Song of a Grain of Dust

"To the soul of Fouad Suleiman"

Emptiness ... emptiness
Frost ... frost
Every grain of dust
calls out
Every ray of the sun
goes dark
A window .... my window
fades away
into the clouds
it folds
As if I had never been,
O my mote,
and the grains of dust
come rolling
down my breast

*

Snows ... snows

Strange is my birth,
strange my dying
A roaring ... a roaring
Wrinkles upon my skin
and mountains tumbling
and the earth leveling,
spinning
Anguish ... my anguish
at my throat,
O my mote,
and my nooses
overturn
from my resting place
Throngs have died
and the branches
over my hair
sway;
my oak tree wails

*

Strange ... strange,
that night,
O my homeland
My companions—a fluttering,
their eyes blazing,
their tongue of fire,
for the lash of my tempest,
a hearth among my hearths

*

Bow down ... bow down,
O my mote,
pray,
O my neighbor,
clasp to yourself
a rib of my ribs,
and raise the lamp
ardently,
and scatter
light
in the sky
of my eternity