Ulysses

Translated by Stephen Watts and Marga Burgui-Artajo

On Malmö bridge
I saw the Euphrates stretching out its hands
To carry me
Where to ? I said
And my dream couldn't end
Until I saw the Umayyad army
Besieging me from every direction.
Goodbye to a window in the land of devastation
Goodbye to the palms pared of their green by war-planes
Goodbye to the clay oven of my mother
Goodbye to our history rusting on its racks
Goodbye to what may be left in our hands
Farewell
We're leaving a bitter land
But going where ?
All exile is bitter ...
..................
The palms whose helixes used to give me shade
Of them nothing's left but a pale image
Empty benches now
And their trunks, gallows for our dreaming necks
And the Euphrates whose pain baptised me
Flows on impassive past plaintive villages
O ... Ulysses
If you hadn't come
If only the road to Malmö were long
Long
Long
Long
........................
..................
You stranger unable to touch one instant of joy
How come all exile now is a prison without walls

Malmö 18th August 1997