Defixiones, Will and Testament

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"The Desert" Verses 1 - 20 
THE DIARY OF BEIRUT UNDER SEIGE, 1982
by Adonis (Ali Ahmad Said)
English translation by Abdullah al-Udhari
  1. My era tells me bluntly:
    You do not belong.
    I answer bluntly:
    I do not belong,
    I try to understand you.
    Now I am a shadow
    Lost in the forest
    Of a skull
  1. I'm on my feet, the wall is a fence —
         The distance shrinks, a window recedes.
    Daylight is a thread
    Snipped by my lungs to stitch the evening.
  1. All I said about my life and death
    Recurs in the silence
    Of the stone under my head …
  1. Am I full of contradictions?  That is correct.
         Now I am a plant.  Yesterday, when I was between fire
              and water
         I was a harvest.
         Now I am a rose and live coal,
         Now I am the sun and the shadow
         I am not a god.
    Am I full of contradictions?  That is correct …
  1. The moon always wears
    A stone helmet
    To fight its own shadows.
  1. The door of my house is closed.
         Darkness is a blanket:
              A pale moon comes with
              A handful of light
              My words fall
              To convey my gratitude.
  1. The killing has changed the city's shape — This rock
         is bone
         This smoke people breathing.
  1. We no longer meet,
    Rejection and exile keep us apart.
    The promises are dead, space is dead,
    Death alone has become our meeting point.
  1. He shuts the door
    Not to trap his joy
    … But to free his grief.
  1. A newscast
         About a woman in love
         Being killed,
         About a boy being kidnapped
         And a policeman growing into a wall.
  1. Whatever comes it will be old
         So take with you anything other than this madness — get ready
              To stay a stranger …
  1. They found people in sacks:
         One without a head
         One without a tongue or hands
         One squashed
         The rest without names.
    Have you gone mad?  Please.
         Do not write about these things.
  1. You will see
         Say his name
         Say I painted his face
         Stretch your hand to him
         Or walk like any man
         Or smile
         Or say I was once sad
    You will see
         There is no homeland …
  1. There may come a time when you'll be
         Accepted to live deaf and dumb, and perhaps
    They'll let you mumble: death,
                   Life, resurrection —
         And peace be upon you.
  1. He wears Jihad uniform, struts in a mantle of ideas.
    A merchant — he does not sell clothes, he sells people.
  1. They took him to a ditch and burnt him.
         He was not a murderer, he was a boy.
         He was not …
                     He was a voice
    Vibrating, scaling the steps of space.
    And now he's fluting in the air.
  1. Darkness.
    The earth's trees have become tears on heaven's cheeks.
    An eclipse in this place.
    Death snapped the city's branch and the friends departed.
  1. You do not die because you are created or because you have a body
         You die because you are the face of the future.
  1. The flower that tempted the wind to carry its perfume
                                                                                       Died yesterday.
  1. The sun no longer rises
    It covers its feet with straw
    And slips away …