From ‘Ode to Hope’

Copies of the GRIEF issue of ArabLit Quarterly, where this poem appears, are available at Gumroad, our ArabLit shop, and elsewhere.

 

Excerpt from Ode to Hope  

By Babiker al-Wasila

Translated by Lemya Shammat and Salma Harland

 

Forgive me—
a sword,
disgraced…
These hands
wasted my land—
my love, my sin. Adrift,
my fate unwound,
snaring my feet.

 

I, son of this land,
never built it—
never cast a poem to stir the stream
may it catch what I dream:
My river was always a Nile,
my patience, a wistful shore.

 

In my land, two Niles entwine—
a beauty ablaze, an eternal struggle
embracing the water’s kin
on a timeless isthmus of lofty plains
beyond the chaos of being.

 

Sudan, what mars your Kushite grace?
What freckles of civilization cling
among the barbarians, death’s heirs,
on this night of broken worlds
past El-Dawsh’s wildest verse?

 

My wealth, womb-like, rich—
my imagination, barren—

مقتطف من “مُعلَّقةُ الأمل”

بقلم بابكر الوسيلة

أسِفٌ

كسيفٌ

سافلُ..

بلدي أنا بدَّدتُهُ بيديَّ هاتينِ،

اقترفتُّ محبٍّتي فيه

وفي التِّيه انطوى قَدَري على قدَميَّ في التِّيه

أنا كابْنهِ

لم أبْنهِ

حتَّى ولم أرمِ القصيدةَ جيِّداً لمُويجةٍ في النَّهر

كي تصطادَ ما يرجو خيالي

(نهري دائماً نيلٌ)

وصبري ساحلُ..

ما أصدقَ النِّيلينِ في النِّيل اشتمالاً

وجمالاً في اشتعالٍ

ونضالٍ خالدِ الأحضانِ لأصدقاء الماء على أبديَّة برزخِ المرَجِ المُعلَّى عن هَيُولى الكون.

يا سودانُ ما هذا الذي في وجهك الكوشيِّ

من نمَشِ الحضارة في حضور بني الحضيضِ

ضيوفِ هذا الموتِ

في ليلٍ طفوليٍّ من أُخريات مُخيِّلة

المدى الدُّوشيِّ!

إنَّ خيري وافرُ الأنثى

وخيالي قاحلُ..

 

Babiker Al-Wasila Sirr Al-Khatim Al-Khalifa, born in Khashm Al-Qirba, Sudan, is a renowned poet and prominent figure in Sudanese literature. A member of the Sudanese Writers Union, he holds a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from the University of Khartoum. His published works include Mountain Anthems (1999), Scandals of the Lonely (2002), and The Deprived from Metaphor (2018). Al-Khalifa has participated in major poetry festivals in Sudan and internationally, including the Al-Mrabad Poetry Festival in Iraq, the Sharjah Festival for Arabic Poetry, and the Arabic Poetry Festival in Algeria.

Lemya Shammat is a writer, translator, educator, and editor who resides in the UAE. She is a regular contributor to ArabLit.

Salma Harland is a British-Egyptian translator-scholar specializing in translational hermeneutics and premodern Arabic literature, with accolades from the American Literary Translators Association (ALTA) and the Dutch Foundation for Literature (Letterenfonds). Her critical writings and translations have been published in The Massachusetts Review, Modern Poetry in Translation, Words Without Borders, Poetry London, and elsewhere.