As always the Everyman’s Pocket Library delivers. This edition is bilingual, which is always nice for deeper appreciation, further discussion and possible encouragement to learn another language. I have asked Arab friends about a few of the poems and they found some of the translations quite accurate, but of course with poetry what sounds nice to the ear of one culture is hard to transform into another. The birds often fly away. The most obvious example in this collection is “L- Poem of the Arabs”, by Al-Shanfara. This is one of the most important poems in Arabic literature and yet in this translation it has no power; it falls flat, lies dead. I found Lady Ann Blunt’s translations particularly evocative because they seemed translated word for word, which might be unnatural but the result is something that is so thick with thoughts, rich with odd rhythm and dense with images. Some of her archaic choices make it pleasantly alien and antique to our ears. This selection spans 1500 years across the Islamic world and has poets from Spain, Northern Africa, the Gulf and Levant as well as Sicily and Iraq. It is heartening that so many of these poems are written by women (the earliest here is Maysun from the 7th century AD)Even in the modern poetry the spell of the desert seems to be on their lips. Needless to say the majority of these poems are about love. Some of the most moving and magical poems, surprisingly for those of us from the ‘West’, are about rain. These are not just in wonder and gratitude, but also in torrential fear.
Some of the early poems (pre-Islamic and early Islamic) are full of bragging like modern rappers, but interestingly not just of physical prowess but also of generous largess. All the early poems show a keen connection with animals- allegories and allusions are made as beauty and strength are given expression. Kinship is felt with wolves; horses and camels are admired. The storm force of a horse is captured in the words of Imru Al-Qays ‘the ribs of him shifts as a rain-stream smoothing stones in a river-bed.’ and in Labid’s lines ‘shaketh her reins galloping, flieth as the doves fly bound for the water-springs’. Deep in Labid’s “Mu’Allaqa” is the heart-wrenching search of a cow for her ‘wolf-raided… sweet calf loitering’ The verses that hold this story echo low to today. One form I have never seen before that I want to use in my poetry is to have what appears to be two columns of verses side-by-side. It is clear that these are to be read horizontally, leaping from one column to the next, but it strikes me that the poet would also like readers to read them vertically as separate verses. What a brilliant game and skill- to have two poems in one! There is only one poem here like that Al-A’Ma Al-Tutili’s “Muwashshaha”. The later poems mix weather with politics and love, and are more direct, less visceral and yet occasionally surreal. Iman Mersal’s “Solitude Exercises” seems to not only pinpoint the loss of love but also robe of mourning already worn before a loved one dies. Mahmoud Darwish best expresses when lovers no longer match,and how they should be reconciled to this and still be friends with fond memories. It is the most upbeat poem that I have read about a break-up. Ibn Hamdis and Nizar Qabbani seem infatuated seducers of the same blood, though they are eight hundred years apart in time. I am jealous that poetry is alive and beating in the Arab world. I am sad that in English it does not command millions of avid fans. An Arabic equivalent of “American Idol”, “Million's Poet”, has 70 million viewers and offers a one million dollar prize. There are many other popular contests such as Prince of Poets and poetry competitions for kids that are watched avidly. Unlike other peoples I have met, among Arabs poetry is not an unusual hobby. The poets I gained most from in this tiny tome are Labid, Abid, Qasmuna Bint Isma’il, Badr Shakir Al-Sayyab, Salma Khadra Jayyusi, Adonis and Iman Mersal. My favourite poet from this book is Ibn Hamdis. The most beautiful poem is Badr Shakir Al-Sayyab’s poem “Rain Song”. Here are some of the many lines I loved from this collection: ‘the lightning…. Gleameth like fingers twisted, clasped in the cloud rivers’ ‘While the wild beast corpses, grouped like great bulbs up-torn cumbered the hollow places, drowned in the night-trouble’ - Imru Al-Qays ‘Clean-swept lie their hearthstones, white as new manuscript writ with texts fresh-graven, penned by the cataracts’ -Labid ‘She, the white cow, shone there through the dark night luminous, like a pearl of deep-seas, freed from the string’ -Labid ‘meat-dishes: flowed the streams of fatness, feeding the fatherless’ -Labid ‘threading the labyrinths’ -Antara ‘high-piled cloud-masses filled to the full, night bursting: The heavily-burdened wombs of the fruitful waters that spout forth rain from many a rift of blackness’ -Abid ‘when the lightning clove it and flash and flickered, as though in the smile of rain-bringing constellations One saw the white teeth flash forth in a sudden gladness’ -Abid ‘I have hidden the name of my love from the crowd… How I long for an empty and