The Juice of Spring — To the Spirit of Fouad Suleiman

To the spirit of Fouad Suleiman

The caverns of carnelian, ruby, and emerald—
their treasures have been sealed away, and the secret of the seal is lost;
the world of new rhymes has been locked in our faces,
and the fair maidens of our village, behind the bolted glass,
are broken with grief, shedding the heart's tears
for an exile long, long as eternity!

*

"Tammuz," O color of love in our sleepless rose,
O slender candle lit in a temple,
bending over its panting a whispered sigh—
yet in its weakness full of rebellion!

*

O you who woke the spring from its lulling anthem,
"Ashtarut" wept for you, and the generous, brimming spring;
and the rooster — the dewy dawn overtook him in our quarter;
he sleeps, while night keeps in his rose-red crown
the shadow of the bowed mourner and the loneliness of the solitary.

*

Fouad, O murmur of hope, O voice of tomorrow,
O smile of hope, O poem of renewal,
O lily that made us drunk with its scattered perfume
and died in youth, in its immortalized spring!

From "the Family of the Inspired Mountain"