Marcel Khalife - Passport

Artist: Marcel Khalife

Composer (poet): Mahmoud Darwish

Passport (translation)

They did not recognize me in the shadows

That suck away my color in this Passport

And to them my wound was an exhibit

For a tourist Who loves to collect photographs

They did not recognize me,

Ah . . . Don't leave

The palm of my hand without the sun

Because the trees recognize me

All the songs of the rain recognize me

 * Repeating previous line*

Don't leave me pale like the moon!

*****

All the birds that followed my palm

To the door of the distant airport

* Repeating previous line

All the wheatfields

All the prisons

All the white tombstones

All the barbed boundaries

All the waving handkerchiefs

All the eyes

* Repeating previous line*

were with me,

But they... dropped them from my passport!!

*****

Stripped of my name and identity?

On a soil I nourished with my own hands?

*Repeating previous line*

Today Job cried out

Filling the sky:

Don't make an example of me again!

Oh, gentlemen, Prophets,

Don't ask the trees for their names

Don't ask the valleys who their mother is

From my forehead bursts the sword of light

And from my hand springs the water of the river

*Repeating previous lines*

All the hearts of the people are my identity

So take away my passport!

end of all mortal things

Photo by: Lucinda Sweets

w..o..r..d..s

"Things Fall Apart"

The Second Coming

by William Butler Yeats

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

From the Cord of Hope

Hope is agony,

yet we hope.

..

We hope secretly

while hope publicly mocks us.

..

Even denying hope,

I hope. And I resent it.

..

Hope is the whip of Time

spurring us forward.

..

And I seek to be a sage when young,

to recover youth's paradise when old,

..

to be free by virtue of that illness, love,

and a captive of love when I'm free,

..

to be eloquent when reticent

and reticent when pearls come in my speech.

..

We all sow hope.

And after all our toil, hope is all we reap.

..

Hope is a tightrope

on which we teeter above the sea of life

like acrobats

..

Yet hope nibbles its own cord

as the seconds eat away their thread

Mikhail Nu'aymah

translated by Sharif S. Elmusa with Gregory Orfalea

Facing the Shadow

I have always thought that by choosing to live inside my own shell I might help in healing my wounds..that I might forget the painful memories I had before, but I was wrong! My wounds never got healed on the contrary they got deeper and deeper and my painful memories kept on hunting me.

It's time to put an end to this misery which I have created for myself. It's time to face my fears, to face my shadow! May God gives me the strength to endure the pain and may he helps me progress in my mission of becoming myself.

Heart of my Soul

Album: Full House

Transcendentalism (1836-1850)

In this entry I'll try to talk briefly about Transcendentalism but before I do that you guys need to put in mind that transcendentalism is a philosophical and literary movement and this entry will only give you an overview of it.

Transcendentalism as I see it, is a continuation of England's romanticism. Its leader Ralph Waldo Emerson, was strongly influenced by William Wadsworth, a prominent figure in England's romanticism. Thus both movements celebrate individualism and demand intimate connection with nature which will eventually help in self-discovery. The only difference between the two movements lies in their relationship with people. The romanticists have cut off their ties with people therefore they maybe a bit of dreamers and escapers. The transcendentalists, on the other hand, focused on educating and teaching their people therefore they are more like social reformers.

Before I start discussing their tenets, you need to know who are the most important transcendentalists. They are: Ralph Waldo Emerson the father of transcendentalism and my spiritual Uncle, Henry David Thoreau, and Margaret Fuller. Of course there are many other transcendentalists but those are the leaders of transcendentalism.

Basic Tenets of Transcendentalism:

1. An individual is the spiritual center of the universe - and in an individual can be found the clue to nature, history and, ultimately, the cosmos itself. It is not a rejection of the existence of God, but a preference to explain an individual and the world in terms of an individual.

2. The structure of the universe literally duplicates the structure of the individual self - all knowledge, therefore, begins with self-knowledge. This is similar to Aristotle's dictum "know thyself."

3. Transcendentalists accepted the neo-Platonic conception of nature as a living mystery, full of signs - nature is symbolic. (the Romanticist share the same idea)

4. The belief that individual virtue and happiness depend upon self-realization - this depends upon the reconciliation of two universal psychological tendencies:

a. the expansive or self-transcending tendency - a desire to embrace the whole world - to know and become one with the world.

b. the contracting or self-asserting tendency - the desire to withdraw, remain unique and separate - an egotistical existence.

This dualism assumes our two psychological needs; the contracting: being unique, different, special, having a racial identity,ego-centered, selfish, and so on; the expansive: being the same as others, altruistic, be one of the human race, and so on.

