Song for Bassam Saba

This poem originally appeared in our 2021 SONG issue of ArabLit Quarterly.

Song for Bassam Saba

By Walid Daou

Translated by Suneela Mubayi

Translator’s note:

Bassam Saba (1958-2020) was the founder of the New York Arabic Orchestra and head of the National Higher Conservatory of Music in Lebanon from 2018 until his passing due to complications of Covid-19.

Walid Daou, born in 1981 in Mount Lebanon, is a blogger, schoolteacher, and poet based in Beirut. Of this poem, he writes: “While walking from my home to Mar Yousef Church in Beirut’s Monot district, where the Conservatory would hold a recital every Friday evening, I would consider the paradox: By taking this long walk, I was shedding the fatigue that was piling up on top of me, but as a result, also adding new fatigue. At the end of my walk, inside the church, there would be Bassam Saba to greet me with his smile. That smile sufficed as my own special ‘Si se puede,’ as if with his smile he was telling me: Yes, you can make all that fatigue go away.”

Bassam means “ever smiles” in Arabic. It comes from the same trilateral root as Basim, “smiling”; Bassem Chit, a revolutionary socialist organizer and close friend of the author, tragically died of a heart attack at the age of 34 in 2014; he is alluded to in the poem. The references to salt suggest the Gospel of Matthew 5:13, where Christ calls his disciples the salt of the earth. – Suneela Mubayi.

 

For Bassam Saba

Where do tears come from, Bassam?

Where does the salt in tears come from?

Was it left over from the spray of the waves

that clung to my eyes

But which sea, Bassam,

when you departed in the winter,

or was it autumn,

the autumn of the land,

the autumn of our days…

Where does the salt come from, Bassam?

Does it come from bread we did not eat

when you with your hands and your breath

left all the bread for us?

You stood there

at the center of the church

smiling

just like your name—Bassam

hunching slightly forward

just like our backs hunch

ever so gradually

under a load that does not relent

that never has

and never will….

You, the one who knew all the burdens

as you let out that breath

from your northern plain

you called out

the call of the children of the land

the children of the factories

Calling out, you crossed the oceans

flying with the seagulls and swallows

to Beirut

You bore

the blows of all the knives

And so the breaths of air

your breaths

softly caressed

their wounds

as much as they could

But when you departed

you were a wound to all wounds

What balm then, Bassam, is there for Beirut?

Each one of you departs

one after the other

leaving your shadows

in the cramped crevices of the land

You leave your many cups

on their own

You leave your plates

You leave your breaths

to struggle against the winds by themselves

You leave the thorns

to weep and yearn

(thorns are more loving,

more tender

and dearer to us)

What country is this, Bassam?

If we ever smile

we are stabbed in the back

many times over

Never mind, Bassam

we will befriend only

crows

foxes

owls

spiders

hyenas

mongoose

and moles

for they too, weep and yearn,

they too

are gentler

more tender

and dearer to us.

Bassam! This evening

I am mixing up names

and meanings.

Doubtless,

with your death, a part of me dies

Yet there is born in me

a new sorrow.

The back will be hunched completely

A tear will cling to

the corner of my eyes

The moon will carry whatever it can

of your melody

It will send it to the sun once

and another time, to the wheat planted

so its stalks will grow

and turn green

rise high

become golden

The flour sprinkled with salt

kneaded into dough

fermented

and baked

And so there will be bread

There will be a table

There will be a cup

There will be wine

There will be dancing

There will be a flute

and there will be

you.

You can read the Arabic original online here.

Walid Daou, born in 1981 in Mount Lebanon, is a writer  and poet based in Beirut. He blogs at nidalat.wordpress.com, where, in his words, “there is more about me than any bio can say.”

Suneela Mubayi earned her PhD in Arabic literature at NYU and translates literature between Arabic, English, and Urdu, and has published in Banipal, Beirut39, Jadaliyya, Words Without Borders, and elsewhere.