Stone - Amjad Nasser

I say to this stone: I am you.
The stone says: you are not so flexible. I say: isn’t my heart like yours? It says: you only knew me from the outside. I say: does this mean that you feel? It says: of course, and sometimes I shed a tear – but I regain my composure, this is my given nature. I say to it: do you have a memory? It says: why wouldn’t I, and my own biography as well, but it is not always open to reading. Record this: I was in a sling, then I became a slab. I once took part in the construction of a bridge, and once confronted the waves of the overflowing sea. Here I am now, as you see, an arch in a derelict house. I say to the stone: so you won’t disappear then? It says: never. You people come and go. Some of you leave the mark of a tender hand on my surface. Others leave a bullet-hole, and I know the difference between this and that.

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Amjad Nasser (born 1955) Jordan
Translated by Atef Alshaer and The Poetry Translation Workshop
Source: The Poetry Translation Centre