Colette Khoury

With You
On The Sidelines of My Novels

Translated into English by

Mohammad Abdul-Karem Yousef
Sawsan Ali Abboud
Nour Mohammad Yousef
Karam Mohammad Yousef
1
2
 Colette Khoury

(1935 - )

Colette Khoury is a Syrian writer and novelist, she was born in

Damascus and graduated from Damascus University with a bachelor's
degree in French literature.

She is the granddaughter of former Syrian Prime Minister Faris al-

Khoury, who was a graduate of the American University of Beirut and
served as a member of the group of Syrian statesmen who opposed
French occupation from 1920. Faris al-Khoury attended the founding of
the United Nations in San Francisco in April, 1945.

Colette’s grandfather encouraged her pursuit of an independent life as a

writer and an artist. Between 1990 to 1995 she served as an
independent member of the Syrian parliament, doing honor to her
grandfather’s judicious political leadership.

In 1959 she shocked the Arab world with a novel in which she wrote
openly on love; this breakthrough novel "Ayyam Maahou" (The Days
With Him) was the first time a woman had come out so boldly on a
subject considered taboo in conservative Syrian society. The novel was
based on a love affair with the legendary Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani.

Colette Khoury was a pioneer of Arab feminism, and wrote angry stories
in the 1950s about men and their selfishness. Khoury's career began in
1957 and has spanned more than 6 decades. Her literary career began
with the publication of a collection of poems in French entitled "Vingt
Ans" (Beirut, 1958). In this collection , Colette Khoury expressed her
discontent with social constraints and the emptiness and aimlessness of
her life; she also described her attempts to find salvation in love. Much
of Khoury's work stemmed from her desire to avoid blatant retaliation;

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writing was the best and only way she could express herself.
Colette Khoury dedicated her work to immersing herself in the female
psyche, particularly defending women's right to love. Colette Khoury
once said, "Since I always felt the need to express what was welling up
inside me...the need to protest, the need to scream...and since I didn't
want to scream with a knife, I screamed with my fingers and became a
writer." Many of Khoury's stories covered topics like love and erotica,
particularly from a female's perspective. Colette Khoury has written
more than 20 novels, as well as many political and literary articles.

In 1959, she shocked the Arab world with a novel in which she wrote
openly about love; this breakthrough novel Ayyam Maahou (Days With
Him) was the first time a woman had audaciously written about a
subject considered taboo in conservative Syrian society. Ayyam
Maahou was inspired by a love affair with the legendary Syrian
poet Nizar Qabbani . Colette created a strong woman in her story whose
love was not so overpowering that it blinded her or made her weak, in
order to maintain the image of a strong, female leader. In the story, the
protagonist and narrator, Rim, against society and her family, as she
tries to develop her personal identity. While Rim's parents died when
she was young and thus never could dominate her adult life, her father's
domineering presence still haunts her after he has passed. Rim is also
disgusted by the institution of marriage in its traditional form. In the
story, she says forcefully, "No! I was not born only to learn cooking and
then to marry, bear children, and die! If this is the rule in my country, I
will be the exception. I do not want to marry!"

Two years later, she published "Layla wahida" (One night, 1961), which
told a story about a night that the main character, Rasha, spent with a
man who was a pilot in the French air force during World War II. This
story was more controversial due to the element of adultery as an
aspect of self-enlightenment. Its married heroine, Rasha, tries to find
herself and regain control of her life through an extramarital relationship
after being forced to prey a 30-year-old man at the age of fifteen. Her
husband, Salim, approaches marriage as a business transaction, lacking
emotion or compassion. Salim treats Rasha like an object and she

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expresses her frustration around this by saying, "Did you consider even
for one day that this woman whom you had brought to supplement the
furniture of your house was a human being? That she was a human
being, who would a thousand times prefer your sharing of one idea of
yours over your offering her the most delicious food" .

Colette Khoury has been twice married and divorced to the Spanish
musician Rodrigo de Zayas, who is a grandson of American
diplomat Francis Burton Harrison and the son of Mexican artist Marius
de Zayas. Khoury and Zayas have one child, a daughter, Mercedes Nara
de Zayas y Khoury.

