Remember Sinbad
someone
remembers
Sinbad
and plunging
their hands into the water
believes they seize
a living
cloud.
What to Say
I think of the sordid streets of Casablanca
of the silent mornings
odors of Brazilian coffee
odors of rancid god
odors of bleeding dreams
I think of the too-recent day of death
and of madness
I think of those who go
far away to live out the end of a glacial tale
I think of those who stay
or who cannot go far away
or who are shut in, cut off from the sundial.
Soon I'll know what to say.
*
And what is it that you do not say,
poet starved for texts
Here you are
a Friday in the month of Rajab
listening to the desert
A story taps at your window
an old story
rainbowish
with heads hands hair
and postcards of Casablanca
And what is it that you do not say
poet starved for texts
Break the window
Sput in the face of angels on airplanes
Trample on the big cloud of Arabia
Here you are
a Friday in the month of Rajab
listening to the desert.
__________________________
Ahmed Bouanani
The Shutters
translated from the French by Amma Ramadan
New Directions 2018