desolate place in order to call my love’s name aloud’ -Ulayya Bint Al-Mahdi ‘in a sorrow not worn away with time, though time wears us away’ - Ibn Zaydun ‘the swarming flood of night’ ‘the moon a blacksmith’s mirror’ -Ibn Hamdis ‘The blossoms break The mirror of the lake, And adroitly aim Their tongues of flame’ -Ibn Hamdis ‘When they struck camp they left a land holding the tombs of those who loved them’ -Ibn Al’Arabi ‘Time and trouble tumble on’ - Abu Al-Qasim Al-Shabbi ‘Rippled by the blade of an oar at break of day; As if stars were throbbing in the depths of them’ ‘Do you know how gutters weep when it pours down’ ‘I can almost hear the palm trees drinking rain’ ‘And in Iraq a thousand serpents drink the nectar From a flower the Euphrates has nourished with dew’ - Badr Shakir Al-Sayyab ‘He will not learn to drink regret from my sighs’ ‘squeeze my heart to give it rest’ ‘my cup has many cracks yet the wine always kissed the brim’ - Salma Khadra Jayyusi ‘To invent a language for you alone To fit the size of your body And the size of my love’ -Nizar Qabbani ‘So I can tailor for my beloved A garment of poetry’ -Nizar Qabbani ‘The pain of the fallen willow trees Under the wheels of autumn’ -Nizar Qabbani ‘My body a rose upon the wound’ ‘I have halos of craving’ ‘This is my flame that erases’ -Adonis ‘The captive nightingale with the horizon which brushes the bars of his cage?’ ‘And sleep silently till daybreak, Not for want of words, But because the weary butterflies Will be sleeping on our lips’ -Muhammad Al-Maghut ‘it wasn’t enough that we be together to be together…’ -Mahmoud Darwish ‘take here to a balcony to see a moon drowning in milk’ -Mahmoud Darwish ‘The poet closes his eyes on a rose of dust’ ‘The night barks here thumps somewhere’ -Mohammed Bennis ‘to topple the pail filled with the remains of our evening together’ ‘I will place your fingers in an ice bowl where there are no tremors...’ ‘These touch-ups in the telling have a magic that cannot be understood by those who never needed to steal the kindness of others’ -Iman Mersal I love the Everyman's Pocket Library: tough little hardbacks that fit in your pocket and have a bookmark; these are truly beautiful books. These anthologies have insightful forewords and always a mix of classic selections and often unusual ones. The anthology is divided into different themes: Buddha nature, happiness, phases of the moon, birds, creatures, spring, summer etc. As well as a strong canon from Japanese poets, this collection has Western haiku stars and interestingly excerpts culled from masters like Shelley and Hopkins so that pieces of their verses become haiku. This selection introduced me to two 'Western' poets whose work I'm now hungry for - Stanford Forrester and Anita Virgil. Here are some snippets I liked 'Scooping up the moon In the wash-basin And spilling it' - RYUHO 'The skylark: Its voice alone fell, Leaving nothing behind' - AMPU 'In one single cry, The pheasant has swallowed The broad field' -YAMEI 'The shell of a cicada: It sang itself Utterly away' -BASHO 'Under a passage of wild geese, Over the foot-hills, A moon is signed' -BUSON 'Having slept, the cat gets up, And with great yawns, Goes love-making' -ISSA 'Early dusk: The mouth of the toad Exhales the moon' -SHIKI 'Frost at midnight: I would sleep, borrowing The sleeves of a scarecrow' -BASHO 'Peeling a pear Sweet drops trickle down The knife' -SHIKI If you’re a big uncle (older man with clout) and you see a place you want to grab a bite to eat, you just drive right up to the door and park there. Chinese traffic has all the worst qualities of Egyptian and Italian driving. Lanes are suggestions that can, at the very least, be doubled. Four lanes are instantly eight. If you want to turn left but you are in the far right half-lane- no problem. Simply, put your vehicle across all other lanes horizontal to traffic and go the direction you need. Chinese traffic is like a serene game of chicken. Drivers get to have at least ten games of chicken each time they hop in their car, bike, rickshaw. The main city streets are very egalitarian; they’re not just for cars but also for pedestrians, bikes and animals. I saw a dog take an exit ramp. Later in Xi’an while foolishly waiting for traffic to thin, I was chided by a friend, who said ‘No nice- just cross the road. It’s not our fault. Too many people’ A testament to Chinese fortitude and forbearance- I never saw any road rage nor an accident apart from the intentional ramming of a taxi by a rickshaw driver who drove us home.
A friend of mine has escaped bureaucracy burdened U.S. academia with his family and run away to live in Costa Rica. He's well happy with the slow simpler lifestyle. He and his wife are making cheese (disappointing this is literal and not an entertaining euphemism for communal farting) and wine. I told him he should make dandelion wine...get your weeding and wino-ing (trademarked expression by the way) done in one. He then said dandelions are really rare there, so imagine in the country with the most biodiversity dandelions are the exotic.
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