{"id":573,"date":"2015-06-01T11:33:07","date_gmt":"2015-06-01T11:33:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/?p=573"},"modified":"2015-06-01T11:33:07","modified_gmt":"2015-06-01T11:33:07","slug":"two-gates-to-redemption","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/?p=573","title":{"rendered":"Two Gates to Redemption"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"anwar<\/a><\/h3>\n

Two Gates to Redemption <\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Poet: Anwar Alkhatib <\/strong><\/p>\n

Translator: Allison Blecker <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The sea has two gates to insomnia<\/p>\n

One leads to unknown ports<\/p>\n

and the other to drowning<\/p>\n

I will choose one for redemption<\/p>\n

Thus the fortuneteller of twilight compelled me<\/p>\n

and buried the color of water in the sunset of my eyes<\/p>\n

She filled the holes in my soul with sand<\/p>\n

and drew on my forehead a torn sail<\/p>\n

On the horizon memory burned<\/p>\n

and there was a corpse stretched out on a boat<\/p>\n

that belonged to sailors returned from ports unknown to them<\/p>\n

To make a choice, two questions:<\/p>\n

Will I be redeemed if the waves cast me<\/p>\n

upon shores inconstant as beautiful women?<\/p>\n

And will I be redeemed if I live in a kingdom of slumber?<\/p>\n

I remember the fortuneteller said in a bewildered voice:<\/p>\n

\u201cPut your alphabet to the test\u2026<\/p>\n

Ports unknown to you don\u2019t mean you\u2019re lost<\/p>\n

and your labyrinthine wandering in the depth doesn\u2019t mean death\u201d<\/p>\n

By way of interpretation then, there are two meanings:<\/p>\n

I strike the sea with my staff and it might split\u2026<\/p>\n

Or a friendly whale takes me to a land that isn\u2019t mine<\/p>\n

The truth has one face: I am not a prophet<\/p>\n

nor the founder of a doctrine<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t claim to walk on water<\/p>\n

All of my wishes are the size of a sparrow\u2019s domain<\/p>\n

in the crown of a cypress tree<\/p>\n

From it, I survey the expanse<\/p>\n

for an idea that has not been suffocated.<\/p>\n

I stand before the narrowing waters<\/p>\n

and embrace the meaning of a life without banks<\/p>\n

On the asphalt of water, I draw a fork for every two waves<\/p>\n

A third wave scatters it, after gathering into a ball that doesn\u2019t last<\/p>\n

And for a second time I draw on her breasts a pair of sea gulls<\/p>\n

flying after a fourth wave<\/p>\n

I draw a fork, then a seventh wave<\/p>\n

then a wave, then another<\/p>\n

arriving at a wave in the making<\/p>\n

The truth has half a face: I am not a sorcerer<\/p>\n

nor do I possess a drop that moistens an illusion<\/p>\n

which ages and departs<\/p>\n

The fortuneteller told me: \u201cDon\u2019t put your heart to the test in the water\u201d<\/p>\n

But I forgot<\/p>\n

And she said: \u201cWhen your visions exhaust you, trespass upon my isolation\u201d<\/p>\n

But I forgot<\/p>\n

Then when I bared my chest<\/p>\n

the fortuneteller of basil did not write the address of my solitude<\/p>\n

I remained defenseless, sewing for the sea a carpet from foam<\/p>\n

that broke, scattered and then sighed<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t sigh<\/p>\n

I was in need of the sea\u2019s breasts<\/p>\n

She breast-feeds me a bit of the ports\u2019 milk<\/p>\n

The truth has many faces: my mother can\u2019t bear the sea<\/p>\n

She was preoccupied with untangling the female jinn\u2019s map of my dead<\/p>\n

Pictures drawn in the void burdened me,<\/p>\n

the spouts of my sorrow opened<\/p>\n

and I began to gather my waves from the sea<\/p>\n

so they would not get mixed up<\/p>\n

A child hastening toward his mother passed by me<\/p>\n

He faced the two gates of the sea, looking at me<\/p>\n

I said to him: \u201cOn the horizon, there are two gates<\/p>\n

One leads to your mother\u2019s soul<\/p>\n

and the other to two forks<\/p>\n

He chose to draw a sea on the sea<\/p>\n

and go far away from the two gates<\/p>\n

11 September 2008<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two Gates to Redemption Poet: Anwar Alkhatib Translator: Allison Blecker The sea has two gates to insomnia One leads to unknown ports and the other to drowning I will choose one for redemption Thus the fortuneteller of twilight compelled me and buried …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":574,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_ml_titleColor":"#000000","_ml_titleFont":"Roboto","_ml_titleFontSize":1.136,"_ml_titleFontWeight":"400","_ml_titleLineHeight":1.3,"_ml_metaColor":"#708090","_ml_metaFont":"Montserrat","_ml_metaFontSize":0.6785,"_ml_metaFontWeight":"400","_ml_metaLineHeight":0.92,"_ml_bodyColor":"#a9a9a9","_ml_bodyFont":"Open Sans","_ml_bodyFontSize":0.85,"_ml_bodyFontWeight":"400","_ml_bodyLineHeight":1.2,"_ml_wooPriceColor":"#666","_ml_wooPriceFont":"Open Sans","_ml_wooPriceFontSize":0.9,"_ml_wooPriceFontWeight":"400","_ml_wooPriceLineHeight":1.27,"_ml_headingColor":"#000","_ml_headingFont":"Merriweather","_ml_headingFontSize":2.02,"_ml_headingFontWeight":"700","_ml_headingLineHeight":1.47,"_mlglobal_userfontcolors":{"headingColorUser":[],"titleColorUser":[],"metaColorUser":[],"bodyColorUser":[],"wooPriceColorUser":[]},"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-8"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/anwar-photo.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=573"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":575,"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573\/revisions\/575"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anwaralkhatib.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}