I shall begin with its density. Its acidity, its ph.

It walks just like a woman:
between the massacre of the invisible
and the concentration camp of visibility.

It barks style and goals,
an hospitable epic.

In the poem, language
deafens ears to itself;
in it, words expand
their circles of friendship.

The alphabet must be masturbated
until it babbles apparently
unrelated things.

Shifting gears in speech,
gestures from another order.
The mosquito's smile within the amber stone.

It is not that you don't understand Arabic.
You don't understand

poetry.

Translation: Lawrence Schimel