The Fertile Crescent - The Cradle of civilisation

THE DIWAN OF ABU'L-ALA

I

Abandon worship in the mosque and shrink

  From idle prayer, from sacrificial sheep,

  For Destiny will bring the bowl of sleep

Or bowl of tribulation--you shall drink.

II

The scarlet eyes of Morning are pursued

  By Night, who growls along the narrow lane;

  But as they crash upon our world the twain

Devour us and are strengthened for the feud.

III

Vain are your dreams of marvellous emprise,

  Vainly you sail among uncharted spaces,

  Vainly seek harbour in this world of faces

If it has been determined otherwise.

IV

Behold, my friends, there is reserved for me

  The splendour of our traffic with the sky:

  You pay your court to Saturn, whereas I

Am slain by One far mightier than he.

V

You that must travel with a weary load

  Along this darkling, labyrinthine street--

  Have men with torches at your head and feet

If you would pass the dangers of the road.

VI

So shall you find all armour incomplete

  And open to the whips of circumstance,

  That so shall you be girdled of mischance

Till you be folded in the winding-sheet.

VII

Have conversation with the wind that goes

  Bearing a pack of loveliness and pain:

  The golden exultation of the grain

And the last, sacred whisper of the rose

VIII

But if in some enchanted garden bloom

  The rose imperial that will not fade,

  Ah! shall I go with desecrating spade

And underneath her glories build a tomb?

IX

Shall I that am as dust upon the plain

  Think with unloosened hurricanes to fight?

  Or shall I that was ravished from the night

Fall on the bosom of the night again?

X

Endure! and if you rashly would unfold

  That manuscript whereon our lives are traced,

  Recall the stream which carols thro' the waste

And in the dark is rich with alien gold.

XI

Myself did linger by the ragged beach,

  Whereat wave after wave did rise and curl;

  And as they fell, they fell--I saw them hurl

A message far more eloquent than speech:

XII

_We that with song our pilgrimage beguile,

  With purple islands which a sunset bore,

  We, sunk upon the sacrilegious shore,

May parley with oblivion awhile_.

XIII

I would not have you keep nor idly flaunt

  What may be gathered from the gracious land,

  But I would have you sow with sleepless hand

The virtues that will balance your account.

XIV

The days are dressing all of us in white,

  For him who will suspend us in a row.

  But for the sun there is no death. I know

The centuries are morsels of the night.

XV

A deed magnanimous, a noble thought

  Are as the music singing thro' the years

  When surly Time the tyrant domineers

Against the lute whereoutof it was wrought.

XVI

Now to the Master of the World resign

  Whatever touches you, what is prepared,

  For many sons of wisdom are ensnared

And many fools in happiness recline.

XVII

Long have I tarried where the waters roll

  From undeciphered caverns of the main,

  And I have searched, and I have searched in vain,

Where I could drown the sorrows of my soul.

XVIII

If I have harboured love within my breast,

  'Twas for my comrades of the dusty day,

  Who with me watched the loitering stars at play,

Who bore the burden of the same unrest.

XIX

For once the witcheries a maiden flung--

  Then afterwards I knew she was the bride

  Of Death; and as he came, so tender-eyed,

I--I rebuked him roundly, being young.

XX

Yet if all things that vanish in their noon

  Are but the part of some eternal scheme,

  Of what the nightingale may chance to dream

Or what the lotus murmurs to the moon!

XXI

Have I not heard sagacious ones repeat

  An irresistibly grim argument:

  That we for all our blustering content

Are as the silent shadows at our feet.

XXII

Aye, when the torch is low and we prepare

  Beyond the notes of revelry to pass--

  Old Silence will keep watch upon the grass,

The solemn shadows will assemble there.

XXIII

No Sultan at his pleasure shall erect

  A dwelling less obedient to decay

  Than I, whom all the mysteries obey,

Build with the twilight for an architect.

XXIV

Dark leans to dark! the passions of a man

  Are twined about all transitory things,

  For verily the child of wisdom clings

More unto dreamland than Arabistan.

XXV

Death leans to death! nor shall your vigilance

  Prevent him from whate'er he would possess,

  Nor, brother, shall unfilial peevishness

Prevent you from the grand inheritance.