In this collection , "With you on the sidelines of my novels" Colette

Khoury probes the inner psyche of women and their relationship with
man. Man ,to her, is a resort , a safe homeland and a place for rest.

This collection is full of magic ,love and life , so let us all enjoy reading
Colette Khoury ,the poetess and the feminist writer.

Translators

Mohammad ,Sawsan ,Nour ,Karam

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 List of Colette Khoury Notable works

"Ayyām maʻah" (1961)

"Laylah wāḥidah" (1961)

"Kiyān" (1968)

"Dimashq baytī al-kabīr" (1970)

"Qiṣṣatān" (1972)

"Wa-marra ṣayf" (1975)

"Daʼwah ilá al-Qunayṭirah" (1976)

"al-Ayyām al-maḍīʼah : qiṣaṣ" (1984)

"Wa-marra ṣayf : riwāyah" (1985)

"With You On the Sidelines of My Novels " (1987)

"Imraʼah : majmūʻat qiṣaṣ" (2000)

"al-Marḥalah al-murrah : qiṣaṣ ṭawīlah" (2002)

"Sa-talmisu aṣābiʻī al-shams : qiṣṣah ramzīyah" (2002)

"Fī al-zawāyā-- ḥakāyā : tisʻ qiṣaṣ wa-masraḥīyah" (2003)

"Kūlīt Khūrī : būḥ al-yāsmīn al-Dimashqī" (2008)

"Wa-yabqá al-waṭan fawqa al-jamīʻ" (2010)

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Poetry That Lost Its Rhythm

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Poetry That Lost Its Rhythm
***
One day in the far….far away,
My love is gone,
He left before he came,
Holding my homeland in his chest,
And in his eyes...
My spectrum…
And his sorrows…
***
One day in the far….far away,
My longing for him intoxicated me,
So I decided to leave,
and immigrate to him,
To appear before him,
But, in The coma of longing,

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I hugged my letters,
And lost his address.
***
One day in the far….far away,
I resorted
To my stories alone,
I built inhabited worlds,
I built glories ,
But ,on the sidelines, I sang
My loneliness and his sadness.
***
Who is he?
I no more know,
Illusions changed his name,
And his figure mingled with dreams,
I no more know,

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Is his chest my homeland
Or the days ?
I made my poems his homeland.
***
Is he a reality or an illusion?
I no more know,
I lost my reality in the hallways of
imagination,
So, don't blame me …
If my poetry,
In the mazes of the questioning,
Has lost rhythm.

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Expatriation

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Expatriation
***
To you,
O! the homeland of true expatriation
O! you, man, who embodied,
Mirage expectations,
O! How far you are!
The distance of the joy in my life.
To you,
The fatigue of dreams,
I will come.
***
I packed my days,
And the tales of misery,
And without turning back,
I carried the burden on my shoulders,

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And walked to you.
Far...far away ...you are,
O! you are the homeland of fairy tales,
Far and The road is bumpy,
And the accommodation is heavy,
And the journey to you is an expatriation…
Far away,
And my life is a question,
Time passes,
And the answer is unarticulateable,
You are a child that fears childhood.
O! You are the man that fears what he
loves…
Far away…
And I traveled to you…
***
A voice shrieked…

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How do you leave home?
My homeland?
The taste of blood in my mouth…
My veins are filled with slain wailing…
And the smell of rottenness,
Nestles,
In my pores.
Homeland!
The smoky clones,
Blur my eyes,
And the stabbed mountains,
Curve my back,
And the thirsty earth is
Screaming into my atoms,
O! You sarcastic time,
"My being is my homeland…"

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But the sound does not know,
He shouted:
"Why are you leaving?"
I muttered in agony:
"My homeland is chest of the man I love.."
And I stumbled to you,
A homeland is looking for a homeland…
***
Tell your doormen to let me in...
The sky is dark,
And the air is poisoned,
And wailing is suffocation,
The road is a desert,
And the goal is a mirage,
And the meager hope is burning,
I am alone,

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Like a wound that has been forgotten,
Tell your doormen to let me in,
O! You, man who
Refuses to disclose sorrow,
O! you, intimate man
Who turns an orphan in the
Days of misery, tragedies and torment.
O! You, old insomnia,
That shines behind the eyelashes,
And behind the walls,
And behind the fog,
Tell your doormen to open the doors…
***
Give them the password,
I brought it to you,
And you know it like me,

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I hid it deep inside me for long,
And my vision swayed by its weight ,
I locked it in my eyelids for a lifetime,
And my eyes burned in it,
I will give it to you alone...
O! You, the man...
That adversity doesn't dissuade his resolve
The password is ...
A tear,
Through which I distilled homeland…
***
Stretch your arms to me ,
Don't ask me who I am!
I carried my days to you,
I came to tell you,
The forgotten old tales.

