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The Epic of Sadness-Nizar Tawfiq Qabbani

November 7, 2011
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THE EPIC OF SADNESS

Your love taught me to grieve
and I have been in need, for centuries,
for a woman to make me grieve
for a woman, to cry upon her arms
like a sparrow
for a woman to gather my pieces
like shards of broken crystal

Your love has taught me, my lady, the worst habits
it has taught me to read my coffee cups
thousands of times a night
to experiment with alchemy,
to visit fortune tellers

It has taught me to leave my house
to comb the sidewalks
and search your face in raindrops
and in car lights
and to peruse your clothes
in the clothes of unknowns
and to search for your image
even…even…
even in the posters of advertisements

Your love has taught me
to wander around, for hours,
searching for a gypsy’s hair
that all gypsy women will envy
searching for a face, for a voice
which is all the faces and all the voices…

Your love entered me, my lady,
into the cities of sadness
and I before you, never entered
the cities of sadness
I did not know…
that tears are the person,
that a person without sadness
is only a shadow of a person…

Your love taught me
to behave like a boy
to draw your face with chalk
upon the wall,
upon the sails of fishermen’s boats
on the church bells, on the crucifixes,
your love taught me how love
changes the map of time…

Your love taught me
that when I love
the earth stops revolving,
your love taught me things
that were never accounted for

So I read children’s fairytales,
I entered the castles of genies
and I dreamt that she would marry me
the Sultan’s daughter
those eyes…
clearer than the water of a lagoon
those lips…
more desirable than the flower of pomegranates
and I dreamt that I would kidnap her like a knight
and I dreamt that I would give her
necklaces of pearl and coral

Your love taught me, my lady,
what is insanity
it taught me
how life may pass
without the Sultan’s daughter arriving

Your love taught me
how to love you in all things
in a bare winter tree,
in dry yellow leaves
in the rain, in a tempest,
in the smallest cafe we drank in,
in the evenings…our black coffee

Your love taught me
to seek refuge in hotels without names,
in churches without names,
in cafes without names

Your love taught me
how the night swells
the sadness of strangers,
it taught me how to see
Beirut as a woman…
a tyrant of temptation as a woman,
wearing every evening
the most beautiful clothes she possesses
and sprinkling upon her breasts perfume
for the fisherman, and the princes

Your love taught me how to cry without crying,
it taught me how sadness sleeps
like a boy with his feet cut off
in the streets of the Rouche and the Hamra

Your love taught me to grieve
and I have been in need, for centuries,
for a woman to make me grieve
for a woman, to cry upon her arms
like a sparrow
for a woman to gather my pieces
like shards of broken crystal.

-Syrian Poet: Nizar Tawfiq Qabbani.

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Nizar Tawfiq Qabbani 1923-1998

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Thank you for sharing this beautiful poem with me @permabloom

Khalil Gibran – Lebanon’s Poet

November 3, 2011
LEBANESE CONNECTIONS, POETRY-My Faves
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Sketches by Khalil Gibran, Lebanon’s most famous poet

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“… …..But you should also be proud that your mothers and fathers came from a land upon which God laid his gracious hand and raised his messengers.” –

Khalil Gibran  I believe in you (1926)

Gibran 2

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My house says to me, ‘Do not leave me, for here dwells your past.’ And the road says to me, ‘Come and follow me, for I am your future.’ And I say to both my house and the road, I have no past, nor have I a future. If I stay here, there is a going in my staying; and if I go there is a staying in my going. Only love and death change all things.- Khalil Gibran

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Kahlil G

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kahlil gibran 001

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“Poetry is not an opinion expressed. It is a song that rises from a bleeding wound or a smiling mouth.” – Khalil Gibran

Dedicated to all the poets and writers in the Middle East who have been murdered in their peaceful pursuit of freedom for their country.

MORE HERE … 

Pity The Nation Of Lebanon…. ……..my tribute to Khalil Gibran……

Song Of Ishtar

November 2, 2011
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Goddess Ishtar (Esther)

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Song of Ishtar – Descent to the Goddess

Me the woman he has filled with dismay

Has filled me the queen of heaven

with consternation…

I, the woman who circles the land-

Tell me where is my house,

Tell me where is the city in which I may live…

I, who am your daughter…The heirodule,

who am your bridesmaid

Tell me where is my house…The bird has its nesting place

But I – my young are dispersed

The fish lies in calm waters,

but I – my resting place exists not,

The dog kneels at the threshold, But I – I have no threshold…

– Ancient Anon.

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Eventually statues of Ishtar, Mesopotamian goddess, along with other pagan goddesses, would be taken from her grottos and replaced with statues of the Virgin Mary. The ramifications for women would be nothing less than catastrophic.

More here about Goddess Ishtar 

See post here:  Catholic Dichotomy of the Female

Khalil Gibran: “Pity The Nation of Lebanon”

July 10, 2011
LEBANESE CONNECTIONS, POETRY-My Faves
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Khalil Gibran

Even Khalil Gibran, Lebanon’s most famous poet, understood his country’s multiple personalities.