XXVI

Farewell, my soul!--bird in the narrow jail

  Who cannot sing. The door is opened! Fly!

  Ah, soon you stop, and looking down you cry

The saddest song of all, poor nightingale.

XXVII

Our fortune is like mariners to float

  Amid the perils of dim waterways;

  Shall then our seamanship have aught of praise

If the great anchor drags behind the boat?

XXVIII

Ah! let the burial of yesterday,

  Of yesterday be ruthlessly decreed,

  And, if you will, refuse the mourner's reed,

And, if you will, plant cypress in the way.

XXIX

As little shall it serve you in the fight

  If you remonstrate with the storming seas,

  As if you querulously sigh to these

Of some imagined haven of delight.

XXX

Steed of my soul! when you and I were young

  We lived to cleave as arrows thro' the night,--

  Now there is ta'en from me the last of light,

And wheresoe'er I gaze a veil is hung.

XXXI

No longer as a wreck shall I be hurled

  Where beacons lure the fascinated helm,

  For I have been admitted to the realm

Of darkness that encompasses the world.

XXXII

Man has been thought superior to the swarm

  Of ruminating cows, of witless foals

  Who, crouching when the voice of thunder rolls,

Are banqueted upon a thunderstorm.

XXXIII

But shall the fearing eyes of humankind

  Have peeped beyond the curtain and excel

  The boldness of a wondering gazelle

Or of a bird imprisoned in the wind?

XXXIV

Ah! never may we hope to win release

  Before we that unripeness overthrow,--

  So must the corn in agitation grow

Before the sickle sings the songs of peace.

XXXV

Lo! there are many ways and many traps

  And many guides, and which of them is lord?

  For verily Mahomet has the sword,

And he may have the truth--perhaps! _perhaps!_

XXXVI

Now this religion happens to prevail

  Until by that religion overthrown,--

  Because men dare not live with men alone,

But always with another fairy-tale.

XXXVII

Religion is a charming girl, I say;

  But over this poor threshold will not pass,

  For I may not unveil her, and alas!

The bridal gift I can't afford to pay.

XXXVIII

I have imagined that our welfare is

  Required to rise triumphant from defeat;

  And so the musk, which as the more you beat,

Gives ever more delightful fragrancies.

XXXIX

For as a gate of sorrow-land unbars

  The region of unfaltering delight,

  So may you gather from the fields of night

That harvest of diviner thought, the stars.

XL

Send into banishment whatever blows

  Across the waves of your tempestuous heart;

  Let every wish save Allah's wish depart,

And you will have ineffable repose.

XLI

My faith it is that all the wanton pack

  Of living shall be--hush, poor heart!--withdrawn,

  As even to the camel comes a dawn

Without a burden for his wounded back.

XLII

If there should be some truth in what they teach

  Of unrelenting Monkar and Nakyr,

  Before whose throne all buried men appear--

Then give me to the vultures, I beseech.

XLIII

Some yellow sand all hunger shall assuage

  And for my thirst no cloud have need to roll,

  And ah! the drooping bird which is my soul

No longer shall be prisoned in the cage.

XLIV

Life is a flame that flickers in the wind,

  A bird that crouches in the fowler's net--

  Nor may between her flutterings forget

That hour the dreams of youth were unconfined.

XLV

There was a time when I was fain to guess

  The riddles of our life, when I would soar

  Against the cruel secrets of the door,

So that I fell to deeper loneliness.

XLVI

One is behind the draperies of life,

  One who will tear these tanglements away--

  No dark assassin, for the dawn of day

Leaps out, as leapeth laughter, from the knife.

XLVII

If you will do some deed before you die,

  Remember not this caravan of death,

  But have belief that every little breath

Will stay with you for an eternity.

XLVIII

Astrologers!--give ear to what they say!

  "The stars be words; they float on heaven's breath

  And faithfully reveal the days of death,

And surely will reveal that longer day."

XLIX

I shook the trees of knowledge. Ah! the fruit

  Was fair upon the bleakness of the soil.

  I filled a hundred vessels with my spoil,

And then I rested from the grand pursuit.

L

Alas! I took me servants: I was proud

  Of prose and of the neat, the cunning rhyme,

  But all their inclination was the crime

Of scattering my treasure to the crowd.

