Song for the Ashes [Archives:2000/44/Culture]

A Poem by
Dr. Abdulaziz al-Magaleh
Translated by
Dr. Mohammed Sharafuddin
To him who used to be my friend:
Before you raise that dagger,
Penetrating deep in the back,
Let me just look at you.
My blood, upon embracing the dagger,
smelt in its blade
Some piece of you.
It perceived the nod
Of that old embrace, finding
Remains of a scent
Of friendship.
So much alike are the wolfs claw
And the hand,
the hand of
The Friend my eyelids so
Much endured and
The tears so long watered.
For him I was
the feather and the horizon:
The refuge from long silence.
I have challenged for him
the wind and have fought the fire:
I share with him 
The words
Why did my face so ashed in his,
While we, fading away,
flowers and thorns growing
So much alike,
Poetry grew and the wound.
How much growing alike,
Oh, did my apple
And That Stone.
 

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