The transcendentalist expectation is to move from the contracting to the expansive. This dualism has aspects of Freudian id and superego; the Jungian shadow and persona, the Chinese ying/yang, and the Hindu movement from Atman (egotistic existence) to Brahma (cosmic existence).
Quotations:

-"All I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all I have not seen." Ralph Waldo Emerson

-"People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character." Ralph Waldo Emerson

-"Today a reader, tomorrow a leader." Margaret Fuller

-"I have urged on woman independence of man, not that I do not think the sexes mutually needed by one another, but because in woman this fact has led to an excessive devotion, which has cooled love, degraded marriage and prevented it her sex from being what it should be to itself or the other. I wish woman to live, first for God's sake. Then she will not take what is not fit for her from a sense of weakness and poverty. Then if she finds what she needs in man embodied, she will know how to love and be worthy of being loved." Margaret Fuller

-"Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life. Aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something." Henry David Thoreau

-"If you would convince a man that he does wrong, do right. Men will believe what they see." Henry David Thoreau

-"Happiness is as a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but which if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you." Nathaniel Hawthorne

some useful sites that might help you understand their philosophy: American Transcendentalism, The blog of Henry David Thoreau

Nostalgic Feelings

Paulo Coelho's blog and site

Here's his blog and here's his site.

I am WOMAN

By Reddy Helen

I am woman, hear me roar

In numbers too big to ignore

And I know too much to go back an' pretend

'Cause I've heard it all before

And I've been down there on the floor

No one's ever gonna keep me down again

Oh yes, I am wise

But it's wisdom born of pain

Yes, I've paid the price

But look how much I gained

If I have to

I can do anything

I am strong, strong

I am invincible, invincible

I am woman

You can bend but never break me

'Cause it only serves to make me

More determined to achieve my final goal

And I come back even stronger

Not a novice any longer

'Cause you've deepened the conviction in my soul

Oh yes, I am wise

But it's wisdom born of pain

Yes, I've paid the price

But look how much I gained

If I have to

I can do anything

I am strong, strong

I am invincible, invincible

I am woman

I am woman watch me grow

See me standing toe to toe

As I spread my lovin' arms across the land

But I'm still an embryo

With a long, long way to go

Until I make my brother understand

Oh yes, I am wise

But it's wisdom born of pain

Yes, I've paid the price

But look how much I gained

If I have to

I can face anything

I am strong, strong

I am invincible, invincible

I am woman

Oh, I am woman

I am invincible

I am strong

I am woman

I am invincible

I am strong

I am woman

My Madness

Sorry guys I can't be serious all the time especially after watching a hilarious Japanese drama. This girl needs to have some space to talk about her addiction to Asian drama/music thus this entry is gonna be about Asians, my love, my madness.

Let me start with the hilarious drama Brother Beat. Hey Magic watch this special it's not translated but don't worry you'll get the main idea.

You know how much I love their mom (talking about the drama) especially when she kicks Hayami or when she says Wakarimashta :D she's really amazing I wish that my mom can act like her wanna have a crazy mom like her.

Anyways I remember that you asked me for some recommendations, ummmm I can't recommend you a drama because now I'm not in the mood to watch something out of 10 or 12 episodes but I can recommend you some movies if you want.

I'm not sure if you watched Lee Jun Ki's movie the one that was about his relationship with his parents so if you have not watched it you'd better go and watch it. It's called What should I do? Also there's another Korean movie which you can watch it's called My Friend Tutor part 2

Here's a summary: a Japanese-Korean girl Junko (Lee Cheong Ah) travels to Seoul as an exchange student in hopes of seeing a Korean student whom she had fallen in love with in Japan. When she arrives at her new university, she finds out that her love-to-be is in the army. On top of that, the guesthouse she's staying at is full of rowdy young guys, including the owner's grating son Jong Man (Park Ki Woong) who also happens to be her Korean tutor. This disagreeable tutor, however, is a lot more interested in teaching her inappropriate words than conjugation.

*****

Let's move to music. Here's a song by Yuna Ito and by the way she's half Japanese. Now I want you to watch this song and then tell me who's the guitar guy? The one with the long hair I'm sure you'll recognize him Oy don't try to steal him from me he's mine & mine forever!!!

.....

And here's my favorite song Be the One by Boa I guess that in this song her inner voice speaks to her I'm not sure about that but I'm sure that the one wearing black represents the Yin and the one wearing white represents the Yang & the two should be united together.

That's all I got for today. Gommai for not posting pictures for your guy Kimura it's hard to find good pictures for Abo Koshaa & don't forget to say hi to him :p

The End of the Peace Process: Oslo and After

In this book Edward Said, the Palestinian-American thinker, criticizes both the Israeli government & the Palestinian government and at the same time he tries to put solutions for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

This book introduced me to ideas and facts I had never encountered before especially the facts about the Israelis. And what's more interesting about this book is that it doesn't focus only on politics but also tries to combine it with literature (the field I'm in love with) In short this book really deserves reading it & you guys should add it to your reading list or you'll miss a lot.

