“It’s well past midnight
I should get up to pray
The mirrors of my honesty
have long been filmed with dust
I should get up
I still have time
My hands can yet discern
a jug of water from a jug of wine
as time’s wheeled chariot
hurtles down the slope of my life
Perhaps tomorrow
the poisonous arrows aimed at me
will hunt down my eyes
two speckled birds startled into flight
Perhaps tomorrow
my children
will grow old
awaiting my return
- Partaw Naderi, “I Still Have Time” (Peshawar City, August 2000), via Poetry Translation Centre
“The earth opens her warm arms
to embrace me
The earth is my mother
She understands the sorrow
of my wandering
My wandering
is an old crow
that conquers
the very top of an aspen
a thousand times a day
Perhaps life is a crow
that each dawn
dips its blackened beak
in the holy well of the sun
Perhaps life is a crow
that takes flight with Satan’s wings
Perhaps life is Satan himself
awakening a wicked man to murder
Perhaps life is the grief-stricken earth
who has opened up her bloody arms to me
And her I give thanks
on the brink of ‘victory’”
- Partaw Naderi, “Earth” (Peshawar City, June 2002) via Poetry Translation Centre
“I am the twin of light
I know the history of the sun.
Stars
rise from the blisters on my hands”
- Partaw Naderi, “Star Rise”, trans. Yami Yiri and Sarah Maguire, via Molossus
“In the lines on your palms
they have written the fate of the sun
Arise,
lift your hand-
the long night is stifling me”
- Partaw Naderi, “Desolation” (Kabul, June 1994) via Poetry Translation Centre