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To tell you about the thirst of shed tears,
And the burning of deserted harbors,
delusions of illusion principles,
I know you know them,
O! You the man who carry disappointment
like me,
And did not bow?
Don't ask me who I am
I am…
I am the land that cannot be refected,
And don't want to be refected,
I am the scorched earth,
That is soaked in blood,
I am your country,
Who lives without sky,
Homeless, lonely and miserable,
No. I don't seek happiness,

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I don't gluttonize the desirable,
Don't ask me who I am…
O! You man…
Who Breathes my flirtatious letters,
I am the woman of eternity,
I'm the woman who looks for the forlorn,
In the chest of a man who does not bow.
Where is your chest?
O! you ,the homeland of true expatriation,
You are my own homeland.

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You Are My Melody

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You Are My Melody
***
Darling!
Don't ask me what I want,
Don't ask me about my wishes,

***

O! You a question,
Who appears with summer
As the most beautiful songs.
***
O! You a rendezvous of lifetime
That comes to light in my life,
To calligraphy appointments for the world,
To sow hymns,
The verses,
And the torches,

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In my world.
***
Darling!
Don't ask me about my wishes,

Long time ago ,

A generation ,
A lifetime ,
One day far, far from now,
I lost dreams ,
I buried ululations,
I knew the eternal depression,

Life passed ….O! my life…

I hugged illusions ,
Searched for their delusions ,
And hope.
***

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With Summer , You came
Holding my fate ,
In your hands.
And you were exhausted asking me..
What satisfies me?
What makes me happy?
To afford
With sun, with perfume ,
With your love.
***
O! You ,the smile of the eyes,
O! You just as you are!
Don't blame me
If my tears glitter,
If I choose silence as an answer,
Sometimes, words hide away,
Sometimes , Sentences vanish…
***

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What shall I say..?
How do I respond…?
My memories are foggy,
My days are but escape,
My past is gloomy,
My history is painted by boredom…
Do you want to make me happy?
Then , stay with me…
Don't ask questions…
***
My ultimate aim, the whole hope
Is your stay with me,
You have made my femininity
Sweeter that a peace of flirtation
Stay with me,
To rewrite my history with kisses.
***
Stay with me ,

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I will show you how to plant earth ,
With letters of light…
Stay with me ,
I will challenge time ,
And convert Winter into Spring.
I will pour my imagination upon existence ,
Wedding ceremonies,
I will light tears , agony and smiles
Like candles in churches,
I will overwhelm the world with light,
Prayers ,
And generosity….
Stay with me ,
I will hold the universe on my palm,
I will modify it once more on my own,
And blow it to you , a clear kiss…
***
O! You, big question,

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That came to my life ,
Holding ,in his heart ,the answer.
You! The big child,
That his love drive my forget
The loneliness of the past
The fear of the coming future,
And the days of agony.
***
You! The prayer that haunts my heart
And my belief.
Don't ask me about my wishes, you and me,
You are an integral part of me ,
Skirt me with your arms ,
Make your love :
My perspectives,
My freedom
And my imprisonment.
I am the melody that float

26
Along the latitude
You are my love ,
You are my only Melody…

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 New Christmas
( Published Under Two Titles)

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 New Christmas
(original Version)

With the dawn of the Christmas,

In a gracious moment of time,
He came to me,
Coming from afar,
Laughing at winter and adversity,
covered in dust,
Wearing the color of the desert,
Holding my homeland in his heart.
***
With the dawn of the Christmas,
He came to me ,
A best gift ever …
His kaki coat has lost its color,
With distance and fog,
The frost committed suicide on his chest,
The sand nestled in his hair,

