We Travel

WE Travel like other people,
but we return to nowhere.

As if traveling
Is the way of the clouds.
We have buried our loved ones in the darkness of the clouds,
between the roots of the trees.

And we said to our wives;
go on giving birth to people like us for hundreds of years
so we can complete this journey
To the hour of a country,
to a meter of the impossible.

We travel in the carriages of the psalms,
sleep in the tents of the prophets
and come out of the speech of the gypsies.

We measure space with a hoopoe’s beak
or sing to while away the distance
and cleanse the light of the moon.

Your path is long
so dream of seven women to bear this long path
on your shoulders.

Shake for them palm trees
so as to know their names
and who’ll be the mother of the boy of Galilee.

We have a country of words.
Speak speak
so we may know the end of this travel.



MAHMOUD DARWISH, 1984