What a city is this o Bassem

Ahmad Baghdadi

Arabic translation: Saleh Razzouk & Philip Terman

 

 

Bassem..

Tell me the truth, do not be polite at all,

Like a girl they came to tear away from her lover, the son of the neighbors.

/

Bassem...

- is Damascus well ?

- Is the dawn still sinking between its eyes?.

- Are all rivers still thirsty to its name

 And to the smiles of pavements when receive the steps of absentees.

....

Is the sky grey over it.. Is that true?!

Do its flowers, my friend, fall in the crow's beaks,

I remember how you used to lean on the wall with your palm..

From this touch a new poem was born..

And i remember also your heart when distributed the life among the dead friends,

And among other friends await for their death..

/

What a city is this o Bassem?..

We manufactured in it our certain death, and here we live

On its death...

- but this death is not enough..

I should punch every wall by my scream..... I should draw a mouth that can not keep silent,

To tell God clearly about our pains and torture..

About all injuries and every fall,

Look at our fall, it is all clear like the blind dawn of  our God..

And look at these prophets.. With fingers immersed in

These crimes..

Their miracles do not deceive me..

Nor their sayings that they are obliged to.. They follow orders...

......

O Bassem

Tell me, please..

Is Damascus alright?..

Or the songs and the lips pour out and sneak their ways among the shoes?!..

Tell me my friend.. Tell me..

I am dying her, i am like an end of a music at the beginning of the orchestra.!..

***

I guess you are not going to tell me about any thing,

Even how my heart is falling from the fourth floor...!

/

O Bassem

Is love still well...

 

2006

 

 

Arabic translation: Saleh Razzouk & Philip Terman

 

 

 poet from Syrai