadow of poets’ desire is Light ~
can you awaken to meet the Divine on the battlefield, in the camps, in government housing or in the ghettos?
if so, you are a saint, not simply an artist
2.
in my small world, my civilized world, people fall asleep reading or after making love or playing in the yard with their children
if they wander, it is through books or planned travel
there are luxuries
there is food
there is cleanliness and paper on which to write
no bombs are dropping to scorch and scar the Earth
there is a certain dignity
3.
in San Francisco we walk along the beach at night, near the Cliff House
we walk to the sound of the waves, the song of the Earth chanting its joys
our feet are bare and relish the comfort of cool sand
the air is clear and cold and easy to breathe, tasting of salt and smelling of sea life ~ here is a pristine moment of peace
i want to bequeath this peace to you, to everyone,
as though it were a cherished heirloom
it is really a birthright
i want to plunge into the waters and gather the ocean in my cupped hands, to offer it to you as sacramental wine
i want to form seaweed into garlands for all of us to wear, to hang over our hearts, a symbol of affection
i want to collect pine cones from the trees that congregate along the coast and feed them to the children to remind them to cherish this Earth and all its creatures, themselves included, and to say …
do not make war in your heart or upon your mother’s body
Lives built on pigeon dreams
structured by Madison Avenue
calculated by Wall Street
beribboned by Hollywood
We take them: these manufactured dreams,
one-size-fits-all, straight off the rack . . . And damn cheap too!
Mad, cannibal pigeon dreams
turn good minds and whole hearts into mince
We pray to false economies,
seek deliverance from Cheap Jack
We buy one, get one free –
And fetch and fetish youth eternal
from face-lifts, Botox™, and boob-jobs –
Exit here:
drugs, alcohol
sex-a-PEAL
en-ter-TAIN-ment.
Get a house, a car, a jewel –
Be the first on your block.
Buy now. Pay later.
Filling the empty with nothing more,
something less . . .
and warehousing our souls, they
gather dust in public storage . . . the first month free.
Poems unwritten. Songs unsung.
Chumped. Stumped. Petrified.
A gullible human Pigeon Pie,
neatly boxed
and wrapped to go.
Come on up, folks, right here and now, get your famous utterances here, ten for a dollar, only ten for a dollar! One violation per utterance and fire and war and brimstone come calling, ten of them, I tell you, such a deal you cannot find anywhere else. Come on up, folks, up this mountain—who shall be king of the hill (or queen—you listening there gary? It could be you!) who shall follow the smoke in the day and the fire at night and hunger for the lost and lead the poor and feed the cold chill night of despair and dispossession disposition unknown—for just ten, count them, ten utterances for a dollar! And you can fight over the order and fight over the fine print define your terms, ten for a dollar. I’m telling you folks, come on up, step right up to the altar of idolatry, loving the electric bill and the gas company and the defense contractor beyond recognition of the face at the beginning of the multi-national parrot sale. Parrots, ten for a dollar as they echo your laugh tracks and needle your relatives pining away in a major depression. For a dollar, ten for a dollar! Pills or utterances, wishes or commandments, prayers or players, I tell you such a deal you cannot find anywhere else but the lowest place on earth, the newest crust, the Syrian-African rift, and oh what a rift it is, oh, what a rift it is. Ten for a dollar! I’m telling you, who needs a dozen when you only have ten fingers and toes, fingers and toes, fingers and toes, ten for a dollar! On the battlefield who cares how much per utterance but only a blessed dime, blessed, blessed time. What can you get for a dime bag death dream time? But four, get full of sorrow drowning the pleasure of ten utterances, love-making screams desire and joy, ten utterances for a dollar. Just ten. Just a dollar. Come on up, folks, ten utterances for a dollar. Come, come, come, come on up, folks. Come on up.
I mean, it’s
Ready to go
Easy to use
Off the rack
One size fits all
New improved formula
Drive through convenience
Super economy size
Hey, it’s
Fast and easy
New better than ever
Bright attractive packaging
Scientific studies prove
As advertised in Life
Safety tested
Guaranteed No mess
You know, it’s
Labor saving easy clean up
As seen on TV
Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval
Nine out of ten doctors recommend it
Research has shown
No assembly required
Government approved
Why should they maintain peace
When war is such a profitable business
Who would benefit from social justice?
The little people
Bad business, then!
Too many of them
Too many mouths to feed
Affects sustainability
So again, war is better than peace
They played this strategy on us so many times before
They solve crisis they created
Playing the game of war
When printing money like wrapping paper no longer works
When the skyscrapers fall like matches castles
They play the game of war
It is a kind of chess but
They play it on our flesh
Earthquakes, floods, tornadoes
Nothing stops the business of war
Peace is just the intermezzo between two refills of the racket launcher
I wonder how a chess mate position would look on this war table….
Peace reigns in this treeless desert of quiet.
Here I don’t worry about the philosophical
or metaphysical question of a falling oak,
redwood, or even a palm if I don’t wish to.
Many will never understand my affinity
for the neatness of the seemingly
dust-cursed and barren wastes of alone.
I don’t mind. The desert protects its own.
Always shifting, always the winds of time
giving me new geography to chronicle
and erasing the needless old steps,
always the sound of my own voice
when I wish to listen to it.
And there are plenty of others here.
Just very, very far apart.
My wanderings have crossed paths
with some of these nomads
and I have fallen in with another.
Sometimes we go off, each of us alone,
to listen to the desert,
take comfort in its cleanliness
of thought and deed and spirit.
We always seem to come back
to share our discoveries
and keep one another warm on cold nights
of what once was just one voice,
one heartbeat wandering
in that wind and the blessed quiet.
The BeZine 