LI

And yet--and yet this very seed I throw

  May rise aloft, a brother of the bird,

  Uncaring if his melodies are heard--

Or shall I not hear anything below?

LII

The glazier out of sounding Erzerum,

  Frequented us and softly would conspire

  Upon our broken glass with blue-red fire,

As one might lift a pale thing from the tomb.

LIII

He was the glazier out of Erzerum,

  Whose wizardry would make the children cry--

  There will be no such wizardry when I

Am broken by the chariot-wheels of Doom.

LIV

The chariot-wheels of Doom! Now, hear them roll

  Across the desert and the noisy mart,

  Across the silent places of your heart--

Smile on the driver you will not cajole.

LV

I never look upon the placid plain

  But I must think of those who lived before

  And gave their quantities of sweat and gore,

And went and will not travel back again.

LVI

Aye! verily, the fields of blandishment

  Where shepherds meditate among their cattle,

  Those are the direst of the fields of battle,

For in the victor's train there is no tent.

LVII

Where are the doctors who were nobly fired

  And loved their toil because we ventured not,

  Who spent their lives in searching for the spot

To which the generations have retired?

LVIII

"Great is your soul,"--these are the words they preach,--

  "It passes from your framework to the frame

  Of others, and upon this road of shame

Turns purer and more pure."--Oh, let them teach!

LIX

I look on men as I would look on trees,

  That may be writing in the purple dome

  Romantic lines of black, and are at home

Where lie the little garden hostelries.

LX

Live well! Be wary of this life, I say;

  Do not o'erload yourself with righteousness.

  Behold! the sword we polish in excess,

We gradually polish it away.

LXI

God who created metal is the same

  Who will devour it. As the warriors ride

  With iron horses and with iron pride--

Come, let us laugh into the merry flame.

LXII

But for the grandest flame our God prepares

  The breast of man, which is the grandest urn;

  Yet is that flame so powerless to burn

Those butterflies, the swarm of little cares.

LXIII

And if you find a solitary sage

  Who teaches what is truth--ah, then you find

  The lord of men, the guardian of the wind,

The victor of all armies and of age.

LXIV

See that procession passing down the street,

  The black and white procession of the days--

  Far better dance along and bawl your praise

Than if you follow with unwilling feet.

LXV

But in the noisy ranks you will forget

  What is the flag. Oh, comrade, fall aside

  And think a little moment of the pride

Of yonder sun, think of the twilight's net.

LXVI

The songs we fashion from our new delight

  Are echoes. When the first of men sang out,

  He shuddered, hearing not alone the shout

Of hills but of the peoples in the night.

LXVII

And all the marvels that our eyes behold

  Are pictures. There has happened some event

  For each of them, and this they represent--

Our lives are like a tale that has been told.

LXVIII

There is a palace, and the ruined wall

  Divides the sand, a very home of tears,

  And where love whispered of a thousand years

The silken-footed caterpillars crawl.

LXIX

And where the Prince commanded, now the shriek

  Of wind is flying through the court of state:

  "Here," it proclaims, "there dwelt a potentate

Who could not hear the sobbing of the weak."

LXX

Beneath our palaces the corner-stone

  Is quaking. What of noble we possess,

  In love or courage or in tenderness,

Can rise from our infirmities alone.

LXXI

We suffer--that we know, and that is all

  Our knowledge. If we recklessly should strain

  To sweep aside the solid rocks of pain,

Then would the domes of love and courage fall.

LXXII

But there is one who trembles at the touch

  Of sorrow less than all of you, for he

  Has got the care of no big treasury,

And with regard to wits not overmuch.

LXXIII

I think our world is not a place of rest,

  But where a man may take his little ease,

  Until the landlord whom he never sees

Gives that apartment to another guest.

LXXIV

Say that you come to life as 'twere a feast,

  Prepared to pay whatever is the bill

  Of death or tears or--surely, friend, you will

Not shrink at death, which is among the least?

LXXV

Rise up against your troubles, cast away

  What is too great for mortal man to bear.

  But seize no foolish arms against the share

Which you the piteous mortal have to pay.

LXXVI

Be gracious to the King. You cannot feign

  That nobody was tyrant, that the sword

  Of justice always gave the just award

Before these Ghassanites began to reign.