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And mixed with the eyelashes,
A gun felt safe on his shoulder.
***
I was alone,
I paint with longing,
Prayers and chants,
A picture of a baby born on Christmas,
Embracing the light in his chest,
Night is in his eyes,
Yelling,
I saw him in front of me,
A big kid,
He mocks the gales of the wind,
I saw him in front of me,
smiling to me,
holding the morning in his hands.
***
I did not ask him why did he come
Like lightening to salute me ,
When he left,
I did not ask him ,

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When he will come back
I closed my eyelids to keep his picture
inside,
All my questions vanished ,
Before his eagerness,
Along with words and promises,
And I came back to draw,
On love ,faith and Christmas,
A portrait of a soldier from my homeland,
Whom I saw my country in his eyes ,
Smiling on
The dawn of the Christmas.
***
Did he really come?
Did he really appear with the dawn?
Good news for me on Christmas morning?
Or was it a dream?
Shining like the sun and going,
Leaving a warmth in my house,
And the birth of a new morning in my
country?

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Its Christmas! Greetings to the protectors
of the land
(New version, Al-Baath Newspaper 2014)

With the dawn of the Christmas,

In a gracious moment of time,
He came to me,
Coming from afar,
Laughing at winter and adversity,
covered in dust,
Wearing the color of the desert,
Holding my homeland in his heart.
***
With the dawn of the Christmas,
He came to me ,
A best gift ever …
His patched coat has lost its color,
With distance and fog,
The frost committed suicide on his chest,

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The sand nestled in his hair,
And mixed with the eyelashes,
A gun felt safe on his shoulder,
I was alone,
I paint with longing,
Prayers and chants,
Picture of a baby born on Christmas,
Embracing the homeland in his chest,
Victory is in his eyes,
Yelling,
I saw him in front of me,
A big kid,
He mocks the gales of the wind,
I saw him in front of me,
smiling to me,
holding the morning in his hands.
***
I did not ask him why did he come
Like lightening to salute me ,
When he left,
I did not ask him ,

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When he will come back
I closed my eyelids to keep his picture
inside,
All my questions vanished ,
Before his eagerness,
Along with words and promises,
And I came back to draw,
On love ,faith and Christmas,
A portrait of a soldier from my homeland,
Whom I saw my country in his eyes ,
Smiling on
The dawn of the Christmas.
***
Did he really come?
Did he really appear with the dawn?
Good news for me on Christmas morning?
Or was it a dream?
Shining like the sun and going,
Leaving a warmth in my house,
And the birth of a new morning in my
country?

34
Burned Snow

35
Burned Snow
***
I let him go ,
A tale of warmth that permeates the snow,
I stood alone and contemplated him,
In the frost of the night,
And in my eyes
A glare is deified ....
***
When...
Sadness is flooding,
I felt him near me,
A life raft and a ship.
And when the universes shook,
And time ignited,
Snow ran away from my heart,

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To fall from the sky,
Serenity messages,
That overwhelm the city...
***
When…
The light overflowed on the latitude,
And the latitude got stuck in my house,
When my city penetrated into poetry,
And the poetry of the world penetrated my
silence...
When sorrows radiate,
I loved in its radiance, my existence and my
survival.
When his eyes became my heaven,
And the whole world is my own land...
I let him go...
***

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More handsome than a dream,
purer than snow,
I let him go…
I was afraid that if he stays,
He would break into my isolation,
I was afraid that he would invade my home
My Desolation,
And reaches my loneliness ,
I was afraid that if he stays,
My walls would collapse in his presence with
the bright snows,
I was afraid that my secrets,
Would spread on the latitude,
Like the spotless tunic.
I was afraid that I might find out,
In the evening of fun and playfulness,
Answer to long awaiting,

38
The secret of my acceptance and rejection,
So I let him go…
I let him go
Like a tear lost amid weeping
I am a woman who is accustomed to
alienation,
Dullness,
And winter…
***
I will not accept…No..
I will not allow the frost to burn in my chest,
Or to convert rain in my life ears of wheat in
the meadow,
I'll crush the glare with my eyelids,
But he is still in my eyes,
Will he come back to me,
When the snow melts?

