Poem: Alwah
ALWAH
Why do I pretend to Sleep
when your Love is so Thick?
When the Pain brushes up against me
and numbs me?
Why with all these years
I lived with a Shadow
pressing against my back…
and in the Night
fragments of you linger
Ethos of the cave
on the wall?
That seething sound
of an Industrial Age:
A train wreck
railroad of howling misery
drives its stakes through the heart
of the Earth…
I listen to it from thousands of years
away…
and how I loath the sound
of Mass Transit.
I used to lie Awake
listening to the yellow-orange glow
that pick their presence through Black Circumferences
beaming…
beaming the tunnel
that Thing they
say is at the end.
The Light.
Each year, your Face appears
in a different shape, a different color:
In Colorado you were Rectangular
in New York you were Oval
in France you were Disambiguating
in Laos you were Amoebic…
Your Presence is Inverted
and Inert…
and regardless of How many times
I have changed—
I am never changeless
Not like you.
Not numb like the Night
which is Anesthetic
like your Lips
that upon the Kiss
suspends me without Feeling
and they call this a Divine State
reality misshapen and Dwarfed
into Samādhi…
I do not Feel
therefore I am.
I am You
and you are That.
—
“Alwah” came out of my subconscious. I had no idea what it meant. I attempted to write about the shadows on the wall that changes in every facet, time and space in life—yet is changeless because it is always the same. It is a metaphor of God.
I did some research and found out that Alwah is something like the “Ten Commandments” in the Qur’an/ or “Tablet” or “Table (of Law)”…. This led me to some passages by ancient Arabic poets that resonated with me—such as the phrases regarding “lines and signs” and time passing etc.
Further Research:
“Years have passed over since I was here and [the signs] have become like the lines of a zabur…”—Ahlwardt, The Divans of Six Ancient Arabic Poets 160;65,1-2
“Whose is the ruined house I see that grieves me so? It is like the lines of the zabur…”—Ahlwardt, The Divans of Six Ancient Arabic Poets 159;63,1
Zabur:
The term zabur is the Arabic equivalent of the Hebrew zimra, meaning “song, music.” It, along with zamir (”song”) and mizmor (”psalm”), is a derivative of zamar, meaning “sing, sing praise, make music.”
Also: Holy Book– Wikip
—
P.S. after crawling out of bed at 4 a.m. to write this poem–now I can sleep.
