Drawn from a collection as provocatively titled as I Don’t Love My Father, this Translation Tuesday features two poems by the Omani poet Aisha Al Saifi who, at a young age, has established herself as a major voice within contemporary Omani poetry. Be it her clarion call to her fellow countrywomen (“[who] speak like singing”) or when she embodies the persona of a prophet (one who “[grows] bigger / Like a poem composed by an intoxicated poet”)—Aisha’s verse is driven by a narrative propulsion that expands her words into a compelling world. In Ali Al Rawahi’s translation, this bold voice which at each turn of phrase manages to be lyrical and declarative at once is a powerful expression of poetry’s ability to both move and mobilise.
My Countrywomen
My countrywomen who
encompass my blood with poems
and rapture
and prayers
My countrywomen
whose anklets
are like doves over the water
And their eyes are mountain dews in the remains
My countrywomen
Who speak like singing
And offer their pains to passersby
The women … they are my friends
tired from
Masculine absurdity
And from anguish
that does not distinguish between
The temporary self from the eternal soul
who trade their disappointments
For a cup of chamomile tea in the morning
And with a single piece of walnut
And a confectioned trail of words
The girls of my homeland who
Mock death
Only care for a life that is
Embedded with god’s grace
And that is coated with laughter
My beautiful ladies
I salute you
In the presence of love
You shine
In the presence of poetry and songs
You shine
Blessed they from birth till death
Blessed they when resurrected
Exhilarated
Like a flock of swans
I Walk On Water
Like prophets
I gently walk on water
I do not stumble
A fleeting dream, moving like a train, is on my tail
Carrying me on its palms, it does not reveal where it is headed
Then it follows me like a minuscule mirage
Upon a hill in the sky of existence
It does not rest nor wither
I say unto it, it is not yet time for resurrection
It does not respond
Countless passersby take notice of my aging in solitude
Like a shell in the ocean
My prolonged patience brings it to sham
So it opens the gate of eternity and enters
It leaves me alone to be extended like a snail
And as a shadow in the dark I shrink
It believes in me, when I come unto it
And it relapses into infidelity when I lose myself into
The fast pace of passersby
And like the sun, it sets away from my body
Leaving behind a reminiscence of light scattered in the distant sky
And like the clouds, all it needs to rain is wild wind and
Sad songs
I grow bigger
Like a poem composed by an intoxicated poet
And like an apple eaten by a hungry melodic mouth, I grow smaller
And I forget why I walked on water
The wind and dust are ignorant of my questions
I see a moon
Sneaking out of my body
And I feel the lightness of my heart
Floating above water
now I know and feel what love does to strangers
I am the rested asleep wanderer
I am the refugee coming to my own aid
I am the drifter who is self-contained with his labyrinth
Every time love disregards my body, I see more
I cry to the wind; let go of me
As you do to clouds
When it follows its steps upon the ground
Water could not catch up with him, nor the volcanoes
It falls willingly into drought
And blooms when it desires so
The distant passers scream at me:
Are you Moses, that the sea lends you this path?
Or are you Noah on his ark, fleeing the warning signs of the flood
This the time of the drowned
And I laugh
I laugh Laugh
All I need is a flute, a song
And a book
So I can pass through
Translated from the Arabic by Ali Al Rawahi
Aisha Al Saifi (b. 1987, Nizwa) is an Omani poet and writer. Aisha supervises The Poetry Lab at Bait Alzubair Foundation which conducts poetry initiatives in cooperation with other bodies concerned with creative arts. She has published three books of poetry and enjoys a wide popularity. As an outstanding poet, she produced for the Oman Radio Channel a cultural program titled Poetry Ports مرافئ شعرية that highlights prominent poetic experiences in the Arab World. She also produced a social program Your Life حياتكم on Oman TV which deals with social issues of the Omani society. She has been hosted in a number of literary programs in television and radio, most notably the BBC, Aljazeera and Abu Dhabi channels. She actively writes on her online blog “Freedom for the Price of Bread حرية بثمن الخبز” where she writes on various social, cultural, personal and political topics.
Ali Al Rawahi is a writer and translator from Oman who graduated with an MA in translation in 2019. He has published one novel and two short story collections which received awards at the Oman Literary Forum. He translated articles about creative writing for Takeeen and contributed in the translation of chapters from Ray Bradbury’s Zen in the Art of Writing and Roy Peter Clark’s Writing Tools. His translations have appeared in Nizaw and Al Arabi. Ali’s poems have appeared in the anthology, With Our Eyes Wide Opened (West End Press, 2014).
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