Beautiful Poem

I was working on a translation on Pablo Neruda's Seashell Collection, and I had to find the English title of his book, Confieso que he vivido. Memorias. And I found this, a beautiful, beautiful poem by an Iraqi poet named Al-Azzawi.

I Confess That I Have Lived My Life

I confess that I have lived my life.
I tasted so many things and forgot thousands more.
I loved women. I forgot to count how many cried over me.
I found friends for good times and friends for bad ones.
I lived among forgotten victims
and learned with my skin the whips of executioners in prison cells.
I stood before unjust courts, accused of blind love.
I wandered from desert to desert and set up my tent in fairyland.
I let my horse drink from the waters of Al-Kawthar*
I slept among thieves on the shores of the Tigris
and sometimes lived in the castles of kings.
I traveled to cities swimming in darkness.
I sat in the sun and walked through snow,
changed one land with another,
one pair of shoes with another.
I burned so many bridges behind me
and sailed on seas that could never be crossed.
In a time of drought, I sowed seeds in the valley of friends.
In darkness, I lit thousands of candles.
Under the waking moon, I sighed like an old man in love
and wandered between continents.
How many times have I built paper palaces in my dreams?
How many times have I swapped reality for illusion?
I have told the truth and I have also lied.
I have doubted a little and I have believed a little.
I have smoked all brands of cigarettes,
drank in bars the best vintage wines
and written the poems of my life.
I have laughed so much in this world.
I have cried so much in this world.
I have passed by like a light flashing in the night.
I have been here and I have seen.
I have stayed and I have left.
I confess that I have lived my life.

*a river in Paradise

by Fadhil Al-Azzawi

November 2, 2006 All Souls

I was watching a nature show last night about a 2,000-year-old tree in England. They recreated its tree biography. It had survived climate changes, wars, plagues, always calling forth some sort of response that allowed it to continue on. But finally, water began collecting between its branches and its heart started to rot.

And it did something it had never done before: a branch began to grow, not upward, but downward. It penetrated into the ancient, rotten core, and began feeding on it as if it were its fertilizer. The branch turned into a root! And a new tree began to grow.

This is what is happening to the Filipinos.