Long Pollen 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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Pain settles in quite instantly your senses 
are totally unprepared for this graveness
the notion to sleep sets in like an energetic 
twilight phase the injury abruptly strangles 
thought my ears are always ringing with this...

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(Remembering Innocence)


Note to Readers of Previous Versions:
There are so many new vignettes scattered throughout the poem that I hope you will reread the whole thing! There are new tales, improvements to previous verses, and improved...

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In the intimate interlace of chance and fate, in the ultimate interplay of time and place, and with the consummate checkmate of my human dignity, all that is -- is over, in the stormy, swarming...

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I had no clue it was Valentine’s Day
Because no one said happy Valentine’s Day
I had no clue it was valentines’ Day
Because I had no one to share the Day
I ventured into another world
And drifted off...

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This is my translation of Rainer Maria Rilke's second elegy from his Duino Elegies, which he began composing at Duino Castle in 1912. 

Second Elegy
by Rainer Maria Rilke
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch 

Every angel...

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Absolute science and art of being whole
           at one and under no delusion that
           ...

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The Deception of Free Verse: Dreams I, Translation of Etiemble’s L’imposture du vers libre by T. Wignesan 

(From René Etiemble’s only poetry collection: le Coeur et la cendre: soixante ans de poésie (the heart and...

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The ask of cultures. 
Dutch to Portugal, do you think colonisation of fruit and lands and their inhabitants was the fairest exchange of our tactics of the strategy to wrestles of communication. They decided the...

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OOOniversal oo

Frightened tepid antisocial ant was football training avidly but failing to attend a fragrant tailor army. Oh dear. That was sure to be put forward to the sacred sanction ship and the sacred sanction...

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The Celtic dreams come forth through auric visions of an all-seeing eye. 
An ancient calling where the mystic rivers flow down a rugged mountain
while Angels bathe in the springs of an everlasting and radiant beauty....

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Each day’s (we’re alive) one more leaf that has fallen
from tree (Fate’s collusion?), our edifice grown
with the help of light garnered from sources outside
of our provenance, moisture, and minerals,
‘cheap’s’ turned to ‘gold,’ not by Chemistry’s...

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Celtic Dreams

The Celtic dreams come forth through auric visions of an all-seeing eye. 
An ancient calling where the mystic rivers flow down a rugged mountain
while Angels bathe in the springs of an everlasting and radiant...

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This is my last confession; there will be no more.

I am impercipient and slow from last night's sleeping pill,
wincing away from the harshness of day.
Kitchen cold, the room tear-splintered,
sunlight striking a watery rainbow in my...

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Q, you; you cry, defy
call me a liar; open inside, simple design
I shout to the sky like a dying firefly
See the light flickering incessantly 
a cosmic wave of energy mingling
an incomplete portrait, complete with hair...

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Ecotherapy,
including permaculture design's care of
Self,
Other biosystems,
Earth Whole EcoSystem,
as three faces of Gaia Goddess holonic trinity,
transmillennially emerges an intricately interdependent paradigm--
clinical as natural eco-political cooperation's
Positive Deviance Psychology.

Transmillennial regenerators are learning
to see with new eyes,
hear with bilateral...

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Me Pretty Parrot

 
                               ...

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APRIL TO THRILL ME

                My Birth-Month April appears in mirth.
          ...

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"Chaos Theory"



The Message is sent on a breeze
Fire eats the wounds of a Mother

Her skin blisters
cracks and peels 

Her children inhale a different pollen
Drones bark messengers like Bowie's Diamond Dogs

Tables now turn
machines are giving orders...

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WINTER

We all have heard The Greatest Creation Story Ever Told,
and it is
as title so boldly baldy states.

Yet, within and without,
before yet also after,
this History of Earth's CoRedemption
deepy lies
highest and healthiest Her EarthStory
born of Sun,

SPRING

RNA's ReGeneration...

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My mind is burning, blazing, turning
With doubts and irrational drivels
My heart is livid and hardened
For it freezes in the potentials of disappointment
Of failure, downfall, and impending death
In ceasefires of never mind, and never more 

My...

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Cypress trees like evergreen steeples
rise above rows of gravestone woes,
their shadows lie side by side like railroad ties 
across writhing paths banded like snakes;
the gravel birth cords sinuous 
sensing the ground   seeking the...

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Come come come and dance with me 
Come come come and sing with me
A sweet aroma is churning in the air
enchanting everyone far and near
Nature is emitting  goose bumps upon my flesh
And I can...

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Fringe benefits (a plug) for perks (yo man) living at 2 highland manor drive

Expanse of green acres draped
like a petticoat when ye arrive
birds of a feather flock together
and bees gather collect nectar,
pollen, and water to...

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