We also have our own poet Frank Faust writing poems especially for this site. His poems here.

THE ARABIC WAR POEMS

You don't win a war
With a reed and a flute.
-Nizar Qabbani

Baghdad is now like Beiriut in 1982 when it was besieged by Israel. Other Iraqi cities will soon be a terrible mixture of siege and civil strife, making them even more like Beiruit then. These are some poems about that time.

Saadi Yusuf A ROOM Has only books A bed And a poster A fighter plane arrives Lifts the bed The last book And leaves it's mark on the poster.

Saadi Yusuf ELECTRICITY All at once we remember the village nights The orchards And sleeping at eight All at once we discover the benefits of the dawn We hear the muezzin's call The cock crow And the village wrapped in peace.

Salah Niazi THE RETURN OF THE VEIL Who stuffed the lark, Stitched fear to it's wings? Who wrapped up that girl in a veil like the slamming of a door?

Saadi Yusuf HAMRA NIGHT A candle in a long street A candle in the sleep of houses A candle for frightened shops A candle for bakeries A candle for a journalist trembling in an empty office A candle for a fighter A candle for a woman doctor watching over patients A candle for the wounded A candle for plain talk A candle for the stairs A candle for a hotel packed with refugees A candle for a singer A candle for broadcasters in their hideouts A candle for a bottle of water A candle for the air A candle for two lovers in a naked flat A candle for the falling sky A candle for the beginning A candle for the ending A candle for the last announcement A candle for conscience A candle in my hands.

Mahmoud Darwish HORSES NEIGHING AT THE FOOT OF THE MOUNTAIN Horses neighing at the foot of the mountain: either to climb or to descend. I give my photo to my lady. When i die hang it on the wall. She said "Is there a wall for it?" I said "we'll build a room for it". "Where? In what house?" I said "We'll build a house for it." "Where? In what exile?" We cried and the song leaked. Horses neighing at the foot of the mountain: either to climb or to descend. Does a lady of thirty need land to frame her knight's photo? Can I reach the top of a difficult mountain? The foot of the mountain Is an abyss or a siege, And the middle of the road a turning point. Ah! the journey in which A martyr kills a martyr. I give my photo to my lady. Tear up my photo when an new horse Neighs within you. Horses neighing at the foot of the mountain: to climb or to climb.

Buland Al Haidari MY APOLOGIES My apologies, my honoured guests, The newsreader lied in his last bulletin: There is no sea in Baghdad Nor pearls Nor even an island, And everything Sinbad said About the queens of the jinn about the ruby and coral islands About the thousand thousands flowing from the sultan's hand Is a myth born in the summer heat Of my small towns. In the burnt-up shadows of the midday sun In the silent nights of the exiled stars. We used to have A sea, shells, pearls And a polished moon And fishermen returning in the evening; We used to have, Said the newsreader's last bulletin, An innocent, dream paradise; For we, my honoured guests, Lie to be born again, Lie to stretch in our long history, The myth told by Sinbad- We used to have A sea, shells, pearls And the hour of birth. My apologies, my honoured guests, The newsreader lied in his last bulletin: There is no sea in Baghdad Nor pearls Nor even an island.

Adonis A MIRROR FOR THE TWENTIETH CENTURY extracts from THE DESERT: diary of Beiruit under siege. 1 The cities break up The land is a train of dust Only poetry knows how to marry this space. 2 No road to his house - the siege. And the streets are graveyards; Far away a stunned moon Hangs on threads of dust Over his house. 3 I said: This street leads to our house. He said: No. You won't pass. And he pointed his bullets at me. Fine: in every street I have homes and friends. 4 Roads of blood The blood a boy was talking about And whispering to his friends: Only some holes known as stars Remain in the sky. 5 The voice of the city is soft The face of the city glows Like a little boy telling his dreams to the night And offering his chair to the morning. 7 In the page of a book Bombs see themselves Prophetic sayings and ancient wisdom see themselves, Niches see themselves. The thread of carpet words Go through memory's needle over the city's face. 8 The killer In the air Swims over the city's wound- The wound is the fall That shakes with it's name It's bleeding name: Everything around us. The houses leave their walls And I am not I. 28 A bat claims the light is dark, and the sun a road to the grave, And babbles on. The bat didn't fall, Only the child asleep in dawn's lap fell off. 31 Whenever I say my country is within reach And bears fruit in a reachable language Another language Kicks me to another language. A coffin bearing the face of a boy A book Written on the belly of a crow A wild beast hidden in a flower A rock Breathing with the lungs of a lunatic: This is it This is the twentieth century.