39
Dots on I's

40
Dots on I's
***
Scared?....me?
How did you believe my excuses ?
Just as I ran away from you.
It's is a word,
That flew away from my poems.
A word in which I apologized
When I walked away from you.
How did you believe that
I poured, in its folds, my expectations,
And stuck in, within letters, my secrets?
Scared ?.....Me ?
Darling ! My love! You are the one
Who thought, analyzed and ... hesitated.
You are the one who looked forward
tomorrow,

41
You are the one was afraid to see himself
baptized in my flames,
You are the one who feared to achieve the
impossible,
You are the one who daunted reading life,
demise, eternity, and annihilation in my
eyes…
Me?
I mobilized dreams to you,
I built, for you, a homeland.
I piled up the days ,a date, to meet you...
A date that flood the world with brightness,
Kindness
And generosity.
I folded, for you, the horizons
And spread them under your own feet.
For you, I bunched up brilliance
And spread it in your hands,

42
for you! alone, I wanted to arrest
esperance.
Scared of your love….? Me…? Me…?
No...
No.. I swear with the arrogance of your eyes
I am not afraid of you...
I, my little one, out of my great love,
Feared about you …

43
Farewell Words

44
Farewell Words
***
Like the gifts of the feast,
Like lights of Christmas trees,
Like chants ,
I thought you would come to me
On New Year's Eve.
Like the prayers,
Like generosity,
Like the joy of the poor,
Like esperance ,
I anticipated that you would come to me,
With days of the past,
Engraved,
On the wall of lifetime...
I imagined the stars,

45
Pouring down legends,
Prospects ripple hymns
And the world gets drunk with poetry,
I thought you would come...
And I saw the springs that dried up
In my country,
Overflowing with love,
A page from our history is flipped,
On hurt, bitterness and disappointment.
I felt faith come
Back to me,
It turns sadness, within my soul, into prayer,
It wipes off Fatigue lines
From my face,
On New Year's Eve .
***

46
O! How far away... away!
Though you are the closest to me
O! How absent you are!
Though you are always there,
In the pulse of my days,
In the shadows of my mind,
And in the burning of my eyes.
I thought you would come to me
On New Year's Eve.
I thought you would defy the world
And come back...
Like a whirlwind of love
That is blown from eternity,
like eagerness,
That brings back lost hope,
and be a chest

47
That it once was a homeland…
Alas! The Big country of exile,
our homeland,
Distorts your known faith
And drove you, like it, love hindrances,
Infatuated with borders…
Drove you ,like him,
Leave your details to strangers,
In the face of lovers, you close your chest,
And adopt the slogan of ingratitude...
made you like him,
Dive in the mud,
In search of brilliance ,
O! You are me...Myself!
My illusion spring dried up
On New Year's Eve.

48
My eyes overflowed with tears,
And my estrangement mocked me,
And my loneliness reveled among the
crowds,
My hands rose to the sky appealing
to allow the homelands -
My country which is your chest,
And the big country
That made us, we both, homeless.
I wish you were here,
My friend,
On New Year's Eve.
I did not think of you,
To celebrate together for the Eid,
It doesn't occur to my mind
That we share the New Year together.

49
It doesn't occur to my mind
That we look forward to tomorrow
Together,
To embrace the mirage of happiness
That haunts us .
I wish you were here,
My friend,
On New Year's Eve...
To bid farewell to a departing year that
brought us together...
Let's say... O! my friend goodbye...to "each
other."

50
Myself and I

51
Myself and I
***
O! You woman in my heart,
Till when,
You remain wandering homeless?

Aren't you satisfied with the torment of love?

You spent your life longing,
In search for a shoulder to cry on it...
Alas...

The Life passes …

And you, every time,
Come back disappointed,
To weep on my shoulder!
You torture me...
You torture me...
O! Woman... You are myself,
You, alone, make my heaven a hell,

52
You make my well-being humiliating…

I am ,the one who minifies the universe

The size of my palm,
I blame horizons for their narrowness,
I see you confine the universe
In a beloved's arm...

Your prospects are lost,

In a look of longing,
And its sparkle...

There is a difference between you and me,

O! You the woman who,
ruins with Love my life.

I am the one... that

Piles up and builds with ambition,
A world…

53
There is a difference between you and me,
I never stood in your way…

Why do you always insist on getting in my way?

I gave you the world,

I taught you existence,
How you did not learn from me not to weaken?

