Translated by Muhiddein Assaf
Mirrors,
Are these brilliant hearts on all compass points -
Our eternal waiting for splendour.
Mirrors,
Are stations that expect, transparently
Your appearance to smell the fragrance of shabboy.
I see the dance of mirrors happy with your angelic,
Sitting in front of them.
I am hearing their songs
In spite of your harshness
And I remain jealous of the mirrors.
So why do you accuse me of desertion?
Is not the jealousy the rebellious face of love?
Jealousy is an emancipation of the senses from its quiet world
An excitement of feelings in your fields
The shout of the soul while it is battering your high walls
The madness of the heart which is astray in your forests
From the Babylonian Joy till the last poem of Al-Sayyab
At the midday of Basrah -
Unattainable. The woodcutters do not know
Only the hunters of the footsteps of life -
Like the exhalations of Kais Ibn Al-Mollawah which the old
In loveliness and verse
Continue to their immortality with smiles.
As a scholar fiery with passion
On your pages my days flow.
In your books my love sets
Three sad states
Where the rivers Tigris and Euphrates cross
Separated
And their passport is always hope.
In the end fish become confused on the coasts
My beloved ...
Perhaps the Euphrates is jealous of the Tigris
From the in-flowing tributaries?
Jealousy is love’s ember;
By its extinguishing love will die,
And by its glowing it will die.
Yesterday your sad eyes were looking at me disillusioned
While I wrote that my heartbeat throbs on your lips.
I release psalms to protect you from your shadow.
On your breast my revelation quarrels
With your sighs;
Your sighs themselves are quarrelsome.
I’ll make the stars into a necklace, embellished by your neck
And wonder flirtatiously.
The dews of your neck are my flames!
You are the sorrow of my sorrows and the release of my madness!
You are the beginning of my beginnings
And the first commencement!
For your sake, I drove all the Myths until they sank in the sea,
The throne of the Goddess Ecstasy in your palms!
You, for whom words entreat:
Blackbirds learn from you how to broadcast their longings
To grant existence to what has been missed.
You, for whom swallows migrate while
The Dove is crying out for your love.
Here your womanliness is epitomized,
Your transparency is eternity,
And your sweetness is an aura.
From your springs Al-Haulage Ibn. Arabi,
Sahrawardi and Jalal Aldeen Al-Romi have drunk.
They have been the heroic slain of your fascination
And your apostles for immortality.
Mirrors,
Are these brilliant hearts on all compass points -
Our eternal waiting for splendour.
Mirrors,
Are stations that expect, transparently
Your appearance to smell the fragrance of shabboy.
I see the dance of mirrors happy with your angelic,
Sitting in front of them.
I am hearing their songs
In spite of your harshness
And I remain jealous of the mirrors.
So why do you accuse me of desertion?
Is not the jealousy the rebellious face of love?
Jealousy is an emancipation of the senses from its quiet world
An excitement of feelings in your fields
The shout of the soul while it is battering your high walls
The madness of the heart which is astray in your forests
From the Babylonian Joy till the last poem of Al-Sayyab
At the midday of Basrah -
Unattainable. The woodcutters do not know
Only the hunters of the footsteps of life -
Like the exhalations of Kais Ibn Al-Mollawah which the old
In loveliness and verse
Continue to their immortality with smiles.
As a scholar fiery with passion
On your pages my days flow.
In your books my love sets
Three sad states
Where the rivers Tigris and Euphrates cross
Separated
And their passport is always hope.
In the end fish become confused on the coasts
My beloved ...
Perhaps the Euphrates is jealous of the Tigris
From the in-flowing tributaries?
Jealousy is love’s ember;
By its extinguishing love will die,
And by its glowing it will die.
Yesterday your sad eyes were looking at me disillusioned
While I wrote that my heartbeat throbs on your lips.
I release psalms to protect you from your shadow.
On your breast my revelation quarrels
With your sighs;
Your sighs themselves are quarrelsome.
I’ll make the stars into a necklace, embellished by your neck
And wonder flirtatiously.
The dews of your neck are my flames!
You are the sorrow of my sorrows and the release of my madness!
You are the beginning of my beginnings
And the first commencement!
For your sake, I drove all the Myths until they sank in the sea,
The throne of the Goddess Ecstasy in your palms!
You, for whom words entreat:
Blackbirds learn from you how to broadcast their longings
To grant existence to what has been missed.
You, for whom swallows migrate while
The Dove is crying out for your love.
Here your womanliness is epitomized,
Your transparency is eternity,
And your sweetness is an aura.
From your springs Al-Haulage Ibn. Arabi,
Sahrawardi and Jalal Aldeen Al-Romi have drunk.
They have been the heroic slain of your fascination
And your apostles for immortality.
