Ali Ahmad Said Esber Poems

Adam whispered to me
in a husky sigh, in silence and moaning:
...

A family of leaves is sitting near the spring,
wounding the land of tears
...

The child I was came to me
once,
a strange face
He said nothing We walked
...

Even the wind wants
to become a cart
pulled by butterflies.
...

The cities dissolve, and the earth is a cart loaded with dust
Only poetry knows how to pair itself to this space.
...

from "Elegy for the First Century"
Bells on our eyelashes
and the death throes of words,
...

1.
The leaves asleep under the wind
are the wounds' ship,
and the ages collapsed on top of each other
...

In a time that confronts me, "You do not belong to me,"
I retort back, "I'm not of you," and struggle to understand it . . .
...

Up there, up above,
look at her dangling from the sky's throat.
Look at her being fenced with the eyelashes of angels.
...

No one knows anything of it, except its name,
as if things exist only in utterance.
Skin devours pulp
and dust is another name for naught.
...