Mohammed Bennis

1948 / Fez

Between Silence And Sun

Again I set my hand down,
Set my eyelids down, upon you
And out of my silence
I come back to you
shielded my friends
and pull open your celestial door
Here am I thirsting
to read breath's tremor
between time's leave-taking.

Here, my vision caught sight of
a look's foresight
Two stars showed before me
so close to morning,
A minaret
immortalising its wind,
A perpendicular light
expanding for me the space of its realm,
Echoes of your footsteps.
deserted your unseen home.

Gypsum, mastic and
restore ornaments language to its roots.
A dawn for this variegation
opiusly inundates me with
with a shower of water
implanting there its flute
with no words heard or uttered
An utter bewilderment

Here you are, O brother in death,
Your lofty brow
wrapt in confusion
made vagabond by the desert's butterfly
Our night
We shall follow the sun's curve
two lovers imbued with the praises
of Andalusian sun
So, prod, then Ibn Rushd
to repeat what is scattered
of the soul's dust
all over the regions.
Ours is a plate and water
Ours too is an elegy
we hang on our walls
an ornament intoxicating strangers.

The light almost touches my brow
I search in a remote corner
for the gluestand
listen to my shivering
Wavering between entwined words
My first inspiration came down to me
from a secret place
crescents of unbound joy
Stick there in my bosom
fresh penned letters
The mercy of from
enacted while wandering along
the dawn's expanse.

Translated by Noel Abdulahad
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