to losing…

Around a couple of months ago, I started feeling like I was losing something. The concept felt rather confusing because I was convinced that the “loss” was not even mine to lose! I was not sure why it was being lost, and I was not even sure if I really wanted it to begin with! And even now, I don't have such answers.

Elizabeth Bishop’s “One Art” kept coming to mind and haunting me. I had strong urges to just post the poem on my blog as an acknowledgement of my “loss”, only a little voice in me kept arguing that there was no real loss, and that if there really was any, it has not yet been lost! Thanks to my short attention span and my wide range of commitments, I ended up forgetting about the whole thing.

In rare moments, I thought of that “loss” and it kinda made me blue because I never really understood why I even considered it much of a loss. Anyways, earlier this month, while talking to a friend, I realized that whatever my “loss” was, I was ok with the term and more importantly, I was ok with the fact that it was no longer there. I found myself accepting and moving on, and it felt good.

Today, something very small and insignificant happened that reminded me of all that. As minor as it was, it was a sign that accepting and moving on were the right things to do and that losing things is not always that bad, even if it feels that way at some point. And in that spirit, I decided to post the poem from my new perspective.

To losing…

One Art
By Elizabeth Bishop

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

---Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

I’ll call it “Death of a Relationship”

Today, as I was getting in touch with my artistic self, browsing random websites for poems, I stumbled upon the poem below.

The structure is rather challenging to read as a poem, especially for those who prefer rhyming ones. However, if you start reading it like a story, and sense the way emotions are built up, perhaps you’d like it the way I did!

I know there are considerable chances I liked it because I could relate, and for that very reason, and for records keeping sake, it did speak for me in more than one part. As a matter of fact, I could fairly say I would have written it myself had I possessed the ability to write poems!

Sorry for the babble! There, enjoy!!

Death of a Friendship
By Harry Guest

I mourn, now that your house contains
such fractured shadows.
This wine you’ve handed me
tastes sour. I joke and you do not laugh.
When you speak, assuming my approval,
I stare into discoloured
depths of my glass, longing
to get away.

Rain drives against your walls. The few
shrubs you have planted shrink in the cold.
Where there was amity, questions
echo between us. Tufts of dark
lilac branching from tall vases shed
minute dry flowers like grief
for a lost fragrance, leave
on the smooth piano scattered omens
neither of us can read.

The past is empty of romance,
its summers flecked with heartbreak
and its negatives destroyed-.But weren’t there moments when
the blue sea glittered, when the lithe
curve of a diver forged another
link between wave and cloud?
I wonder, though, in fear
were those young grinning faces always
plague-marred, was the fun a lie,
were dreams we’ve jettisoned
mere husks about this dirt,
dislike? One fiction may
have replaced another for
wherever I look with you I find,
instead of light, a slyness.

We could not name the truth. What used to brag
lies in your cupboard under lock and key.
You care no more
for angels or the underdog,
translating all the terms we used
into intolerance. Your world
now clusters round
the emulation of the rich.

I can’t feel glad about old times
because I am afraid
that what I see here I suspected then
but shunned the knowing.
The tarnish of this has rubbed off on me.
The years we shared look counterfeit. If so,
more than affection died today.
What hurts perhaps the most
is that in you as in a mirror shows
not only what I could have been
but what I was or am.

Alone again, naturally

Why do people hate alone? Why do they fear alone? I don’t think alone is bad; there are much worse things.

Alone is my favorite poem by Edgar Allan Poe. Alone is what I am in every emotional moment, and I don’t hate it, nor am I afraid of it; probably because I have seen what’s worse, which is being with someone who made me yearn for being alone.

It’s been a while since I felt upset about anything lately, but of course something had to happen and change that… yesterday was the worst night in a while, and today wasn’t great either. And this is when it hit me, lying in bed holding both of my kids and trying so hard not to let myself cry; I am alone!

I didn’t want to call my aunt to rant, I didn’t want to call H for some moral support, I didn’t want to share my moment of weakness with anyone. I kept talking to myself and reassuring myself it will be ok, I know it will be, and when it does, I want it to be my own work, without anyone’s help!!

Years ago, I felt that way, and I called him thinking he was a shoulder I could cry on… and here I am right now because of that stupid notion. I am right here in this very place because I mistakenly thought he would be there for me instead of depending on myself.

Alone is not bad, alone is just fine. This is what I have to tell myself every time I feel that overwhelmed. I should not need anyone to make me feel better, I should know how to feel better on my own; this is the only way I wouldn’t get disappointed.

I did not let the negative energy consume me; I didn’t mope in my bed and let half awake sleep take advantage of me. I got up and started cleaning up; that’s the best I can do now when I am feeling angry and/or hurt, clean up! It’s funny because I am quite the messy person by nature, but now I know exactly where everything goes, it took me around an hour to fold every item of clothing back to where it belonged. And I did it because I decided to be alone, instead of running to the phone and dialing a friendly number.

Thank you for the hurtful and thoughtless words! They reminded me of all the things I had almost forgotten. They reminded me of why I so wanted to leave before, and they also reminded me that I should not expect help from anyone.

I can do it alone; I would rather do it alone than depend on someone who is bound to let me down making me feel so worthless and inadequate once they get tired of my existence or stop finding great company in my presence.

Oummi...*

I discovered Marcel Khalife last year (thanks to Maat). I have to say, I am taken by him; his music, his voice, and oh my God the lyrics; courtesy of Mahmoud Darwish of course.

I would like to share this song “Oummi” with lyrics right below… I did not post the video from utube because when I first listened to the song I heard it while driving, so I advise to listen to the song while minimized and feel free to read the lyrics for easy reference.

أمي ...

أحنُّ إلى خبز أُمي
وقهوة أمي
ولمسة أُمي ..
وتكبُر في الطفولةُ
يوماً على صدر يومِ
وأعشَقُ عمرِي لأني
إذا مُتُّ,
أخجل من دمع أُمي !
خذينيِ إذا عدتُ يوماً
وشاحاً لهُدْبِكْ
وغطّي عظامي بعشب
تعمّد من طهر كعبك
وشُدي وثاقي ..
بخصلة شَعر..
بخيطٍ يلوِّح في ذيل ثوبك ..
عساني أصير ُإلهاً
إلهاً أصير..
إذا ما لمستُ قرارة قلبك !
ضعيني , إذا ما رجعتُ
وقوداً بتنور ناركْ ..
وحبل غسيل على سطح دارك
لأني فقدتُ الوقوفَ
بدون صلاة نهارك
هَرِمْتُ فردّي نجوم الطفولة
حتى أُشارك صغار العصافير
درب الرجوع .. لعُش انتظارِك!!

(من ديوان "عاشق من فلسطين" 1966)

Now isn’t this beautiful!!! I made my favorite part in bold and bigger font!

* This is to you Nana, I miss you… may you rest in peace.

a haircut, a mocha frappe, and random stationary item!

My day did not start off well... and even right now, it’s not going that well, which makes me think it won’t end well either.

However, I did manage to steel a couple of hours out of home, and got myself, a haircut, a mocha frappe with extra chocolate syrup and a new daily agenda that I sooo love; it has those verses written on it:

"يا قلبي إوعى تعــاشر الدون
و لا تكلمة بالاشتــراحة
تكلمــه الكـــلام مــوزون
تلقـاه يرد بقبــاحة"

ابن عروس

Luckily, I am easy to please although extremely hard to impress!

Something to think about...

If

By Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!

I don’t think I am left with much to say after those inspiring words…