Poetry in Translation: Salah Jahin’s ‘Cigarette Ash’
Salma Harland translates the legendary “Cigarette Ash” («تراب دخان» ) written by the legendary Salah Jahin (1930-1986) in 1967.
Poetry
Two Poems by Al-Dawy Mohammed Al-Dawy
“Many years ago / I swallowed a butterfly while I was singing.”
New Poetry in Translation: ‘The Light Isn’t Surrounded by Guards’
‘Rays of light aren’t surrounded by guards.’
‘She Stretched Out Her Hand’: A Translator’s Tribute to Mourid Barghouti
“My first memory of reading a poem by Mourid Barghouti (1944-2021) goes back to the tenth grade. I was reading “غمزة” (“A Wink”) from his “قصائد مختارة” (Selected Poems), and I was fascinated by how Mourid managed to give such a sense of movement to his words.”
Two Laughter Poems & a Cover Reveal from Maya Abu al-Hayyat’s ‘You Can Be the Last Leaf’
“You will hear and taste her laughter and also yours. Because laughter is ‘the excess knowledge no one takes seriously,’ the cherished identity smuggled out of psychology and surveilled consciousness.”
New Poetry: Rym Jalil’s ‘My Mother’s Kitchen’
“Every day I lie and say / I know this place. / My mother’s kitchen / brims with afflictions / I must pretend to befriend it / we all know it can have only one master / from its beginning to its end”
Poetry in Translation: Nada Elshabrawy’s ‘In a Bad Movie’
We walk the streets shoulder to shoulder / bumping into plastic mannequins / they break / but we shatter
New Poetry: Samar Abdel Jaber’s ‘Four Years Without You’
“Perhaps you think poetry / is a waste of time, for eternity can’t be rendered in languages / and death after death / has a different name.”
‘If I Were a Cat’: Rasha Omran’s Poetry in Three Languages
“If I were a cat / I would was my skin with my tongue / like this / your scent passing from my skin to my mouth, so I’d think I’d devoured you”