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Homelands

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Homelands
Arabic poem by: Adel Said*
Translated into English by: 
Inaam Al-Hashimi (Gold_N_Silk)
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At the end of the line I stand
As should a professional homeless do
Exactly at the end of the line
Before the committee on homelands distribution 
Among those who fall in the overflow
Over the needs and capacity of time, place, 
Maps, 
Population records,
And cemeteries. 

At the end of the line I stand 
Hanging like a teardrop in a funeral 
Collecting what have fallen of my years,
My fables
And my extinct dreams,
In the bundle of my childhood that missed her doll
And my deferred share of my mother’s tenderness.

I have a flavor the midwife failed to sever
With the umbilical cord
In my heart, there is still a nursery rhyme
About a duck swimming in a river
And a songs about a fair maiden’s tear dripped down with  kohl
And my fingers are still trembling
In fear of the lesson and the swish of the teacher’s ruler.

I have in the piggy bank of my life
Volumes about hunger and wars of social classes
Burned by the fascists 
Who also snuffed out the tears of forbidden love.
I have in the piggy bank of my life
Dates I saved of palm tree’s yearning for the land
And some palm pollen dust still traveling in my lungs. 

I have no signs of prophecy on my forehead 
And no halos of saints 
But my homeland that’s sitting there 
Amidst the committee on the homelands distribution
Will recognize me
And I'm in the queue 
I will not compete with the homeless comrades 
For their homelands 
And will not accept that illustrious one on the right 
And not that opulent one on the left
I’ll accept only that one,
That one whose head is a palm tree 
And whose arms are two rivers.
 
- You , O Mister!
 You who was at the end of the line,
 You haven’t been recognized
 By any of the homelands gathered in the committee,
 The exiles snuffed out your flavor
 And withered your songs;
 Despite the high level of adoration in you
 No homeland on earth
 Understands your language.

 - Even  that one? !

 - Even  that one ..
And out of pity 
We decided to grant you a berth,
A berth that will never come to an end
You will waste on it  
All that’s left in your lifetime’s piggy bank 
Of tears, 
Of dreams loitering outside the fence of life 
And of years flying, like neglected pieces of paper,
Out of the window of history! 

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Translated by: Em. Prof. Inaam al-Hashimi
USA
*  Adel Said is a poet from Iraq who resides in Norway

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