The messenger with her hair long to the springs *** This is the story of the other side of creation I discovered it, my eyes obscured The path, my beloved, Leads from her awaiting me Leads from my return to her This is the story of the other side of creation Listen Do not shoot the doors The breakers bear the message to the wind The wind to the trees The trees to notebooks. You, old men with homes, and you, young boys of the streets Sit this very night in the presence of the lover. You, who hurry about, did you really leave only to return? Shatter the night for an instant Come, gather round the one to testify. Pray, my love, that I spread a feast, befitting their appetite. Birds of the harvest season soar past But your light does not recede, its hand before me still. I am the collector of your echo’s traces Read me before they know me, then I will arrive early at the heart This, in my twisted language, in your vision This, in my thieving hands, is your treasure This, from my row boat, is your sea, so watch over your sea from my boat, your eyes the sails that protect me You, who change life with crushing ignorance You are the dependable one You change life, effortless With the nakedness of purity, to its passion alone do secrets yield This is your story The story of the other side of creation Enable me, God To reflect on my sin And for the sake of all my fathers To suffer their remorse and repentance and then collapse At my loved one’s feet. Beloved, Time of justice ripens in you, may the feast begin All of life kneels at your feet in me I am for you all of time’s penitence distilled in one body prostrate before you life’s obedient tenure, I wash your door step with all creation’s tears. I am the devil proffering his soul Tenderness has triumphed over me The clouds have swollen behind the locks and the sky’s curtainsare rent apart The rain yields to the earth Tenderness triumphed over me, my beloved loved me My love hauled me up from the bottom of the sea and I saw creation enacted from the beginning My loved drew me into the light like a prophet at the crossing of road My beloved lodged me at the source Joined me and filled me with her presence. I am your head, then you, loved one, are the halo around mine I am your head and you the crown on mine I am the exodus and the return between your two moons Your love welcomed me in doubt and in conviction Took me in, rescued me Freed me from the ubsurd struggle and poured me the wedding wine It purified me and recreated me Extinguished what was ablaze and ignited what was ashes An eternal flame Your love told me of my identity, one born of you, The whisper of the lingering echo among the people Bellowed into nations, crashing like cymbals Ringing like tambourines in your hands: Halleluiah! Virtues were circling around me like vanquished clouds I was speaking an honest language so as to recruit thieves and reduce time, disrobing it of fear I was foul vinegar in my body. But I speak one word of yours and perfume alone is distilled I was addressing love while my door was slammed shut in its face Addressing it, while my arms embraced a language Through you I became love, I burned my mouth and so love’s vivid dawn issued forth Instead of language I became tears For tears are to God’s grace as waves to an island. Once my army is a mighty giant and my land was vanquished Now my army is destroyed by life’s harmony my land a sprawling giant I lay down my tears, a sturdy bridge across the abyss. Her hunter is falling The white sparrow prays for him and he is saved, The overpowering one flogs her and she asks about the illness whish consumes him as though it is he who is the victim He the invader, she at peace He desperate, she at peace He tyrannical, she at peace For she is earth and earth is sky, and the assailants fleeting clouds. Who is she whose praises I sing? I say “she” but mean you I heap them all on you because you stand alone They are meaningless except for you. My beloved, I saw the sun beneath her eyes a moon in a river beneath the willow tree Mad woman, because she is queen the poor grovel for her affection Mad woman, because she is consummate beauty and completely complete In nature beyond nature, she dismounts amidst the debris to take pity on me The woman, the one, the Almighty Lost to me since paradise The pearl polished my the blows of ongoing generations Shrouded in perfection she came into the world, Chosen, unblemished The perfect choice her wedding dowry unequalled She is the one to whom I come contrite, with the conscience of all men Confessing their sins to all women since time’s beginning Because she is the heiress of splendour, imprisoned in the vaults of the two testaments Because she is the messenger with her hair long to the springs. I am knocking, knocking, knocking, open up and erase all that was before Let the storyteller tell and the sceptic listen The enchantress is white, there are no black enchantresses The forest plagued by the lion, delights in the butterfly It is green because the butterfly is green, its reflection, the forest. Of your lips And at your robe’s them draped over a pedestal, I saw the other side I saw it O loved one In your accepting my love I saw giving. And about you I saw the word, a halo. I learned from you the sweetness of the moment and the good in people. You stay up the night in me like a prisoner in the tower, she lights it with her freedom then flying through the