Perhaps she is still of the age of roses, this Iraqi student who composes verse! Could she be a new "Mala'ika" sprung up on the riverbank of Amarah in southern Iraq?

And I went asking my white room about you and about my love

And I went — alas for hopes! — they failed, and my echo gave them back

•

And I asked the star about you .. even the fire .. even the evenings

And I found them keeping the pledge and tending my memories

•

And I asked it about everything that passed within it, in the nights

And I asked it — would that it had known my secrets and my state

•

The white room still keeps the old pledge

The white room has not forgotten the love, nor forgotten the bliss

•

It will go on remembering every day when a meeting held you within it

And it will go on remembering every moment, whenever evening comes to mind

•

My careworn heart will visit it whenever its sorrows stir

And will visit it every day, to call back its melodies there

•

For the white room knows all my griefs and my gladness

And in it two hands were clasped — so where, O days, is my yesterday?

•

Yesterday — how sweet it was! Where is yesterday, O my far-off yesterday?

Would that the days of happiness — would that they might return

•

I shall go on remembering my white room, resting place of your memories

And go on worshiping it, and worshiping what remains of your evenings

•

And today, after despair, my weary, sorrowing heart comes back

To the memories it returns — and to what lies hidden — and the moaning melts it

•

But if, after a while, what throbbing is left in my heart should brim over

Do not suppose I shall go on waiting for you, O beloved

•

For treachery has burst what weeping remained in my heart

And treachery has put out the flame of sacred love, and its blaze

•

And tomorrow you will try to bring back yesterday, or to tell over the melodies

But my melodies and my heart, when you return, will be in silence

•

And I shall have bidden my melodies and my hopes farewell in a grave

And you would see me laugh, if you but knew some part of my affair

•

Then you would go asking my white room about my secret and about me

And you would go asking it — and does wishing avail?

•

No .. do not ask, if you come one day seeking to bring back

The memory of the nights .. for the nights do not return

Amarah — Iraq