A LINING OF A SKY OF BERRIES

By Iqbal Tamimi

I searched for myself in the shelves of raw history.

Part of me is a song...
wandering in the fields of alienation,
the other part,
a peasant of a permanent season.

I sometimes see myself
the lining of a sky made of berries.
and I see myself at other times,
a morning
that donated its lungs to overcome crisis,
that dies
as it breathes its surprise.

I am ghosts... with transmigrated voices
combing my letters in a mirror
decayed by dust made of confusion.

I use the rust as my makeup
and I hide my figure in the veins of the wind.
I throw myself in the middle of many restless days,
I carry palm trees to the heat of the dead.

Nightmares run away from my fractured dream
and my fingers enslave me while I sway
in the middle of the spikes,
like a copy of a bloated worry;
a stranger in the home of the threshing floors,
the autumn of seasons,
the grey of the old sickles.

I hang over my letters
like a feather in a storm.
I chase happiness with my fishing rod,
cracked memories catch me with guillotines.

The children teach me how to draw my shadow
and the mirrors teach me how to donate,
loan some of my breath to the suffocation;
this surprises the boredom yawning with my sleepiness.

From my forehead fell the drops of loss,
fermented for the autumn.
I get intoxicated by the dawn,
the sands swallow me,
the octopus is working its tentacles
in my revolving legends,

the reason for chaos is refreshed by me,
I hold,
I own my freedom from slavery
while I envy those who are in shackles
because I am only a metaphor...