From their treetops
the crows already see
the coming year
Last day of the year…
amid the bare trees I walk
on my solitary way
My lonely path
into the new year wanders
between bare trees
This, my life,
I animate with my heart
and live as poetry…
New year
old resolutions
this life of poetry
This November
I want to be a wild field
feeling into my bones
the surge of autumn,
surrendering and letting it all
fall down into the ground
to be cradled in darkness,
to know the meaning of long rest
and unperturbed sleep.
This November I want to go
deep down into my roots
to be acquainted again
with the nature of my being,
the stranger’s face, which is my face,
the face that I once loved
and must learn to love again.
This November I will let the summer wine
brew deep in my veins
with the warmth of its sun,
I will let my dreams
carry me over to the other plain
where spring arrives
with new wildflowers and fruits
and a renewed thirst for life
taking me to the edge of all that I am.
A positive thinker is not one who believes in the positive outcome of every situation. Some situations are clearly hopeless, with the outcome bound to be negative.
A positive thinker is not dispirited by the negative event, but still affirms life and sees therein something to learn. He grasps that growth and understanding happen in difficult situations where one is challenged and even defeated.
A positive thinker understands that no defeat is final since life is deeper than all defeats and love is stronger even than death; and since life always finds a way, he puts the defeat to his advantage by learning from it and being reconciled to the nature of life.
A positive thinker does not believe that he will simply get what he wants by adopting a positive mindset, but understands that the important lessons happen when one’s desire is frustrated, and that failures offer the most important lessons and are the true shapers of character.
A positive thinker is one who believes in the transformative power of our attitude towards life. We are not the passive objects of outside events but we have the power to change them by changing ourselves. Our power lies in our response to what happens to us.
الحبّ هو أن تجد شيئاً جميلاً في الذي تُحبهُ كلّ يوم.
Every lived life rises on the foundation of an unlived, imagined life that could’ve been but never did.
The idols are big in proportion to the smallness of the faith.
Science can purge God from the human imagination the day it can vanquish poetry.
It is our spiritual vacuum that we attempt to fill with pleasure, without succeeding.
Solitude is the virtue of the strong.
The moth does not give up until it is burned.
You can win every very battle but still lose the war.
There is no suffering that cannot be surmounted by death; there is no death that cannot be vanquished by love.
بعضُ الأشخاص بلسمٌ للروح.
A life in ruins…
alone I sit
gazing at the moon
When I think back of your suffering,
of the images and moments
that never leave me,
when I remember the questions
that in your pain you asked,
why me? What wrong have I done?
When I see your eyes again,
and the look in them
as you saw your life
which you loved so much
crumble before you and slip away
although you wanted it to stay
with all your heart.
When I feel how year after year
you grasped at us and at life
with every bit of strength and hope
you had in your loving heart,
and your words of not wanting to die
and leave us still ringing in my ears
as your tears rolled down
as I held you and tried to comfort you,
telling you it won’t happen,
that we’ll find a way.
When I think of your strength
and faith and patience
and how you dealt with it all
blow after blow,
and how after each storm of pain and tears
you were laughing again
and trying to manage and elevate yourself
and embrace life with whatever you had.
When I think of that time I told you
that it should’ve been me, not you,
and you told me not say that
because you were stronger than me.
When I think of your unborn daughters,
the ones we told you you’ll have,
and that time on your deathbed
when you asked me if one day
I’ll name my daughter after you, Sarah.
When I think of time of our childhood
when we played in the fields
by the cemetery where you’re now buried,
and all the times we frequented
the river and mountain
surrounding that place,
never thinking for a moment
that me or you can one day lay there,
at least not before old age.
When I think of my life without you,
how, still, I am not finding a way to move on,
how I’ll never see you again,
not once, not ever,
how you will be missing from all
the events of my life…
When I think of you after all these years
you tell me that life must go on
and the poem must be finished,
you tell me to finish all the paintings
you wanted to create,
you tell me to be this love.
I smile and I kiss you.
I love you with all my heart.
In this life we exchange one chain for another, and cannot live without chains. Freedom is to choose what binds us and compels our soul, what gives our life root and direction. Not all chains are the same. Some degrade us, and others lift us to the sublime.
في هذه الحياة نحن نستبدل قيد بآخر، فلا قدرة لنا على العيش بدون قيود. الحرية هي في اختيار ما يربط ويُخضع نفوسنا، ما يعطي لحياتنا جذوراً واتجاهاً. ليست كل القيود مثل بعضها. بعض القيود تحقرنا، وأخرى ترفعنا إلى الإله.