O! Soft female...
O! myself!
You suffer… you suffer from love.
Your pain calms my strength,
And your pain repels my strength,
And I…
I won't find a shoulder to cry on…
While you...
Are always on my shoulder…

54
Be compassionate with me,
O! Woman, I sympathize with her...
With me, I am the strong,
Try, once, to be sympathetic to me
Alone, we are …
I know this…
Isn't it the right time for you ,
O! Woman who lives deep down within me,
Isn't it the right time for you
To know?

55
Imprisoned Disclosure

56
Imprisoned Disclosure
***
Your filled glass,
Complains its orphanage
to mine .

You promptly left and went,

So it revenged me,
And leaked its misery ,
To my glass…

I will not blame you ,friend

You are still here,
Your spirit did not leave with you…

But your glass sought your hands,

57
And missed your lips.

Sensual it is ,
It does not know how to nestle
Your tears in your absence…

Naïve it is ,
it does not conceive that
You have fill it from your bleeding wound.

I wished….
I wished you had broken it,
After you had neared it from your lips.

But…
It is not my Business…With it?

58
It is not my concern with a poor glass,
It thought that you have neglected it
Out of hyper-happiness…
Why do I have hatred on it,
Why do I find its sweetness bitter…
Did I ? Friend ,Did I envy its ignorance?
It does not know that you are still here.
You who went,
And did not know what I understood
From all narration…
You did not know that it holds in within,
Your tears not its tears.
Friend! You talked long hours,
Told several stories,
Events,
And explained behaviour,

59
But you forgot one story,
Alone ,of interest to you,
I wished I had heard it alone…all alone,
A story of impossible love
That exists, for my sake, in your heart,
A story of disclosure that strangles it,
It shows off,
From your eyelashes
And surges…
From a glass you filled in…
Do not be surprised ,friend ,
If I know by heart…
The secret of your passions…
For I haven't heart from all your stories
But the story untold…unfold…

60
Yearning to You

61
Yearning to You
***
Why are you asking
About my news?
About my programs? … About my projects?
About my travel dates?
As if at the moment we met.

As if we, all the days, did not paint

The following surprises that occurred.

As if we were, in a moment again,

Did not sift the history of illusions,
And all our past stories.

As if, in our stealthily meetings, I did not

secretly travel to your mind.

62
As if you did not haunt
My poems…

Why are you suddenly asking me about my

news?
As if you were promptly going away,
Or as if I were leaving...

Who poured in your eyes, now,

Confusion of thinkers ... and anxiety of
poets?

***
Why are you asking me...
As if I were a stranger coming to you?
Between you and me

63
A flashing connection case,
But,
In which ,We summed up the stories…

Between you and me...A lifetime ,

With which we summed up words...

between me and you,

There is an open book.

Did I hide anything from you?

It's a leaf of leaves hid away.
It might shyly hide from
Your presence.
I might not tell you that
I have yearning...

64
I am yearning to you.
***
Yearning to you…
And you are with me …
As if I did not see you..
As if I did not hark to you…
Whereas you are near me ,
You live under my eyelashes,
And in my hearing system.
***
Yearning to you…
As if you were absent ….
And I am alone…
With you , all people left
As if I were a traveller ,
As if I would travel,

65
As if you are the travel ,
As if yearning is stored with you….
Yearning I am to you…
As melody yearns to chords,
As the eyes yearn, in the summer of my
country, to stay up at night,
As our land yearns for rain...
Yearning I am to you…

***
Tell me …Tell me…
Without questions ….
Tell me …
Our life flees away…
And the universe terminates..
Tell me…
About that forgotten legend,

66
About that tall farer ,
And how he silently loved a fairy ,
How he hid his love to her,
A case ,
In his eyes…
Passionately…passionately…
Tell me about that woman …
Who ruined the world in a whisper,
Only for the sake of his eyes,
And rebuilt it in a touch,
In her comfortable palace.
How did she weave the magic carpet
With her emotions ,
And cast it under his feet.
***

67
Tell me ….
Time is running …
Yearning I am to you…

Tell me…
The secret of silence hymns…
The hid disclosure
In eyes,
Without my knowledge ,
Hide me in your eyes.