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Khalil Gibran

                                                  One of my favourite books in my home library.

(Unfortunately ‘Khalil’ has been misspelt on the book cover)

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The following is a short story and poem taken from:

Khalil Gibran, The Garden of the Prophet (written 1934)

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Sketch by Khalil Gibran

And Almustafa came and found the Garden of his mother and his father, and he entered in and closed the gate that no man might come after him.

And for forty days and forty nights he dwelt alone in that house and that Garden, and none came, not unto the gate, for it was closed, and all the people knew that he would be alone.

And when the forty days and forty nights were ended, Almustafa opened the gate that they might come in.

And there came nine men to be with him in the Garden; three mariners from his  ship; three who had served in the Temple; and three who had been his comrades in play when they were but children together. And these were his disciples.

And on the morning his disciples sat around him, and there were distances and remembrances in his eyes. And that disciple who was called Hafiz, said unto him: “Master, tell us of the city of Orphalese, and of that land wherein you tarried those twelve years.”

And Almustafa was silent and looked away toward the hills and toward the vast ether, and there was a battle in his silence.

Then he said:

My friends and my road-fellows

Pity the nation that is full of beliefs and empty of religion,

Pity the nation that wears a cloth it does not weave, eats a bread it does not harvest,

And drinks a wine that flows not from its own wine press.

Pity the nation that acclaims the bully as hero, and that deems the glittering conqueror bountiful.

Pity the nation that despises a passion in its dream, yet submits in its awakening.

Pity the nation that raises not its voice save when it walks in a funeral, boasts not except among its ruins, and will rebel not save when its neck is laid between the sword and the block.

Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox, whose philosopher is a juggler, and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking.

Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpetings and farewells him with hootings, only to welcome another with trumpetings again.

Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years and whose strong men are yet in the cradle.

Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation.

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Sketches by Khalil Gibran, Lebanon’s most famous poet HERE

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Anne Frandi-Coory’s  Lebanese Family tree and photos HERE: 

Exiles

June 30, 2011
POETRY-My Faves
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Maria Grego cropped 2

EVA Exiles

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EXILES

Exiled from home. The far sea rolls

between them and the country of their birth;

the childhood-turning impulse of their souls

pulls half across the earth. Exiled from home.

No mother to take care that they work too hard,

grieve not too sore;

no older brother nor small sister fair

no father any more.

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Exiled from home; from all familiar things;

the low browed roof, the grass surrounded door;

accustomed labours that gave daylight wings;

loved steps on the worn floor.

Exiled from home. Young girls sent forth alone

when most their hearts need close companioning;

no love and hardly friendship may they own,

no voice of welcoming.

Blended with homesick tears the exile stands;

to toil for alien household gods she comes;

a servant and a stranger in our lands,

homeless within our homes.

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– Charlotte Perkins Gilman. (1914)

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Above left: Anne Frandi-Coory’s maternal Italian grandmother, Maria Cajetan Grego Frandi

Above right: Anne Frandi-Coory’s paternal Lebanese grandmother, Eva Arida Fahkrey (Coory) 15yrs old & married, in Bcharre, Lebanon, on her way to New Zealand. 

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See later post: Italian Villa With Virgin

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See Immigration & The Promise

Roman Centurion’s Song

April 2, 2011
POETRY-My Faves
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The Roman Centurion’s Song                        

Roman Legion: Actors at Kirby Hall. Photo by Rita Roberts from 'Toffee Apples and Togas'.

(Roman occupaton of Britain 300 CE)

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Legate, I had the news last night – my cohort ordered home

By ship to Portus Itius and thence by road to Rome.

I’ve watched the companies aboard, the arms are stowed below:

Now let another take my sword. Command me not to go!

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I’ve served in Britain forty years, from Vectis to the Wall.

I have none other home than this, nor any life at all.

Last night I did not understand, but, now the hour draws near

That calls me to my native land, I feel that land is here.

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Here where my men say my name was made, here where my work was done;

Here where my dearest dead are laid-my wife-my wife and son;

Here where time, custom, grief and toil, age, memory, service, love,

Have rooted me in British soil. Ah, how shall I remove?

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For me this land, that sea, these airs, those folk and fields suffice.

What purple Southern pomp can match our changed Northern skies,

Black with December snows unshed or pearled with August haze-

The clanging arch of steel-grey March, or June’s long-lighted days?

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You’ll follow widening Rhodanus till vine and olive lean

Aslant before the sunny breeze that sweeps Nemauses clean

To Arelate’s triple gate; but let me linger on,

Here where our stiff-necked British oaks confront Euroclydon!

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You’ll take the old Aurelian road through shore descending pines

Where blue as any peacock’s neck, the Tyrrhene Ocean shines.

You’ll go where laurel crowns are won, but will you e’er forget

The scent of hawthorn in the sun, or bracken in the wet?

