Always Midnight, never dawn

Mourid Barghouti is a Palestinian poet, long exiled from the land of his birth, and currently living in Cairo. His latest collection, Midnight and Other Poems (Arc Publications), is a fine work that deserves a wide readership. (The book also includes an essay on the author’s life and circumstances, a handy introduction for those who may not be familiar with Barghouti’s memoir, I Saw Ramallah.)

Midnight is a long, moving poem but not an arduous read. The blurb describes it as a “montage of images of the land of his birth and the strong emotional responses to which these images give rise” and it is one of the most accomplished poems I have ever read. Lines jump out at the reader, images so strong, stark and moving that they almost induce vertigo:

Your heart has stopped
yet the earth beneath you pulses.

Your blood now circulates
outside the confines of your body.

Or when a house is destroyed by the Israeli army:

My grandfather’s cloak gets hooked
on the bulldozer’s teeth.

Midnight is astounding in its ability to shift the reader from one scene to the next while ensuring that the narrative effect of the work is not lost. The shorter poems too are filled with heart-wrenching moments depicting the plight of Palestinians. Barghouti writes that:

Death
stays up, active
for our sake.

In It’s Also Fine, he writes:

It’s also fine to die in our beds
on a clean pillow
and among our friends.

Nor does he shirk the difficulties of being a writer living under the wary eye of Arab governments in Interpretations:

A poet sits in a coffee shop, writing.
The old lady
thinks he is writing a letter to his mother,
the young woman
thinks he is writing a letter to his girlfriend,
the child
thinks he is drawing,
the businessman
thinks he is considering a deal
the tourist
thinks he is writing a postcard,
the employee
thinks he is calculating his debts.
The secret policeman
walks, slowly, towards him.