After all….It does not matter

If I leave,
Or you travel
Upon the magic carpet.
It does not matter…

68
As long as I live in the clear eye..
As long as ….
I feel yearning to you …
Yearning I am to you…
Though you are beside me .

69
Your Voice Is a Messenger of Longing

70
Your voice is a messenger of longing
***
Because your shining face
Never lived in my eyes,

Because your sweet laughter

Never visited my ears,

Because your spectrum, the Farer tourist,

has never ever visited my imagination,

Because I never engaged myself in thinking

about you,
Today , I think of you .
***
Your voice that creeps in the dark
atmosphere of hatred is

71
A breeze of serenity,
And a golden ribbon of love.

Your voice that defies the bleeding news

And folds the overwhelming landslides,
To penetrate the telephone wires to my
ears,
An esperance tone ,
A schedule of generosity,
A prayer of a prophet.

Your voice that raided my silence once,

Surprised me charged with promises,
and deadlines,
Then used to visit me like gifts on Feast
morning.

72
Your voice ,in the darkest periods of
blackness flowed into my loneliness like a
ray of light.

Your voice that appears to me like the

dreams of dawn and cuddles in its peace…
A goodbye.

Your voice that wakes me up

Every morning importunately, urgently,
A beloved child,
Forgets all and disappears…

Your voice of the homeless adventurer..

Your voice that is tired of homelessness,
Nights have strayed him…

73
Your voice is searching, in dysphonia, for a
shelter…

Your voice is the doctor that I am his

caretaker …

Your voice is the messenger of longing and

worry…
Your voice is the fountain of poems…

Your voice carries the day time to me ,

Leaves the sun and poetry with me.

Your voice teaches me longing and

compassion again...
***
Your voice ,O! handsome man,
Reminds me of the beauty of your
presence...

74
Your voice draws your portrait into my
imagination.

Your voice that leaks inside me

Naked beyond the nights,
Falls into my ear
Confused, anxious , grievous,
Saturates with sadness your phantom,
Washes up your eyelashes with tears,
clothes your lineaments with a noble pallor,
Ever since ,I started to see you…You
handsome...delightful...
***
Because your brilliant face
haunts my eyes today,
Because your sweet laughter,
Today, leaks nostalgia into my soul.

75
Because your kind gentle specter,
Today, embraces my senses...
I won't meet you one day
No!...
I will never meet you,
And don't be surprised.. You handsome…

In these strangling, boring and stifling days,

I ,desperately, need to keep loving you,
I only love you...
Only through your voice...

76
An Ode to Traveler

77
An Ode to Traveler
***
Sweeter than love,
My hidden feelings for you,
Clearer .. and clearer than
The songs of passion,
The songs of love,
And the love preludes of infatuation songs.
***
Like a warm sea breeze,
In winter days,
Like a sincere outstretched hand,
In seasons of crying,
like sincerity…

I didn't decorate it,

78
Illusions did not contribute to weaving it,
My hidden feeling for you is
Real, soft and transparent,
Like a perfume boat
Gliding towards an island,
Like a sea of tenderness imprisoned by a
princess, in her eyes, kept for the sad king.
Like a fairy tale,
Told to an old man by a little girl,
Like an eternal candle in the dark,
My hidden feeling for you
Always lighting up
My heart and your home.
***
Yesterday,
When I was with you,
Up there in the sky,

79
In the place overlooking
On the city,
Sorrow was overflowing
From our hearts,
It dyes our meeting
With sad memories,
Over there in that place,
We were planning to defy time,
And tell each other secrets.
***
But Damascus
Glittered at the foot of the mountain,
Folding for us
Its wounded history.
In turn,
We folded our misery stories...

80
And we made the future
On our way
And he revealed himself to reveal,
And Damascus swam in perfume and
poetry.
Damascus sank in the sun
yesterday...
When I was with you,
And I glimpsed behind your smile tears ,
I gave you my joy and my hope.
***
When I opened my mind to you,
There in the high place,
Rejuvenate your sober body,
A wave of longing swept your face,
As if to flood Damascus for me
With warmth and whisper…

81
Yesterday,
when I was with you
to say goodbye to you.
***
Dear traveler,
I missed yesterday,
And the weather has turned up down.
***
The weather was cloudy,
The sun went out,
And the world narrowed down on me,
And I searched for my city in the city.

