Long Grande Poems

Fadwa Tuqan has been called the Grand Dame of Palestinian letters and The Poet of Palestine. These are my translations of Fadwa Tuqan poems originally written in Arabic.



Enough for Me
by Fadwa Tuqan 
loose translation/interpretation by...

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English translations of Arabic poems by Fadwa Tuqan aka "The Poet of Palestine"

Enough for Me
by Fadwa Tuqan 
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Enough for me to lie in the earth,
to be buried in her,
to sink...

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MY Collaboration with Ricky Nelson in the Last Days of 1980

The eventful news of that day about what was found on board that crashed plane, won't replace that particular memory of Mr. Rick Nelson's hearty...

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Resistance On The Iberian Peninsula

“Liberté, égalité, fraternité (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity),”
Scream French revolutionists as they guillotine monarchists heads, 1
Then crown Napoleon Bonaparte Emperor of France, 2
Who commands the French forces in wars raged across Europe.

The Grande...

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Translation of Eric Mottram’s A Faithful Private 7 with excerpts from “Notes on Poetics” by T. Wignesan

(Note: With this post, I bring to a close EM’s pamphlet collection: Faithful Private, GENERA editions by Colin Simms,...

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You did not choose to be born,
much less Black Lives Really Should Equally Matter born
into this legacy,
your familial and civil Two-Connecticuts destiny.

I realize that,
And regret perhaps my own choices
in response to invitations for care-giving
and healthcare-receiving
were...

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Italian version. (continued from first part)
Tale è l’orror  che assale la mia mente
Di quanto ho visto e rivissuto prima
Da ridurla al silenzio più opprimente.
Pian piano poi risal verso la cima
Creando ancora immagini e illusioni
Senza...

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The Eiffel Tower (La Tour Eiffel)

‘Iron Lady,’ of sensual beauty in the ‘City of Light:’
(La Dame De Fer: Bienvenue a Paris, France!)

Built to be the world’s tallest structure at 300 meters,
As the gateway entrance to...

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L'Assimilation – Non! Translation of Oodgeroo Noonuccal’s “Assimilation – No !” by T. Wignesan

Born Kathleen Jean Mary RUSKA on November 3, 1920, in the North Stradbroke Island, off Queensland, she was deemed as an aboriginal...

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It’s like being hit by a meteor
Where there’s no tomorrow
It is like doomsday, really
Where everything is ugly
And absolutely nothing is pretty
I just received the bad news
That my sister-in-law had died
Suddenly and extemporaneously
Without being sick tremendously
I...

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Translation of Eric Mottram’s TIME SIGHT UNSEEN, Part Three by T. Wignesan

"Instead of an item in a school of rhetoric, the poem could have variety of articulations, continuity and discontinuity, sentence and parataxis, and an...

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Into A Dark Raging Storm, Tempest And Hail


Into a dark raging storm, tempest and hail
alas, sadly all was to be to no avail.
Twelve pounders broke loose crashing about
some over the wind praying in a shout.

Prisoners...

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Translation of Eric Mottram’s KRIM: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY TO SEPTEMBER 1989 - I by T. Wignesan

( This poem is from the collection, ESTUARIES: Poems 1989-91. Twickenham: Solaris, 1992, 62p. Pub. by Yasmin and Peterjon Skelt. Back...

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Asian Epicurean Quest

At the heart of China Town, Kuala Lumpur (capital of Malaysia) is Petaling Street.
  
Domain of hustlers, hucksters, cheap-jacks and diblers; purveyors of street food, rude t-shirts, and rubber sandles to put...

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Lembrança

Seremos lembrados 
se dermos 
à nossa geração mais jovem 
um mundo próspero e seguro, 
resultante 
da prosperidade econômica 
aliada à herança civilizacional. 

************
Sonhos

Sonhos 
não são aqueles que 
chegam 
enquanto estamos dormindo.
 
Os sonhos são aqueles...

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Cowpoke
by Michael R. Burch, circa age 16

Sleep, old man...
your day has long since passed.
The endless plains,
cool midnight rains
and changeless ragged cows
alone remain
of what once was.

You cannot know
just how the Change
will rape the windswept plains
that you...

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Out                                  ...

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Welcome to the man with the largest ego on planet earth
Thinking I'm gods gift to women, and acting like I'm a hero in a verse
Just because I tell a story through my words and rhyme...

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Klacatoo – Translation of Kevin Gilbert ‘s « Klacatoo » by T. Wignesan

On nous avait coincé sur la rive de Lachlan
un endroit qui s’appelle Klacatoo
là où nous rassemblions au coucher du soleil
quand nous entendions le...

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In the bathroom…bathing in the bathtub
I’m drowning in gloom…grooming for a rub
I’m repenting for hurting myself and others…understand…
These devils in my mind and hands…got so damn out of hand

Dripping soap and water on my pigmentation...

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Emotional guillotine clefts
     irredeemable psychological umbilical accord
witnessing heart breaking,
     woe-begotten inhumane rip cord
gut wrenching shuffle board
     (indiscriminately sporting)
     most...

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Twas The Night Before Inspection...,

Not a human creature stirred, nor seen 
through out Highland Manor, 
     property carpeted in lush green
(a deathlike stillness descended un keen
hilly quiet, October 10th, 
 ...

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it’s wonderful,
amazing the world dwellers are
civilized they’re as well as I’m really!

with them-

my language is English
I’m civilized!
my language is Arabic, Mandarin, French, Bengali etc
I’m civilized!
I’m fully literate on grammar
I’m civilized!
I’m highest educated on economics, politics,...

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With a heavy heart,
the sorrow in it 
feels 
           all
	       hope
        ...

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He was old and haggard, in the year nineteen twenty something
A tall lanky old man, with a worn out hat and a rusty ring
His squint blues eyes pulled together the wrinkles upon his face
With an...

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