Long Tremors 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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Greetings to those who would willingly seek admission to theater of the absurd. Zoltan Goliath and Otis Trench are masters of the avant-garde genre silent musicals for the imaginary stage, an art form sui generis....

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It's weird
and sometimes wild
living with a non-LeftBrain verbal dominant
aspiring child,
now young adult

I find myself waiting for him
to nonverbally connect
and correct me
about my patriarchal domineering
economic and political ableist sins
of felt omission from commercial value
and, perhaps worse,
my...

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"A dressed day has disrobed into the depth of a drawer's nightstand." 

(Oh, how positively awesome that what can be sorted out in such an explanatory pattern that a difference would maketh a day.)

The muskiness...

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“On the Sonnet”
by John Keats

If by dull rhymes our English must be chained,
And, like Andromeda, the Sonnet sweet
Fettered, in spite of painéd loveliness;
Let us find out, if we must be constrained,
Sandals more interwoven and complete
To...

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Hilda my partner turned in her bed as the early morning train hurtled by at breakneck speed sending tremors round our dwelling.
Those long flowing tresses embrace the shafts of first light so enthusiastically.
An otherworldly spot...

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They call them crushes because that's how you feel after the first "No". After they say that they don't feel the same way. And all of that after your entire world was minimized to encompass...

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It had come, at last, today was the day
you see, it was full moon and that meant
it was time for the initiation ceremony
over the next week Mambo would complete tasks

Then he would become a man...

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I…breathe again…
Meditating on flowers of my pasture, plucked with my eyes,
Resting…open, like buds blooming, and resting…

“Take me…” he said weakly, so softly in my ear…

I greeted the demon with the warmth in my eyes, 
Upon...

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I’m facing way too much stress
I need some spiritual happiness
I’m embracing my true endeavors and my passions that make me feel blissful
I don’t need this greedy society bringing me down and making me feel stressful

I’m...

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CHAPTER ONE

They closed the county zoo for it was sick financially
They thought they’d take the creatures to their homes across the sea
The Silverback Gorilla soon in Africa would be
And then they’d go to Asia where...

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Empathy Ink Not Blood / Trolls on the Run

           An Army of pens descended, the battle lines were Drawn
      ...

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I was an accomplished librarian, who took pleasure from written words,
As opera singers find their pleasure, in the halls where music is heard.

I was well matched to such absorbing work, knowing it was worthwhile,
Like stars...

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Inapropos trois faux pas jokingly blurted out...

yesterday August 30th, 2022.

The following fictitious account
predicated upon words spilling
out me mouth before taking time
to think through how sarcastic remark
would affect primary listener.

Comments about marital matters
particularly ours (yours truly...

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I returned home after forty years to my home island of Hawaii. Its preferred nickname is the Big Island, lovingly a.k.a., the Orchid Isle, and yes, a.k.a., the Volcanic Island. Rightly named as the sole...

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I am an empty soul; I simply have no drive, it’s a wonder that I can survive
I am too depressed and I feel no rest; I always feel this pain deep in my chest
Life is...

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Realizing a fresh life growing inside, 
What thoughts coursed through your mind, 
I still wonder, oh dear my mom. 
Did you gleefully welcome the news?
Or respond to it with a violent shock?

So sure, right away...

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Cabbage grew ears in a silver basin. How rare! Wow! Exclusive is extremely experienced erotic erogenous errors but tremors can often be counted in the folding, unfolding and refolding of long heavy curtains. A lengthy...

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I suspect Albert Einstein's mathematician wife
taught spatial Left
and temporal bicameral Right Al
to feel the passing
and surging
spatial ebbing and temporal flowing,

Circling
and spiraling evolutions
and oceanic NonZero Sum sweep
of 4D overflowing empowerment
in primal Earth enlightening space
3Dimensional
in bilateral Yang...

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Decade
         solid 
                solitary 
       ...

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In a smokey room, each time I awake, the dream again descends.  Deeper into the 
abyss I fall to a sea of melancholic funk.  Souls waft by on clouds of imagination, 
clinging to...

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The missus pounded mine posterior...
causing percussive rumpus 
to vibrate like jelly

Me experienced quite disruptive sleep
(quite early in the morning 
of November 10th 2022 -
no shut eye could I keep),
hence though exhausted, I share
childlike trait of...

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Dragon did a pratfall, his tail accidentally taking his Mama’s computer out.
Poor Mama’s mind, lost its’ cool, as her computer hit the floor and went out.
Withdrawal left steam coming out of her ears, as nightmares...

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Am never paving way ever again to tears,
Am standing tall to all these fears,
I have trembled enough,
Struggled enough,
Am never looking back again,
Nothing will take me back to that futon,
I have worked harder to slide back,
Embraced...

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