Away from the world,
I long to live in a little cabin
lost in the wild,
there to listen
to the heartbeat of the world,
to wait for the sunset and the dawn,
to be found by the forest,
to read and to write
not as a hermit,
but as a man who has come
to the essence of things.
Cruising into old age,
reading books
and writing poetry.
~
With one foot in the grave
she sits smiling at me…
my mother
~
هذا المطر
في عتمةِ الليل عاشِقَين
يُقَبِلان بَعضَهُما
~
This rain…
in the dark night two lovers
passionately kissing
~
كقمرٍ في الماء
ترتَجِف
وأنا أُقَبِلُها
October…
born again I fall,
a leaf in the wind
~
Moon in the window…
my heart takes on the stillness
of far away stars
~
What’s more to life than this?
watching the leaves fall,
listening to the wind…
~
October…
on my birthday I look
at the yellow leaves
Unfinished poem…
at dusk I sit watching
a leaf in the wind
~
Loneliness –
without it I’d be
just a face in the crowd
~
Moonflower
her body in my bed
burning softly
~
Sous la lune d’été
sa peau nue sauf
de la chaleur de ses baisers
تحت ضوء القمر
بشرتها العارية الا
من حرارة قبلاته
Summer moon…
her bare skin covered
in the warmth of his kiss
العمرُ لم يُبقِ مني
الا هذا الشعر
أكتِبهُ لأقول أنني أُحبكِ
~
Spring in the mountains
all day I sit listening
to the wind in the pines
We all coexist with the idea that the people we love might disappear at any moment, though this idea, in the every day life, only occupies the fringes of our minds. But when someone you love has cancer, the idea becomes central, and it moves to occupy the entire space. Managing your emotions while going through this is one of the hardest things a human being has to do.
The years move on, and the things which seemed so important become trivial; time and loss have a way of distilling life to its essence. The years move on, what remains now are the simple things that were there all along, waiting in the quiet. The years move on, and we start making friends with our own disappearance; how well can we dance the dance before saying goodbye?
Things, in the end, will not be alright, and it is unrealistic to expect them to be so. Life will falter, sickness will creep in, relationships you value will be torn, friends and lovers will one day be strange as ghosts, everything will change, nothing you love will remain the same, and, in the end, sooner or later, you yourself will disappear without ever having felt like you have had enough, or that you have fulfilled all your dreams, or resolved the puzzle of life. If you can truly face this fact, deeply, without closing your heart, you will attain internal peace, and will be able to dance in the rain for a little while. You will give all you can give, and you will know the gratitude of love.
Femme
en moi tu es l’infini
qui désir être poème
~
Another year ends…
one by one leaving me
the people I love
~
Snow on snow falling…
my heart a well
of incurable sorrow
My first thought
as I woke up today,
as the autumn sun gently
sneaked in through the window
caressing my bed,
was to halt the flow of time
and stay encased
in this moment forever;
it was a desire to stay here,
embraced by the arms
of an imaginary woman,
and no longer have to face,
day in, day out,
the vicissitudes of a life
I can no longer bear.
When sadness comes
sit with her, invite her over
to a cup of tea or coffee,
or maybe just a little wine,
resist your urge to escape from her
by drowning her in some frantic activity,
and rather hold her gently
like you would your beloved wife,
drown in her eyes
all your sorrows, fears and anxieties,
tell her what she already knows,
your insomnias and terrors
before a life devoid of affection, meaning or completion.
When sadness comes
sit with her, though she thumps
against your chest
like a wild horse being tamed,
gather up your strength and tell her
all that the harsh tides of life
have washed up inside your heart,
or just sit with her, in silence,
reading a book or listening
to a bird singing happy and unaware.
When sadness comes
smile back to her, sadly,
and offer her the dark rose
of that void pulsing in your chest,
and watch her take it, gladly,
placing it delicately
in her wildly waving hair.
When sadness comes
welcome her, that lifelong friend
loyal to a fold and intimate and tender,
and know that all she asks of you
is for you to tame her
so that one day she may begin to tell you
all the reasons for which
she is your promise of love.
Through the withered grass
a winding path…
the journey itself is home
Inspired by Basho
Not to shrink away from fear, not to rationalize it, hide it, or pretend it isn’t there. To use fear as a way of knowing your weaknesses and strengths, keeping you rooted in reality, as a way to highlight the areas of your life that are asking to grow, to keep you moving on the edge of your life, the edge that is asking you to use up your insight, strength, and imaginative powers, the edge that is sharpening you, allowing you to become the best version of yourself, the person you were meant to be. This is the purpose of fear, and that is the way it should be used by a philosophy that embraces life.
Rooted in Love 