As a part of its continuing effort to share a portion of the literary wealth of Arabic poetry with the English reader, The Arab American News translates a poem by the legendary Syrian poet

Nizar Qabbani.

In this poem, Qabbani addresses war-torn Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War. A decade and a half after Qabbani’s death, in 2008, the messages he sent to Beirut could be directed to his hometown of Damascus, which is currently facing its own civil war.

The first message:

How is the situation?

We ask you, and we know well

the naivety of the question.

We ask you

like orphans in the funeral of beauty.

The second message:

Didn’t you sell a moon to buy an earthquake?

And sail boats…

And sand….

Didn’t you sell the red cherry in your forests

and the wild thyme

and hay?

Didn’t you sell?

The apple trees…

And the birds…

And the lights… And the waterfall?

And the laughter of children?

Didn’t you sell the pain of flutes in your plains 

and the color of the ballad?

Didn’t you sell heaven

to live on the remnants?

The third message:

Friends of poetry in Beirut,

Didn’t you sell the last of stars in your sky?

Didn’t you sell

what is left of the beauty of your women?

Didn’t you sell to the militias that torture you

the last string in the shirt of the poem?

The fourth message:

Friends of patience in Beirut,

tell us:

In what land is patience planted?

Tell us:

Is it possible for the rose to rise from its bed?

And for its scent to awaken?

And for the ink to flow?

After they crossed out,

the best line in the book of life.

In what land is patience planted?

Tell us:

Is it possible for the rose to rise from its bed?

And for its scent to awaken?

Is possible for the letters to return from their exile?

And for ink to flow?

Is it possible to retrieve our lives?

After they had crossed out 

the best line in the book of life?

— Translated from Arabic by Ali Harb