Arabic Poems

A bilingual anthology of poems from the sixth century to the present, Arabic Poems is a one-of-a-kind showcase of a fascinating literary tradition.

The Arabic poetic legacy is as vast as it is deep, spanning a period of fifteen centuries in regions from Morocco to Iraq. Themes of love, nature, religion, and politics recur in works drawn from the pre-Islamic oral tradition through poems anticipating the recent Arab Spring.

Editor Marlé Hammond has selected more than fifty poems reflecting desire and longing of various kinds: for the beloved, for the divine, for the homeland, and for change and renewal. Poets include the legendary pre-Islamic warrior ‘Antara, medieval Andalusian poet Ibn Zaydun, the mystical poet Rabi‘a al-‘Adawiyya, and the influential Egyptian Romantic Ahmad Zaki Abu Shadi. Here too are literary giants of the past century: Khalil Jibran, author of the best-selling The Prophet; popular Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani; Palestinian feminist Fadwa Tuqan; Mahmoud Darwish, bard of occupation and exile; acclaimed iconoclast Adonis; and more. In their evocations of heroism, nostalgia, mysticism, grief, and passion, the poems gathered here transcend the limitations of time and place.

MARLÉ HAMMOND, a Lecturer in Arabic Popular Literature and Culture at SOAS, University of London, is the author of Beyond Elegy: Classical Arabic Women's Poetry in Context.

Foreword
 
Imru’ al-Qays, “Mu’allaqa”
Labid, “Mu’allaqa”
‘Antara, “Mu’allaqa”
‘Antara, “Abla’s spirit”
Al-Shanfara, “L-Poem of the Arabs”
‘Abid, “I watched through the night”
‘Abid, “No thunder came”
Al-Khansa’, “Lament for a Brother”
Maysun, “Song of Maisuna”
Umar Ibn Abi Rabi’a, “Ah for the throes of a heart sorely wounded!”
Majnun Layla, “I last saw Laila”
Majnun Layla, “Laila I loved”
Rabi’a al’-Adawiyya, “Two ways I love Thee”
Abu Nuwas, “O moon called forth by lament”
Abu Nuwas, “She sent her likeness stealing in dream”
‘Ulayya Bint al-Mahdi, “Three Love Epigrams”
Al-Ma’arri, “Some Power troubled our affairs”
Al-Ma’arri, “Bewildered”
Ibn Zaydun, “Poem in N”
Wallada, “Must separation mean we have no way to meet?”
Qasmuna Bint Isma’il, “Seeing Herself Beautiful and Nubile”
Al-Mu’tamid, “Of the Place of His Youth”
Al-Mu’tamid, “The Letter”
Ibn Quzman, “Muwashshaha”
Al-A’ma al-Tutili, “Muwashshaha”
Ibn Sara, “Oranges”
Ibn Sara, “Aubergines”
Ibn Hamdis, “Moon in Eclipse”
Ibn Hamdis, “Water-lilies”
Ibn Khafaja, “Lovely Maid”
Ibn Khafaja, “Lovely River”
Hafsa Bint al-Hajj, “Those lips I praise”
Ibn al-‘Arabi, “As night let its curtains down in folds”
Ibn al-‘Arabi, “The tombs of those who loved them”
Ibn Nubata al-Misri, “I have renounced and given up all speech sublime”
Jibran Khalil Jibran, “Of Happiness and Hope”
Jibran Khalil Jibran, “Of Love”
Abu al-Qasim al-Shabbi, “The Will of Life”
Ahmad Zaki Abu Shadi, “Evening Prayer”
Fadwa Tuqan, “I Found It”
Badr Shakir al-Sayyab, “Rain Song”
Salma Khadra Jayyusi, “Shudan”
Nizar Qabbani, “I want to write different words for you”
Nizar Qabbani, “Take all the books”
Nizar Qabbani, “I want to make you a unique alphabet”
Adonis, from This Is My Name
Muhammad al-Maghut, “Dream”
Mahmoud Darwish, “We were Missing a Present”
Mahmoud Darwish, “A Lesson from Kama Sutra”
Mohammed Bennis, “Rose of Dust”
Iman Mersal, “Solitude Exercises”
 
Biographies of the Poets
Acknowledgments