The Living Statue

... At the end of this past April, the poet of Bahrain, Mr. Ibrahim al-Arrayedh, visited Beirut in response to an invitation from the Arabic Department of the American University of Beirut to lecture on poetry at the Fourth Congress of Arabic Studies, whose proceedings we noted in the last issue of this magazine.

In a delightful session at the office of The Woman's Voice, the poet al-Arrayedh expressed his highest admiration for the only magazine that raises the banner of the Arab woman to a level worthy of her place in the modern leap forward, without losing anything of its sobriety..

The poet was gracious enough to present us with this poem, "The Living Statue," from his collection of verse "The Brides" (al-Ara'is), published by Dar al-Ilm lil-Malayin in Beirut.

She dwelt on the dark floor of a plain and humble house,
a maiden who owned no bread, yet was rich in beauty.
She went in rags, but hers was a pure soul;
a revolution had robbed her of everything but her virtue.
She writhes whenever she sees the house empty —
where are her father and mother, in the darkness of eternity?
And her brother, felled in the fray by a wretch's hand:
he dropped, while the fluttering flag bent low in salute.
How should she not weep — has fate left her anything at all?

★

She went out, stumbling in her hem, to a neighbor close by,
who lived among people, in his solitude, like a stranger,
gray hair traced upon his forehead like scars —
where in all of time is a heart never terrified by calamity?
She came to him in his workshop, hard at his labor,
carving the body out of rock and bringing forth wonders.
He saw her walking in her rags like one under suspicion,
hunger's traces of pallor upon her cheeks,
and he turned to gaze at that beauty in an awesome silence.

★

He drew near her fevered body ... yet with a knight's honor.
Why was she not shaken by him, why did she not fear his approach?
In his eyes — nothing to affright her — was the light of prophecy:
one of beauty's devotees for art's sake ... however far his excess.
Then she felt his hand pulling away the garment with force,
and she moved to cover her breasts .. in modesty and honor.
"I... I... do you not feel that I stand over an abyss?"
He said, "Enough! By my gray hairs you stand in the shade of fatherhood.
Were you bared, art would rise by your shoulders to its heights."

★

So she cast off what covered her only a little,
then said, "And when will you feed me?" He said, "At dusk."
And she knelt long before him in her nakedness,
and he found no fault in her figure except its thinness.
He bent to examine the body .. its branches and its roots,
and sensed in her limbs — her eyes closed — something overwhelming.
Then, when she heard him utter the verdict: beautiful,
she rose smiling through tears that ran in streams:
"Can this beauty give me life, age after age!"

She stood naked among the statues like a pearl,
holding her lips to laughter, a tear in her eyes,
while he went on marking out her measure with chisel in marble.
She never once tried to bend her neck and spoil his work;
she held her pose like that a whole day through.
He is working for art — and is there any shame in that?
But for hunger she would never have consented to endure as he endures,
and he is in his own world ... if only the world knew his secret:
one glance he casts upon her, and upon the marble a glance.

★

The sun leaned toward the west .. and still he toiled,
and the honed marble was transformed until it became a form:
a fingertip — from her hand — bent down to prop a cheek;
the breast came clear .. and upon the breast something that defies;
the belly rounded — in its fold — most beautifully.
He said, "But for hunger, it would never have gone so hard with the maiden."
Then he drew the right palm full length along the thighs —
he hides that whose enchantment had come back the stronger —
and lengthened the leg till at the ankle it verged upon its contrary,
and he sees it, a foot that delights to have its willful way.

★

Night fell dark ... and he paid the maiden no heed —
the artist's aim is to carry art to perfection.
He folded the hair upon the head like wave following wave,
and bared the forehead, lustrous as a glittering mirror,
and showed the glance of two eyes drawing out their question;
beside the ear he curved a crescent from the lock at the temple,
and set the nose, needle-fine, in beauty and proportion.
Then, when he came to the mouth, he saw in it one thing more.
He said, "If this mouth would only part in a smile, it would be lovelier still" —
and behold, a voice — the cock's voice — rose high with the morning.

★

The figure was finished ... it lacked nothing but speech.
He turned, laughing to the maiden in a kind of apology:
"Look at the work of my hand — it is worthy of regard:
it is a deathless miracle .. like the day itself!"
And he saw her: she moved not a lip .. the body bare.
He came close to her, a live coal of fire within his ribs —
and behold, the girl in her place — like a bracelet:
a body without a soul, keeping its endless wait,
only the mouth — just as he loved it — parted in a smile.

★

He bowed before her, weeping his wretched end,
and folded the garment's hem over her — in his affliction.
"I call to you .. and does the dead hear a mourner's voice?
I would give myself for you .. and what use to you my gray head in its pleading!?"
Then he cast a bewildered glance toward his statue
and saw it staring fixedly .. with no pity for his state.
So in despair he did a thing that had never crossed his mind:
he hurled a piece of hard stone that marred some of its beauty,
and went off stumbling over things, raving in his derangement.

★

The scholar stood up among the crowds to speak.
He said, "The expedition to the East tells us a wondrous thing:
while they were crossing the deserts .. southward,
they came there upon a statue — I shall unveil it presently.
God knows, though it be found flawed at the forearm,
it still, for all the flaw, makes hearts bleed:
it is the most beautiful statue of a fair woman ever brought to light."
And he drew away the veil, and all cried out: "Blessed be —
the hand of art has immortalized a beloved in the hard marble!"