Edited and introduced by Gibson Fay-LeBlanc
Born and raised in Baghdad, Iraq, Kifah Abdulla spent over eight years as a prisoner of war in Iran and now lives in Portland, where he is a poet, artist, activist, teacher and international citizen.
With Thanksgiving coming this week, followed by the winter holidays, Abdulla’s poem has a powerful message to deliver. Here, the imagination brings the speaker back to the natural world, back to sensory experience, and back to love despite anything that might have happened before. In times of personal and political turmoil, would that we could all tap into this reservoir of generosity that resides within us.
This poem was translated from Arabic by Brook DeLorme.
How Generous Is the Imagination
By Kifah Abdulla
I dreamt
That I was a sparrow, joyous
In a tree
In a field, far away
Follow me, little bird
Across the enchanted fields
I dreamt I am
On a green branch
In my blissful nest
I walk alone on a path
It doesn’t end
I walk, my eyes towards a gleam
Which doesn’t fade so I quicken my steps
That I might find the beginning
My ears are very tender
To hear pure sound
The first notes of raindrops leaving a cloud
And the first whisper of a breeze
Ruffling the tips of grass
The first sound of calm light
Revving the morning
Don’t narrow your hearing
Let it go deep
Until it explores the secrets
Those things
Present in the heart of night
They make my hearing soft
My spirit light
My body free
And the need for my beloved clear
Gibson Fay-LeBlanc is Portland’s poet laureate. This column is produced in collaboration with the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance. Poem copyright © 2016 Kifah Abdulla. First published in the self-published collection “Dead Still Dream,” 2016, the poem appears here by permission of the author.
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