LXXVII

You cultivate the ranks of golden grain,

  He cultivates the cavaliers. They go

  With him careering on some other foe,

And your battalions will be staunch again.

LXXVIII

The good law and the bad law disappear

  Below the flood of custom, or they float

  And, like the wonderful Sar'aby coat,

They captivate us for a little year.

LXXIX

God pities him who pities. Ah, pursue

  No longer now the children of the wood;

  Or have you not, poor huntsman, understood

That somebody is overtaking you?

LXXX

God is above. We never shall attain

  Our liberty from hands that overshroud;

  Or can we shake aside this heavy cloud

More than a slave can shake aside the chain?

LXXXI

"There is no God save Allah!"--that is true,

  Nor is there any prophet save the mind

  Of man who wanders through the dark to find

The Paradise that is in me and you.

LXXXII

The rolling, ever-rolling years of time

  Are as a diwan of Arabian song;

  The poet, headstrong and supremely strong,

Refuses to repeat a single rhyme.

LXXXIII

An archer took an arrow in his hand;

  So fair he sent it singing to the sky

  That he brought justice down from--ah, so high!

He was an archer in the morning land.

LXXXIV

The man who shot his arrow from the west

  Made empty roads of air; yet have I thought

  Our life was happier until we brought

This cold one of the skies to rule the nest.

LXXXV

Run! follow, follow happiness, the maid

  Whose laughter is the laughing waterfall;

  Run! call to her--but if no maiden call,

'Tis something to have loved the flying shade.

LXXXVI

You strut in piety the while you take

  That pilgrimage to Mecca. Now beware,

  For starving relatives befoul the air,

And curse, O fool, the threshold you forsake.

LXXXVII

How man is made! He staggers at the voice,

  The little voice that leads you to the land

  Of virtue; but, on hearing the command

To lead a giant army, will rejoice.

LXXXVIII

Behold the cup whereon your slave has trod;

  That is what every cup is falling to.

  Your slave--remember that he lives by you,

While in the form of him we bow to God.

LXXXIX

The lowliest of the people is the lord

  Who knows not where each day to make his bed,

  Whose crown is kept upon the royal head

By that poor naked minister, the sword.

XC

Which is the tyrant? say you. Well, 'tis he

  That has the vine-leaf strewn among his hair

  And will deliver countries to the care

Of courtesans--but I am vague, you see.

XCI

The dwellers of the city will oppress

  Your days: the lion, a fight-thirsty fool,

  The fox who wears the robe of men that rule--

So run with me towards the wilderness.

XCII

Our wilderness will be the laughing land,

  Where nuts are hung for us, where nodding peas

  Are wild enough to press about our knees,

And water fills the hollow of our hand.

XCIII

My village is the loneliness, and I

  Am as the travellers through the Syrian sand,

  That for a moment see the warning hand

Of one who breasted up the rock, their spy.

XCIV

Where is the valiance of the folk who sing

  These valiant stories of the world to come?

  Which they describe, forsooth! as if it swum

In air and anchored with a yard of string.

XCV

Two merchantmen decided they would battle,

  To prove at last who sold the finest wares;

  And while Mahomet shrieked his call to prayers,

The true Messiah waved his wooden rattle.

XCVI

Perchance the world is nothing, is a dream,

  And every noise the dreamland people say

  We sedulously note, and we and they

May be the shadows flung by what we seem.

XCVII

Zohair the poet sang of loveliness

  Which is the flight of things. Oh, meditate

  Upon the sorrows of our earthly state,

For what is lovely we may not possess.

XCVIII

Heigho! the splendid air is full of wings,

  And they will take us to the--friend, be wise

  For if you navigate among the skies

You too may reach the subterranean kings.

XCIX

Now fear the rose! You travel to the gloom

  Of which the roses sing and sing so fair,

  And, but for them, you'd have a certain share

In life: your name be read upon the tomb.

C

There is a tower of silence, and the bell

  Moves up--another man is made to be.

  For certain years they move in company,

But you, when fails your song do fail as well.

CI

No sword will summon Death, and he will stay

  For neither helm nor shield his falling rod.

  We are the crooked alphabet of God,

And He will read us ere he wipes away.

CII

How strange that we, perambulating dust,

  Should be the vessels of eternal fire,

  That such unfading passion of desire

Should be within our fading bodies thrust.