Bolero in
Najd
Bolero
was there
dear Najd
under
your bluer
than blue
skies
under
your old
and young
stars
for you
and only
you
to hold
dear
and cheer
For you
to wear
and to
carry afar
and to
leer
that
lonely scar
with no
one to share
Bolero
was there
dear Najd
Bolero
was there
From your
high and low lands
high and
low years
and their
tears
were born
one
precious drop by one
unfeathered
and lonely
like your
desert flower
a rare
arabian beauty
from this
earth laced its solemn
Shy like
your desert rain
among
your ageless wadis
Jumana
was born
Jumana of
Najd
as she
will always be known
singular
and blessed
a rare
arabian beauty
on this
earth as in heaven
In Najd
Jumana
was everywhere
like its
sun
in its
moving sand
and in
its restless air
Jumana
was everywhere
in its
stubborn wadis
that she
wears as beauty scars
across
this sacred land
adored
with heavenly stars
its stand
against
time and bliss
Jumana
was everywhere
like a
cosmic
eternal
kiss
upon this
land of
Najd
Jumana
was everywhere
before time
learned onto who to stare
and with
whom to share
her
eternal beauty
and her
celestial grace
her gift
and bounty
to her
chosen place
Jumana of
Najd
Eyes meet
across time
Jumana's
and his
two novae
not of this earth
a
singular moment of an unwritten history
a moment
of birth
a
beginning of another surreal Najd story
to be
written by both
like none
before
or since
save
Leila and
her Kayss
Eyes meet
across time
Jumana's
and his
in a
timeless land
under
timeless skies
a moment
of birth
of an
eternal prize
from this
giving land
that is
Najd
Now
feathered and together
Jumana
and he
take to
the skies
still
sands and
white air
below
and above
all the
heavens to show
Sphere
onto sphere
they roam
as
princess
and her
emir
suns
young and old steal a glance
with
light from their distance untrue
Do you
see Miro
molding
his Milky Way
dear
Jumana? he calls
or Dali
dragging his Virgo?
Can you
spell Leila in the stars of Hydra
dear
Jumana? he calls
or Kayss
chasing those rays for you in Antlia
like
Duchamp's dream brush
one
primal ray by ray
one
rebellious star by star
he trawls
all
provoked together for you to wear
in
extreme lush
a
necklace
for a
princess
made in
the heavens
for you
dear Jumana
he sighs
just for you
To steal
a tethered stare
on your
journey home
to the
land of Najd
streaming
hair in starry wind by hair
stripped
bare
of
envious space and time
only
primal meaning and rhyme
will tie
you always to me
he sighs
like your
gentle smiles that hide our dreams from the night
dear
Jumana
till our
desert sky disinherits this ancient sea
and our
desert sun its lucent light
Bolero's
tunes
were
there
through
Jumana of Najd
in those
hidden chimes in her skies
and in
her forbidden morphing dunes
in
Jumana's eyes
playing
those tunes
with her
silent
rhythmical
sighs
Bolero's
tunes
were
latent
in your
dunes
Najd
and
nascent
in
Jumana's tears
tunes of
drops gently falling onto dunes
drop by
drop
dunes
sculpt the desert image
of a
celestial gift
Jumana's
tears
and
Bolero's tunes are one
with your
dunes
a cosmic
union
re-written
anew in Najd
to usher
in tear and silt
her
unrehearsed
impending
death
that
looms closer and closer
to be the
fore
of a
triad
that is
forever unversed
Jumana of
Najd
you have
been chosen to soar
In a
singular moment of an unwritten history
unfolds a
new surreal Najd tragedy
his
Jumana ascends to skies he cannot reach
to
heights Bolero cannot climb
and
depths no tunes can breach
Jumana of
Najd
can you
hear me? he calls
Silent
and abandoned
he falls
as does
his meaning and rhyme
never
stopped searching for that boundary
between
the real and the imaginary
where he
has seen her face countless times
in stars
dead and
alive
and in
his empty words and orphan rhymes
and has
sensed her eyes countless flights
in cosmic
sighs
near and
far
but never
close enough
to arrive
Can you
hear me? he calls
his
Jumana of Najd
He lolls
for an answer
a whisper
enough to
alter
this
reality
of a
singular moment of history
of a
singular tragedy
whose
lyrics were woven
by Jumana
and he
to the
tunes of Bolero
for a
story stolen
and was
never meant to be
because
of one ascended
and the
other subtended
in a
surreal Najd tragedy
Jumana of
Najd can you hear me? he calls
silent
and abandoned
he falls
a final
fall
to his
abyss
his
meanings shattered
and his
rhymes torn
sands
shifted
in the
only form they know
death to
call
less
his
Jumana unborn
and an
orphaned
Bolero in
Najd
for all.
