joanna bujes wrote:
>
> Thank you Brad,
>
> Finally, this issue makes it to the LBO mailing list! Yes, on this topic,
> the silence has been deafening out there.
>
The rage Brad feels is felt by many -- and is part of the reason the issue only intermittently appears on this or other left lists. We did not feel this same choked rage during the Vietnam War because we were _doing_ something about it. Our rage found outlet in action.
Carrol
The Earth is Closing on Us
Mahmoud Darwish
The earth is closing on us, pushing us through the last passage, and
we tear off our limbs to pass through. The earth is squeezng us. I wishe were its wheat so we could die
and live again. I wish the earth was our mother So she'd be kind to us. I wish we were picturesd on the rocks for our
dreams to carry As mirrors. We saw the faces of those to be killed by the last of us in
the last defence of the soul. We cried over their children's feast. We saw the faces of those who'll
throw our children Out of the windows of this last space. Our star will hang up mirrors. Where should we go after the last frontiers? Where should the birds
go after the last sky? Where should the plants sleep after the last breath of air? We will
write our names with scarlet steam. We will cut off the hand of the song to be finished by our flesh. We will die here, here in the last passage. Here and here our blood
will plant its olive tree.
------ [Note: autumn in the next poem should be seen as the autumn of the seige of Beirut.]
We are Entitled to Love Autumn
Mahmud Dawish
We are entitled to love the end of this autumn and ask: Is there room for another autumn in the field to rest our bodies like
coal? An autumn lowering its leaves like gold. I wish we were fig leaves
I wish we were an abanadoned plant To witness the change of the seasons. I wish we didn't say goodbye
to the south of the eye so as to ask what Our fathers had asked when they flew on the tip of the spear. Poetry
and God's name will be merciful to us. We are entitled to dryu the nights of lovely women, and talk
about what Shortens the night for two strangers waiting for the north to reach
the compass. An autumn. Indeed we are entitled to smell the scent of this autumn,
to ask the night for a dream. Does a dream fall sick like the dreamers? An autumn, an autumn.
Can a people be born on the guillotine? We are entitled to die the way we want to die. Let the land hid in an
ear of wheat.
----
Both poems from _Victims of a Map_, by Samih Al-Qasim, Adonis, & Mahmud Darwish, London: Al Saqi Books, 1984. Translations by Abdullah al-Udhari.