windows becomes a wind in the garden You stay up the night in me like the flame in the lamp, Like providence you watch over the traveller. You found me among mire and thorns, took in the fugitive And he became radiant. She is beyond all praise who gives refuge as she does My image bears fruit in her body He is a fool who boasts and struts in ignorance as I do What good is brute strength When everything is so simple and beautiful Because you say: I love you Everything smiles at me Because you watch over me I am at peace Because you suffer life’s tension I am at peace Because you issue forth nothing but harmony. Your body enlivens the spirit and your spirit gives life You act out your jealousy, strong so the unsure one is placated You act out your jealousy, weak, so I walk, a master, carrying the keys Your conceal jealousy, so I think you ignorant. You know and remain pure Your jealousy is the jealousy of a queen And your power to set free is the power of a queen The opening of your two lips is a feast Your lips, the master’s wine Your mouth is ruddy with the sun of your brow The kindling sings in the fire because your ears are the crowning My hand is to you one hand, yours a league of hands You stripped the shade from the tree of remorse Winter purged me of my sorrow and summer scorched it. As small as a speck of gold You dispel black magic You are one to be savoured, gentle, your hands entwined with love And every word you speak grows thick with rain In the body of winds. As light as ostrich feathers you do not call me forward, But whatever, with every minute, I come across you, i rush to you after a long absence So simple, you dazzle wisdom The world beneath your gaze, is wheat stalks and trees of water Life quivers alive, the skies above cargoes overflowing with gifts You are my gift, O God, add my years to hers Loved one, you are the other side of creation Loved one, you are truth In you is my inspiration and wisdom In you my rapture In you ecstasy and shelter You are the reunion of our two bodies, one body at peace with the elements I am your head but you the halo around it You do not teach me as men do nor use your power against me But you are like the virgin Mary in your silence So I obey you, my sin surrendering to your humility. I learn from you yet you do not teach How is it that the one invincible with love spares the life of her murderers How is it that the lighthouse is small and the darkness vast And how is it that the small one pervades it How is it that the one possessed of kindness is mighty, uncomplaining, And how is that God gave her fear for us And left fright to the self-deceivers. O lord Protect my loved one O lord, who said to woman: mother Protect my beloved O master, Lord of hosts, hosts of dreams Protect, O master, my beloved Clear the path before her Watch over her days Ripple her fields with pastures of fancy Make for her every night The eve of the feast O lord, God of those who arrange for reunion, the other side of the guarded bridge O lord, master of seals, contracts, and sighs Seeking from you their sustenance, I asked you for blessing for my beloved They seek from you a place to rest but there is no place of rest except my beloved My beach, the shores of her sea and her sea a sanctuary People go to their work while I because of her love go to you Have pity, O lord, she led me to you You at the forefront of my prayer’s possesion Bless her more than I ask you So that your gift a flood, swells hope. She led me to you She speaks so I say glory to you She acts and so your river flow in my wasteland She looks and so I see you She acts and so I reflect on your miracles To them earth ends where sea begins For me land ends beside her feet. She led me to you and I confessed because she made me dizzy with truth as though drunk She led me to you for the sake of my soul, So is it not little no matter how much I ask you? Until she becomes a gnarled grandmother like the oldest olive tree, Prolong her days, O lord And forever renew her land I believe therefore I ask it I ask and because of that I believe My belief stems from her, O lord Preserve her, bless her She shines and so I am illumined by you. I sing you, my beloved So I may touch their lives with but a trace of your touch on my life So I may immerse them in the heart-illumining secrets And in the secrets-illumining heart, With but a flicker of the light You shine on my own heart and secrets So that I be with them in the morning’s awakening a fraction of what you are to me: A rain of stars And a sun of wells Rays piercing me through church glass Two healing hands. Begin the feast and sing along with the lover I embrace you, beloved, from all sides For you surround me I asked them to the feast but wish I had not Who when you appear would not cry “Ah” Am I really strong and virtuous therefore able to bear jealousy’s weight? The mountain is a lighter burden than desire, and the earth smaller than jalousy. Show me a twilight that longs to plunge into night more than I long for you Show me a mirror that yearns to reflect you more than I yearn for you Show me a desert that longs for its prophets more than I long for you Show me a cry for help that yearns for hands outstretched more than I yearn for you And I am jealous I feign composure while jealousy’s winds sweep me away like dust I guard over you fearful, proud and backward I guard over you capable, despicable My misary is overwhelming