Mourning Herself

Says "Today is the day of mourning myself. Sitting here with no one except Darkness, the only faithful friend I have in this world. He's here right by my side. Hugging me with his frozen arms so that I won't hesitate performing my ceremony, the ceremony of my misery."

My reading for my brother's photo.

"Quotations" part 2

أقوالهم الجزء 2

***

we [Arabs] are stuck, subject to the call of our past and the weight of our history, unable to get beyond ourselves or to seek others

Edward Said

نحن ]العرب [عالقون بين خضوعنا لماضينا وثقل تاريخنا , غير قادرين على تجاوز أنفسنا أو السعي إلى الآخرين.

إدوارد سعيد

***

Most of our [Arabic] literature is devoid of any attempt to portray, much less to understand, the other. How many recent novels seriously attempt to represent an American or an Israeli? Hardly any.

Edward Said

يخلو معظم أدبنا ]العربي[ من أي محاولة لتصوير أو حتى لفهم الآخر. فكم عدد الروايات الحالية التي تحاول بجدية تصوير الأمريكي أو الإسرائيلي؟ بالكاد نجد أي رواية.

إدوارد سعيد

***

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is in prison.

Henry David Thoreau

في ظل حكم حكومة تسجن أي شخص ظلما , يبقى السجن هو المكان المناسب ل الرجل العادل

هنري ديفيد ثورو

***

Keep the Salves physically strong but psychologically weak and dependent on their master. Keep the body take the mind.

The Great Debaters "movie"

أبقي العبيد أقوياء بدنياً وضعفاء روحياً , معتمدين على سيدهم. أبقي الجسد وخذ العقل.

من فيلم The Great Debaters

***

We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.

Plato

يمكننا بسهولة أن نغفر لطفل يخشى الظلام , لكن مأساة الحياة الحقيقية هي حينما يخشى رجال النور

أفلاطون

***

Women always worry about the things that men forget; men always worry about the things women remember.

By An Anonymous

دائما تقلق المرأة من الأمور التي ينساها الرجل و دائماً يقلق الرجل بشأن الأمور التي تتذكرها المرأة.

مجهول

***

إن المقاييس الأخلاقية التي يضعها المجتمع لابد أن تسري على جميع أفراده بصرف النظر عن الجنس أو اللون أو الطبقة الاجتماعية فإذا كان المجتمع يؤمن بالعفة في الجنس كقيمة أخلاقية فلابد أن تسري هذه القيمة على جميع أفراده أما أن تسري على جنس دون الآخر أو على طبقة دون الطبقة الأخرى فهذا يدل على أن العفة ليست قيمة أخلاقية وإنما هي قانون فرضه النظام الاجتماعي القائم

نوال السعداوي

***

أشنع جريمة اقترفتها المرأة , أنها ولدت الرجل الذي يهجوها

مجهول

***

هامش:الترجمة ليست من إختصاصي لذا أعتذر على ردائتها وأرحب بأي محاولات لتحسين ترجمة هذه الأقوال. وأعتذر لعدم تمكني من وضع "رابط" الجزء الأول من الأقوال. ذاهبه لأعتكف مع كتبي

"O" by DBSK

This song talks about the dilemma of the modern man. It questions man's sickness of this world, lose of faith, and tries to put an end to it by following some of the Asian believes, Jeong (righteousness) Ban (opposition) Hap (harmony) But will that work???

Yo! U Know ( his friend's name ), let's try some noise bit.
"O" "O" "O" Let's do this.

So tell me, what do you think about the way things are?

If you step back and look at this generation,

there's no principle, no rule and no absolute truth

does your figure in this era always come back to its original form?

(You're struggling to understand what justice and truth is.)

The ideal that doesn't exist in reality…

means nothing!

…."O..." Now I'm afraid of the opposition that only exists for one's profit

We will be drifting without destination

Now the one I'm searching for

Is the effort to be together

….Let us join hands and shout together.

Our dreams should come true

People who thirst for this dream to be realized…

Gather courage in the form of Jeong (righteousness)

You know! Check it, check yo!

Irrational disputes, flying at each other.

Here we go, right now! An open mind yo! Open mind!

That's how we'll find a resolution.

I have to go I have to go gotta make my Ban Jeong, rightly Jeong, till it's right.

The effort of Jeong (righteousness) Ban (opposition) Hap (harmony)

will someday make the dream bloom on this earth.

When everyone works towards even a small dream,

Things will change. We just have to pave the road.

I mustn't hinder the flow of progress with the weight of my Ban (opposition).

We can coexist at any time!

"O..." I don't know why, I'm still afraid. Am I doing this the right way?

"O..." We struggle towards our destination.

Always believing that a growing harmony

Will surely be achieved.

Someday, like a blooming flower,

wouldn't it brighten the earth?

