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Ennui

ملل

Her letter
flutters lightly
in my hand.

Each page conveys
a sigh of sentiment,
a dissipated breeze

that soothes the
surface of an
ornamental pool

but shies away
from any gross
particularity.

In Tarifa at noontime,
even the hibiscus
is exhausted.

First published in Blue Minaret.

Two poems

قصيتان للحب

I
In my palace,
I have built a hundred fountains.

Though they play all day,
not one can catch
the sparkle of her eyes.

II
In my garden,
I have made a paradise.

Alas, the chaffinch
sings her heart out
in my neighbor's tree.

First published at Poetry Soup.

Palace

قصر

Its courtyard traps
impatient air,

restrains the
ranks of tulips.

Here, too, I plan
my brilliant escape.

Ebb

جزر

In the tidy marina,
the tide is going out.
My last image of her
tugs at its mooring.

I pause on a slope
of the Alpujarras.
The wide sky can't
encompass my loss.

A hooded crow calls
two hours before fajr.
The engraver has come,
desperate for epitaphs.

First published in NOON: journal of the short poem.

Bosphorus

البوسفور

Seaweed reaches for
a radiance above: the
whirl of dervishes.