ApPENDIX 1: POETRY EYTAN IN THE STEEL TRAP Fadwa Tuqan [One morning a child from Kibbutz Ma'oz Hayyim asked, "How much longer must we defend the motherland?" It was an awesome question.] Under the tree, branching out, spreading and growing ... growing In savage rhythms, Under the "star", as it builds before his very eyes Walls of bloody dreams, Forming a trap, held tightly together with the thread of steel, Trapping him within, denying him movement Eytan, the child, the human being, opens his eyes And asks, Why the trap and the walls? Why the time with amputated legs, clad in khaki and death, Enveloped in smoke rising from flames and from sorrows? If only the "star" could tell the truth, If only it could. But alas! Alas, the "star"! Eytan, my child You are the victim, drowning in lies, And like Eytan, the harbor is sunk in a sea of lies, Drowned by the bloated dream With the head of a dragon And a thousand arms. Alas, alas! If only you could remain the child, tlle human being! But I shudder, and live in dread That you may grow up inside the trap, In this time of amputated legs, clad in khaki, In cruel death, in smoke and sorrow. 154 ApPENDIX 1 I fear, my child, that the human in you may be smothered, That it may totter and fall- Sinking Sinking Sinking to the bottom of the abyss. (El-Messiri [comp. and trans.] Palestinian Wedding [Washington, DC: Three Continents, 1982]) [ON YOM KIPPUR] Yehuda Amichai On Yom Kippur in 1967, the Year of Forgetting, I put on my dark holiday clothes and walked to the Old City ofJerusalem For a long time I stood in front of an Arab's hole-in-the-wall Shop, not far from the Damascus Gate, a shop with buttons and zippers and spools of thread in every color and snaps and buckles. A rate light and many colors, like an open Ark. I told him in my heart that my father too had a shop like this, with thread and buttons. I explained to him in my heart about all the decades and the causes and the events, why I am now here and my father's shop was burned there and he is buried here. When I finished, it was time for the Closing of the Gates prayer. He too lowered the shutters and locked the gate and I returned, with all the worshippers, home. (Selected Poetry ofYehuda Amichai, trans. Chana Bloch and Stephen Mitchell [Berkeley, LA, London: University of California Press, 1996], p. 49) THOSE WHO ARE PASSING BETWEEN PASSING WORDS Mahmud Darwish a you who are passing between passing words, Pack your names and leave Pull out your hours from our time and leave Steal what you will of images so that you understand What you never will: How a stone from our land builds the ceiling of the sky. a you who are passing between passing words, From you the sword-from us our blood POETRY 155 From you steel and fire-tram us our tlesh From you another tank-from us a stone From you a tear-gas bomb-from us rain Above us as above you, are sky and air So take your share of our blood and leave Go to a dancing dinner party It is tor us to water the roses of the martyrs It is tor us to live, as we like. a you who are passing between passing words, Like bitter dust, go where you wish, but Do not pass between us like flying insects For we have work to do in our land: We have wheat to grow and water with the dew of our bodies And we have what does not please you here: Stones or partridges So take the past, if you wish, to the market of antiquities And restore the skeleton, if you wish, to the hoopoe On a porcelain plate We have what does not please you: we have the future And we have things to do in our land. a you who are passing between passing words, Heap up your delusions in an abandoned hole, and leave Set the clock back to the sovereignty of the Golden Calf Or to the timing of the revolver's music For we have what does not please you here, so leave We have what you do not have: A homeland bleeding out a people who bleed A homeland worthy of oblivion or memory a those who are passing between passing words, It is time that you left Live wherever you wish but not among us It is time you lett Die wherever you wish but not among us For we have work to do in our homeland We have the past here We have the tlrst cry of lite here We have the present, the present and the hlture We have this life and the life-after So get out of our native land Out of our seashore, out of our sea Out of our wheat, out of our salt, out of our wound Out of everything, and get out Of the memories of memory a you who are passing between passing words. (Trans. from the Arabic in Mahmud Darwish, ed. Sabri HafIz [Beirut: Dar al-Fata ai-Arabi, 1994]) pp. 183-186. 156 ApPENDIX 1 TEMPORARY POEM OF My TIME Yehuda Amichai Hebrew writing and Arabic writing go from east to west, Latin writing from west to east. Languages are like cats: You must not stroke their fur the wrong way. The clouds come from the sea, the hot wind from the desert, The trees bend in the wind, And stones fly from all four winds, Into all four winds. They throw stones, Throw this land, one at the other, But the land always falls back to the land. They throw the land, want to get rid of it, Its stones, its soil, but you can't get rid of it. They throw stones, throw stones at me In 1936, 1938, 1948, 1998, Semites throw at Semites and anti-Semites at anti-Semites, Even men throw and just men throw, Geologists throw and theologists throw, Archaeologists throw and archhooligans throw, Kidneys throw stones and gall bladders throw, Head stones and forehead stones and the heart of a stone, Stones shaped like screaming mouth And stones fitting your eyes Like a pair of glasses, The past throws stones at the future, And all of them fall on the present. Weeping stones and laughing gravel stones, Even God in the Bible threw stones, Even the Urim and Tumim were thrown And got stuck in the breastplate of justice, And Herod threw stones and what came out was a Temple. Oh, the poem of stone sadness Oh, the poem thrown on the stones Oh, the poem of thrown stones. Is there in this land A stone that was never thrown And never built and never overturned And never uncovered and never discovered And never screamed from a wall and never discarded by the builders And never closed on top of a grave and never lay umier lovers And never turned into a cornerstone? POETRY 157 Please do not throw any more stones, You are moving the land, The holy, whole, open land, You are moving it to the sea And the sea doesn't want it The sea says, not in me. Please throw little stones, Throw snail fossils, throw gravel, Justice or injustice from quarries of Midgdal Tsedek, Throw sot!: stones, throw sweet clods, Throw limestones, tllroW clay, Throw sand of tlle seashore, Throw dust of the desert, throw rust, Throw soil, throw wind, Throw air, throw nothing Until your hands weary And even peace will be weary and will be. (Yehuda Amichai: A Life of Poetry, 1948-1994, trans. Benjamin and Barbara Harshav [New York: HarperCollins, 1994], pp. 465-466) MAHMUD DARWISH Rita and the Rifle Between Rita and my eyes­ A rifle And whoever sees Rita Kneels and prays to the divinity of her honey-colored eyes. And I kissed Rita when she was young And I remember how she clung to me And how her resplendent braided tresses covered my arm I remember Rita As a sparrow remembers its brook Ah, Rita There stand between us a million sparrows and a million memories And trysts Fired on by a rifle. Rita's name was a carnival in my mouth Rita's body was a wedding celebration in my blood And I was lost in Rita for two years And she slept in my arms tor two years And we made pledges over the most resplendent wine-cup 158 ApPENDIX 1 And we burned in the wine of our kisses And We Were Born Again. Ah, Rita What is it that turned my eyes away trom yours? Nothing except a nap or two or honey-colored clouds Before this ritle. What has been done is done o silence of the night, My moon migrated far at dawn In honey-colored eyes And the city swept away all the singers and Rita. Between Rita and my eyes- A ritle. (Mahmud Darwish, Diwan Mahmud Darwish [Beirut: Dar al-Awda, 1978], 1: 308-309) SPARROWS DIE IN GALILEE -We will meet after a while A year, or two, a generation after And she shot with her camera Twenty gardens and the sparrows of Galilee. Beyond the sea she set out to search for a new meaning of the truth. -My homeland is a clothes-line For kerchiefs stained with blood shed every minute I stretched on the shore Like sand and palm trees.