In the mountain,
In the neighborhood,
There in the high place,
I found neither memory nor perfume

82
I did not find a sunshine that
Decorates my way
All of Damascus,
Hid away from my eyes.

My friend
My friend
How greedy you are!
Was it necessary to travel?
Was it necessary….
Was it necessary to carry Damascus with
you?

83
Because You Love Me

84
Because You Love Me
***
Because you love me,
A smile blooms on my lips
In the midst of crises.
The worry goes away
And the gloom recedes
Prayers grow on my eyelashes.
***
Because you love me,
Light and hope are planted on the earth,
My imagination fills with pleasure,
Light sprouts from my fingers,
Happiness blossoms,
Despite the misery.
It opens its arms

85
And hugs me,
Because you love me
***
Because you love me
The horizons twinkle around me
Despite depression.
Space becomes transparent despite
pessimism,
The horizon expands,
Despite chest tightness.
***
Because you love me,
Heaven Spreads on my forehead and sleep,
Sun dances in my eyes,
The letters sing in my hands,
And the universe echoes,
And I feel the destiny carries me up,

86
Overwhelms me,
With warmth,
It supremes me up ...
Because you love me.
***
Because you love me
Heart beats,
The world around me breathes,
Because you love me... I live.
***
Darling...
If you never loved me,
Stars sink into the sky,
Tragedies return to the earth,
Along with worries and gloominess.
The trees are burning out of drought,

87
And rain ruins my days,
All hopes fade away.
***
If you never loved me,
Words suffocate among my fingers,
songs suffocate in my throat .
The sun goes out in my eyes,
Hopes sting in my lungs,
Promises fall,
The lights go out,
The world returns as it was, in reality,
Barricaded with dams,
No rays...no hope...no giving,
Melody is lost,
The tendon breaks...
***

88
If you never loved me,
The world is devoid of people in my eyes...
The spider weaves its web around my life,
Darling…
if you don't love me one day,
I'll die...
**
But
Why Does my body tremble and protest ?
Why Does ask me to be safe?
Before I forge the future,
Before I risk my life,
Before I change time,
Darling…
Would reassure me
Do you love me…? now?

89
Ink on Paper

90
Ink on Paper
***
Arrogant?
Why are you arrogant man?
***
Is it because ,
You saw yourself,
In my stories,
A strutting king,
And I was the slave,
Who bowed to you?
***
Is it because ,
I, in my loneliness,
Hugged you and folded myself back,
I poured you colors on whiteness,

91
And scattered you on the pages, line after
line?
I was silent before you came.
***
Is it because ,
I sang you,
You thought you were the turning point
In my life?
***
Is it because ,
My letters
Turned your eyes into
Springs for yearning,
Seas of serenity,
And sleepless nights...?
***
Is it because ,

92
I sang
In these two eyes that I was guided to the
right way,
I am the lost ,I am the thirsty?
***
Is it because ,
Confessed to Rhythms that
I am now satisfied and
You believed that
You are a source of inspiration that breaks
out?
***
Is it because ,
You found yourself in my poems,
A god?
And you believed my passing words?
***

93
Is it because ,
One day , I needed you,
And my yearn to you drive you forget,
I am a poetess ,
That burns the world in one second ,
ignites the ashes with what has already
burned, if she wants?
No...
Never be arrogant...
O! man that
Shines in my radiant imagination...
You are...
No more the start .
And I...
I don't need you anymore...
After I poured you ink on paper…!

94
 Table of contents

No Title Publication date Page no

1 Introduction 2021 3
2 Poetry That Lost Its Rhythm 1987 7
3 Expatriation 1972 11
4 You Are My Melody 1975 20
5 New Christmas 1973 28
6 Its Christmas! Greetings To The 2014 32
Protectors Of The Land
7 Burned Snow 1980 35
8 Dots on I's 1980 40
9 Farewell Words 1977-1978 44
10 Myself and I 1975 51
11 Imprisoned Disclosure 1973 56
12 Yearning to You 1984 61
13 Your voice is a messenger of 1983 70
longing
13 An Ode to a Traveler 1983 77
14 Because You Love Me 1984 84
15 Ink on Paper 1972 90
16 Table of Contents 2021 95

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