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Let me work here for Britain’s sake-at any task you will-

A Marsh to drain, a road to make or native troops to drill.

Some Western camp (I know the Pict) or granite border keep,

Mid seas of heather derelict, where our old messmates sleep.

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Legate, I come to you in tears-my cohort ordered home!

I’ve served in Britain forty years. What should I do in Rome?

Here is my heart, my soul, my mind-the only life I know.

I cannot leave it all behind Command me not to go!

– Rudyard Kipling

Elizabethan KIrby Hall - Northamptonshire UK

Another aspect of Kirby Hall

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Toffee Apples & Togas
-by Rita Roberts

Ode To Stepfathers

January 14, 2011
POETRY-My Faves
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Paris 2001 001 2

In Paris with my daughter and my partner.

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My daughter sent this greeting to her stepfather:

“For dad with Love” …”For you, dad,  for all the times you’ve had to put up with all our s…,

and never complained and always been there.”

Step Dads

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Happy Father’s Day!

Oh, Wait. I’m sorry.  You’re not their ‘real’ dad are you?

Give me a break.

If ever there was an unsung hero, it is the stepfather.

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‘The Wicked Stepmother’ may be the evil character of the Disney

Classics, but at least she could defer to BioDad to discipline

the child. Stepdads, on the other hand, are expected to take

over when mum doesn’t feel like (or can’t) handle it.

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Parenting, and especially disciplinary stuff, is hard enough

when the child shares your genes. Stepdads are at a double

disadvantage. They are supposed to discipline the child

without getting the mother angry. The episode can turn

into this big perpetrator/victim/rescuer thing that

nobody really wins but Stepdad ends up losing most of all.

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Some stepfathers handle this by backing away. They let

mum take care of everything. But that’s not really being a

father to the child. In the eyes of the child, that can make

the difference between being ‘Dad’ and being just ‘that man

my mother married [or lives with]’. Being a step-parent is

easier if you have an easy to parent child. It can be hell if the

child happens to be one of those who are difficult to parent.

I know. I have both.

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For inspiration as a stepfather, I look to the

character of Joseph. This guy was the ultimate step-parent.

Don’t think that raising Jesus was easy. Even Jesus

pulled the “You can’t tell me to do that” bit on Joseph. The

kid disappears for three days while they are travelling;

the entire tribe has to turn around to go back and find him,

and once he does turn up, he pops up with this “Know ye not

that I have to be about my Father’s business?” stuff. Translation:

“My REAL dad said I could”.

Jesus was 12 when that happened.  There is nothing else

written about him until he is thirty years old.

That’s because he was grounded.

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The other classic example of a stepfather is

Mike Brady. Mike Brady, the 70’s version of

‘Father Knows Best’, ruled his home with and iron

fist covered with a velvet glove. He was caring, patient

and wise. He had none of those nasty masculine traits

that create problems for dads. Can you imagine Mike

Brady breaking wind while the kids are in the back singing

“When it’s time to change…?”. No way. Mike Brady was perfect.

A little too perfect.

Personally, I think he and Sam the Butcher had something

going on behind Mrs Brady and Alice’s backs.

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Stepfathers deserve special appreciation. They have sacrificed that special

time alone with their wife [or partner] before the kids would have been born.

In some cases they may have forfeited the idea of having biological children

for the sake of being able to provide a better life for the children that were already there.

And, in many more cases, they have to subordinate their own needs as a man for

the unconditional love of a child to those of the biological father. Sure, he sees them

on weekends and during vacation.

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Stepdad is the one who rushes them to the doctor

when they’re sick, or takes the time to explain to a seventh grade girl why boys aren’t

always nice. Stepfathers are the mean men who say “No, you can’t stay up all night

on a school night”. BioDads are the party givers, the trip takers, the all around nice guys

who don’t have that many stupid rules, laugh a lot, and buy all kinds of nice gifts.

Stepdad is the one who has the rules. He’s the one who might not have any extra money

because BioDad forgot to send his child support cheque again and it costs a lot to feed

and buy clothes for three teenagers.

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And if Stepdad is lucky, he is the one who’s making a difference in the lives of these children.

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So when you’re helping your son or daughter pick out a nice Fathers’ Day gift for their ‘real’ dad on Fathers’ Day, try to remember that this father in absentia is missing out on watching his kids grow up. Try not to envy the fact that while you’re spending the night with a sick child, this guy is spending his nights with women half his age. We’re talking women who barely remember Jimmy Carter. Now, THAT would be a horrible way to live. You can bet he’s not spending his Saturday afternoon looking for some last minute gift for some guy he doesn’t even like. Make sure that you pick out something real nice. Maybe this purple and yellow plaid necktie that’s the size of a table cloth that your eager four-year-old is waving in front of your face.

“Yes, son, I think he’ll love that”.

– From ‘Happy Fathers’ Day!’  by Bob Seay.