Here the birds' journey ends, our journey, the journey of words,
and after us there will be a horizon for the new birds.
We are the ones who forge the sky's copper, the sky that will carve roads
after us and make amends with our names above the distant cloud slopes.
Soon we will descend the widow's descent in the memory fields
and raise our tent to the final winds: blow, for the poem to live, and blow
on the poem's open road. After us, the plants will grow and grow
over roads only we have walked and our obstinate steps inaugurated.
And we will etch on the final rocks, "Long live life, long live life,"
and fall into ourselves. And after us there'll be a horizon for the new birds.
Mahmoud Darwish
Wow. What we have thought if we read this poem 40 years ago? Would we have eagerly agreed that it was time to make way for the new birds (us)? And could we have imagined that we would ever have to make way for the new birds?
ReplyDeleteHmmm, I am the one -- way back then -- that asked for a birthday cake with blue icing and the inscription, "Is that all there is?"
ReplyDeleteThis is so rich that I can read it over and over and never quite get it all. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteElaine and Gene and Ruth and Pamela,
ReplyDeleteThanks, Ruthie.
I don't understand it all, but I get a lot out of this.
What is "the sky that will carve roads after us"? What does this mean?
This was written by a very political Palestinian poet, now dead, who lived a life vastly different from ours. I imagine that some of his words and word-symbols could easily elude us.
and after us a horizon for the new birds.. .
ReplyDelete