This poem eats from my flesh, while you drink my blood
Mohamed Ellaghafi, an eminent Moroccan poet and writer, known as one of the pioneers of modern poetry of Morocco, shares his poem
Mohamed Ellaghafi a Moroccan poet, writer, and publisher, was born on December 7, 1960, in Casablanca. He is the founder and current president of the University of Moroccan Creators and the founder of the National Poetry Award in Morocco. He has published more than fifteen books, ranging from poetry to short stories, and has participated in significant national and Arab poetry gatherings. He is considered one of the pioneers of modern poetry in Morocco, with his beginnings tracing back to the early 1980s as the founder of the (Five Senses) poetic movement, an artistic movement that emerged to align with the course of modernity.
Currently, he publishes in the Qatari magazine Doha, the London-based newspaper Al-Zaman, and the Egyptian magazine Al-Ahram. He was also honored by the Moroccan Ministry of Culture in 2019, in Beirut and Cairo in 2014, and by several prestigious associations both nationally and internationally.
His works have been translated into several languages, including English, French, Persian, German, and Italian.
THIS POEM Eats From My Flesh
This poem eats from my flesh
While you drink my blood,
O breaths steeped
In sorrow.
I will not blame the sun for setting,
I will not turn my neck backwards
As I count the minutes of my life.
No one will believe me if I say
There’s a great terror in my head
And a hell in my chest.
No one will believe me,
Not the courier of love
Nor the beloved lamented in my papers.
This poem eats from my flesh
While I tear down the continent of my heart
Searching for a title
For a new draft.
This poem eats from my flesh,
My black blood boils between your lips
And upon the roadside of your breasts
The pain of the day sighs.
This poem eats from my flesh,
And the earth, and the beloved,
And the clouds that rain from my eyes.
Between you and me, a thousand breezes and a faint whisper,
And this noise obscures the meanings.
I almost buried what was left of the remnants of my bones
If not for the poem’s return to its senses.
I passed through here contemplating the shores,
Smiling at all this emptiness
That contains nothing but your shadow.
I see in the froth of the waves
The whiteness of your heart, O sea.
This poem eats from my flesh
While you drink my black blood.
Nothing remains of this thin body
But bones floating on the surface
Of my flowing tears.
This poem eats from my flesh
While you drink my black blood
By the shore,
The sky is open and the sea stretches out,
Slaughtering me from vein to vein.
I wish I were dust,
And you were sifting me with the salt of your heart.
This poem eats from my flesh
While you drink my blood,
So what remains at a distance from the eye!
Is a mirage and questions for the wind!
That didn’t bring your messages.
This poem eats from my flesh
While you drink my blood.
Has the evening not come yet!
For us to smile together on the surface of the water
And wait for the wind to merge our faces
And for us to fade away slowly
Like the clouds at noon?
I am skilled at singing like a caged bird,
And also skilled at standing on one leg
Like a sad heron.
Sad,
Both I and the sea,
Each of us battling,
Its waves visible,
And my waves internal.
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Prepared by Angela Kosta Academic, journalist, writer, poet, essayist, literary critic, editor, translator
