BIO
Abdullah Al-Araimi is one the most prominent poets of the Sultanate of Oman. He started writing poetry in the early 1990’s. He has participated in poetry readings and festivals in Arab and European countries, including Dhabi, Tunisia, Mauritania, and Libya. He has published four poetry collections: The Concerto of Words (2005), Give me a Name O Love (2008). I Do Not Claim to Have a Horizon (2010), and The Way Home (2016). A number of his poems have been translated into French and English.
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Notes on The Margin of War
I
What does war tell you?!
A gazelle running after his hunter while drowning in his own blood
seeking a chance for life
and a dream that may flow on his foot
II
What does peace tell you?!
Our poems are not a moon at the height of the hymn
Nor have we claimed to descend from the butterfly
so that our pedigree may be traced
Not with a sick heart
are slanting skies rubbed by lightenings
III
What does love tell you?!
There has to be some space for songs
that the dove may build a nest upon the soldier’s hood
and the distance between the bullets and rainbow may become shorter
IV
What does poetry tell you?!
It is the blood above the pillows, above the beds,
on the door handle, on our weary fingers
How could we call the horses by their names
and how could we chronicle the death of horses on a threshold
V
What does the land tell you?!
Is a pound of martyrs enough
for us to realize that we are like the rest of humans?!
VI
What does the night tell you?!
O life that has nothing
save death coming to death in a moment of dust
and of a resolution – whose feet has rusted – leading to no resolution
VII
What does life say?!
A Temple for defeat will be built here.. let’s admit it:
We are the generation of perversity, generation of madness
generation of failure, generation of dispersion
generation of men/fronds
VIII
What does the wind tell you?!
I’ve come to unearth the heritage of those who passed from here
leaving their shadows behind as iris flowers
and to sweep out the grass of words
lest it leads the thieves of elegies to the roses of their dreams here
IX
What does the sea tell you?!
All that sparkles in her tender body
is put out by a moon in the sky of the Arabs
The suns on her infantile mouth
and the roses ornamented on her breast
will be buried in the land of the Arabs one day
And all that can’t be seen of the charm of her flowers
will be stolen by the Arabs’ hands
It was my intention to take the girl back in her school uniform
But she was filled with tears
And slept.. lest she be seen by the Arabs’ eyes.
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