Jeong! (righteousness)

Ban! (opposition)

Hap! (harmony)……

Burdened by scars, it seems you face trials in the dark.

Even if you start to feel like retreating,

No matter what, don't stop! Don't stop!

"O..." Don't be afraid. Keep going on for life,

"O..." All the way, until there's nothing left.

All we seek now is effort for the sake of Hap (harmony)

Let us join hands and shout together.

People who thirst for this dream to be realized...

Gather courage in the form of Jeong (righteousness)!

In this society, people go about

Offering neither right nor left hand. We just have to pave the road,

Nothing can stop us. Silence the doubts--Ah!

The Hollow Men by T. S. Eliot

الرجال الجوف
للشاعر الإنجليزي ت . س . إليوت

ترجمة:

عبد المنعم خليفة خوجلي

I

نحن الرجال الجوف
نحن الرجال المحشوون
المتكئون على بعضهم
مثل حزم ملأي بالقش
:
عندما نهمس سوياً
تنبعث أصواتنا المبحوحة
هادئة وعديمة المعنى
كالريح بين ثنايا العشب الجاف
أو كأرجل فئران على زجاج مكسور ..
ونحن في مخبئنا الموحش

::
أشكال بلا هوية
وظلال بلا ألوان
قوى مشلولة
وإيماءات جامدة
:
عندما يتذكرنا أولئك الذين عبروا بجسارة
إلى مملكة الموت الأخرى
لا يتذكروننا كمفقودين ذوي نفوس جامحة
بل كرجال جوف
كرجال محشوين
***********

II

أعين لا أجرأ أن أراها..
في أحلام مملكة الموت
هذه لا تكاد تبين ..
فالعيون هناك
شعاع من الشمس على عمود مشروخ
شجرة تتمايل
وأصوات مع الريح تغني ..
أصداؤها أكثر بعداً وأكثر تجهماً
من نجم آفل
:
دعني لا أدنو أكثر
من مملكة حلم الفناء
دعوني أرتدي هذه الأقنعة التنكرية المتعمدة
من فراء الفئران وريش البوم ودمى الحقول
أنطلق كالريح …… ولا أدنو أكثر……
ذلك ليس هو آخر اللقاءات
في مملكة الشفق

************

III
هذه الأرض الجرداء
هي أرض الصبار
التي ترتفع فيها الصور الحجرية
ويتلقون فيها أكف الموتى المتوسلة
تحت بريق نجم وشيك الأفول ..
هكذا في مملكة الموت الأخرى
نصحوا وحيدين .. في ساعة نرتجف فيها من الرقة
وشفاه ستُقبِل .. تتمتم بالصلاة على حجر هشيم.
************

IV
العيون ليست هنا..
ليس ثمة عيون هنا...في هذا الوادي
وادي النجوم المحتضرة
الوادي الأجوف
الفك المهشم لمملكتنا المفقودة .
:
في آخر مواقع اللقيا
نتلمس طريقنا سوياً
في صمت مطبق
ونحن مجتمعون على شاطئ هذا النهار الفياض

:
بلا رؤيا .. إلا عندما تعود العيون للظهور
كنجم سرمدي
أو كزهرة وافرة الأوراق
في مملكة شفق الموتى
محط آمال الرجال الجوف وحدهم

************

V
هنا نطوف حول التين الشوكي
"يا أيها التين .. أيها التين"
هنا نطوف حول التين الشوكي
في الخامسة صباحاً عند الفجر

:
ما بين الفكرة والحقيقة
ما بين الحركة والفعل
يقع الظل..
................................لأنك أنت الملكوت

:
ما بين التصور والخلق
ما بين المشاعر والتجارب
يقع الظل..

................................لحياة ذات مدى ممتد ..

:
ما بين الرغبة والتقلص
ما بين الفعالية والوجود ..
ما بين الجوهر والمنبت
يقع الظل..
................................لأنك أنت الملكوت

:
ولأنك أنت الحياة
ولأنك أنت ..
:
هكذا ينتهي الكون
هكذا ينتهي الكون
هكذا ينتهي الكون
ليس بالصيحة المدوية
وإنما بالأنين.

..........................

قمت بإضافة بعض التعديلات على ترجمة المترجم

I wonder...

Sometimes I keep wondering...when will I be able to fly??

Reflection

This photo was designed by my brother (his nickname is Blackyone) I loved his photo so much that I wanted to share it with my site visitors. And as usual this crazy girl, who's so obsessed with reading and analyzing everything around her, has to do some analysis to this lovely photo. My personal interpretation to this photo is that the eye here represents the inner self of the girl who's standing and we can see that the reflection of the dry tree in her eyes is different from what she really sees which means that true happiness comes from your inner self and this of course will reflect your own view of the world. Another interpretation for this photo is that the eye represents a spiritual guidance from God to human beings who are suffering in this world.