Mohammed el-Makki Ibrahim and the Homeland as Beloved

Mohammed el-Makki Ibrahim and the Homeland as Beloved

Patriotism in a Romantic Key

Introductions and translations by Adil Babikir

For Sudanese readers living through the current crisis, the following lines by the late Mohammed el-Makkī Ibrahim resonate with striking immediacy, even though they were written in the 1980s. Beneath the layers of grief, a restrained optimism continues to breathe through its lines.

 

Let me know when flowers burst from the trenches,
and the grass rises,
and flocks of sandgrouse and pigeons
make their way back home.

Let me know when the river whinnies once again,
throws open his cellars,
calling all peoples to celebrate
in the acacia forest, or the bamboo groves.

Let me know when the sesbania blossoms,
the clouds drape their shade over the Butana plains,
throwing their silky shawl
upon the shoulders of Kordofan.

Let me know when to rise from death’s deep slumber,
shake off my paralysing fear,
unfurl my wings and set out
for a land that dwells in our dreams.

 

Mohammed el-Makkī Ibrahim is a romantic poet par excellence. Even his patriotic songs are suffused with romance and lyricism. His celebrated piece بعض الرحيق أنا والبرتقالة أنتِ (A Drib of Your Nectar) can well be read as an epic love poem, although it was among the early literary expressions of the “Jungle and Desert”—a literary current that emerged in the early 1960s to explore a path beyond the polarization of Arabism and Africanism. Ibrahim, one of the pioneers of that movement, describes his “girlfriend” as khilassiyah (one of mixed racial descent): “partly Negro, partly Arab, and for sure, some of my words before the Lord.” The poem in which he references her is replete with vivid scenes of romantic encounters:

 

Old fronds are motionless.

Seabirds in utter silence.

The spring has dozed off and everyone is sound asleep

except me,

the fragrance,

and the spears of your vigilant guards.

When I get through,

I race down to you—

my hair wet—

my chest full of flowers.

So keep your door ajar,

and your bed warm.

Put on a nightgown woven of fragrance,

and songs of the spring and the trees.

I’ll have a lengthy chat

with your bosom at dawn.

Alas, my orange,

love encounters are short-lived.

So come feast your eyes on me—

Dawn will soon break.

The ocean is peaceful and serene,

palm fronds caressing and romancing,

the palace pool lush with water lilies,

and the bees showering flower buds with kisses.

Now, I am elegant as never before,

more vigorous than vigor,

glittering in the raiment of new light.

So, feast your eyes on me,

before the next tide sets me adrift.

But I shall soon come back, aboard a fresh wave.

Have you recognized me?

On winds and waves—

On heavy rains—

in my death and resurrection:

I shall come.

Say, then, you have recognized me

and have engraved my features and genes

on rock and sand, among groves.

Say my name is now engraved on the plaque of love.

Now it’s time to leave—

though I still crave

the bounties of your body,

still unsated of your bosom.

So promise to call me in again,

to your bed for yet another night,

and to make it long,

with your hair on my arms;

your color dissolved in my color and my genes:

I am dissolved in you.

So blend me

with the graves of tropical flowers,

with the tearful times,

and ages of slavery.

Embrace my remains and let the sap

carry me along, in its life cycles, across the island.

Embrace my remains and

hold me tight in your arms.

What a lovely fragrance!

How fecund you are!

Negro and naked!

And—for sure,

some of my words are before the Lord.[i]

Ibrahim’s pure romance comes naturally, vivid and overflowing:

Your palms are two poems: of love and of carnival

two pillows soaked in ambergris,

spills of honey, wine, and jasmine.

Your palms protect my life and history.

When they land on my hand,

my hand will bloom and

create new deities and a virgin world.

And when they caress my forehead,

my forehead is relieved

of fever and stupor.

If they land on the heart and hearken,

they lend its beats wildness, glow, and vigor,

and it goes on beating forever.

Yesterday, when we bid farewell,

Two stars looked at me and exchanged winks.

The solemn Nile jokingly cleared his throat.

A flirting star congratulated me.

“You are matchless,” the street said.

So tell me, sweetheart:

When and how did our affair come to be known?

Was the jasmine by the corner snooping on us?

Did it carry the aroma of our conversation in its wake?

Did I whisper it to the Lord in a serene dawn?

Did we impart our secret to a young palm tree—and

she got pollinated,

And gave birth to pearls and amber?

Did I murmur it to a singer?

Perhaps it was me!

Or perhaps us!

I think, sweetheart, it is our love that reveals us!

Mohammed el-Makki Ibrahim (1939-2025) was a celebrated Sudanese poet, writer, book critic, and political analyst. He left behind many publications, including four books of verse, a collection of satirical essays, and hundreds of articles published in the Arab media.

Adil Babikir is a Sudanese translator and copywriter based in the UAE. He has translated and edited several works, including Modern Sudanese Poetry: an Anthology (Nebraska, 2019) and Mansi: A Rare Man in His Own Way, by Tayeb Salih (Banipal Books, London, 2020). His latest book, The Beauty Hunters: Sudanese Bedouin Poetry: Evolution and Impact, was published by University of Nebraska Press in April 2023.

[i] This translation first appeared in Adil Babikir’s Modern Sudanese Poetry: an Anthology, University of Nebraska Press, 2019