yet there is no end to why I guard over you so Can it end as long as I see Can the world, the people, and my love end? And will I be jealous of my own eyes For whom do you see in them that I do not? If I were to be true I would have hidden them, sat alone So that people would long for your fields in my eyes. But where can I hide and who am I deceiving? Ah, why am I not supreme master of my eyes! The stallion of my jealousy runs away with me, his shadow before him, urging him on You, truth, be strangled Why do you sweep me away while the prowlers are around me? Be patient Do not leave me in the open so they may rob me Do not bare my jealousy that they may master my love Help me to hold it in Help me So the masked tyrant in me is not exposed So that my loved one does not know what dwells inside her slave Who feigns humility The greedy one Torn apart by his drive to dominate Lest she know That the one who damns his hangmen fathers, the one who claims himself redeemed from the sin of possession His heart is still two hearts The legacy of jealousy tied around his neck His, a soul which diffuses light yet is murky. Help me o truth Be gentle with me Until I am worthy of her Until I kiss my jealousy on the head of its untamed steed, and fulfilling my vows I unfasten legacy’s necklace Then I will no longer torture my beloved with presumption Because I will be a slave with one heart free without breaking away A slave to her happiness With one heart Heart of a slave who waits on her with freemen’s heart. The enchantress Believes herself bewitched By her love’s spell cast over me I am she We smother the fire encircling the house Where we love sleeps Smother the fire ringing the earth Where our baby sleeps There where in the middle of everything Our love’s branch Sprouting forests and rivers Leafing happiness Bursting into freedom Bread’s blossoms And blossom’s bread Our love’s branch Reaches up to you, O God From the bottom of the wounded river Bearing the whole world A fruit Washed by the thorn of repentance It brings it to you with joy And the river is laughter And laughter the colour of a rose. Beloved I swear to be your plaything, your captive I swear to deserve your star on my shoulder I swear to hear the call of your eyes in order to resist the wisdom of your lips I swear to forget my poems in order to commit you to memory I swear to run after my love and swear it will continue to outstrip me I swear to fade out for the sake of your happiness like stars at day I swear to house my tears in your hand I swear to be the distance between I love you and I love you I swear to hurl my body for eternity to the lions of your discontent I swear to be your cage’s open door faithful to night’s promises I swear that my waiting room will be jealousy, my entering it, obedience, my staying there complete extinction I swear to become prey for your shadow I swear to long forever to be a book open on your lap I swear to be the world’s rupture between you and you that I may be in you its solitude I swear to call out for you so happiness will answer the call I swear to harbour my country in my love for you and, the world in my country I swear to love you without knowing how much I swear to talk beside you and share with you this one friend I swear that my years swarm by, bees from the hive of your voice I swear to fall from the lightning of your hair, rain on the field I swear whenever I come across my heart between the lines, I shall rejoice: I found you! I found you! I swear to look down from Asia’s peaks, so as to worship you. O night, night Carry up my prayer Hear me O Lord Plant my beloved and do not uproot her Enrich her with years unborn Fortify her with my coming years Keep her leaves green Let no wind diffuse her scent Keep her tent pitched high for in its heights is a sparrow’s paradise Grant her the life of the cedar so her grandsons may parade, beneath her healing hands Grant her the life of the cedar so her miracle may transcend distant borders Grant her the life of the cedar so that many nations submit to her, as my repentance did Keep her doors open that hope is not strandedat night in the outdoors Offer her up to the winter years so she gathers what broke away Watch closely the stars in her eyes, deep in there is birth. And behold there is rain The chimneys stand tall to receive the coming. It rains from a kiss. The sky looms up The youthful earth is budding life The provisions grow high Listen to the rhythm of the harvest season The divided kingdom is united Its crown is love, the kingdom’s peace. The impossible, a way of life. It rains from a kiss Exile collapses Let the dust of exile grow thick Come forth From despair’s depths and the icy heights From desire’s ruins and the ashes of patience Come forth Become me as I become you I am your transparency I am he who failed and saved you both. My beloved unearthed the lost one Pointed the way to the missing one The messenger conquered with sweetness With compassion she conquered armies She bears witness, disclosing the return. Come forth The kingdom is open Flocks of songbirds at the kingdom’s gate, flutter forth in welcome At a kiss’throw you stand from the gate The treasures stand alone Earth is lonely Life is lonely Come forth Enter, your head garlanded with gold Burn all behind you All behind you Set the world ablaze with the sun of returning. ________________ Translated by Brandel France, With thanks to Adnan Haydar