Live Encounters Arab Poetry & Writing 16th Anniversary Volume Five
November- December 2025
A seated elder, poems by Ahmad Nabawi.
Translated from Arabic by Dr. Salwa Gouda.
A seated elder
When the missile struck him
He was repeating:
Your land is your honor
And freedom
Is the most precious possession
When the missile struck him
The earth was quenched with the Elder’s blood
And the words
Were instilled in the people
He was a prisoner of the wheelchair
For it accompanied him
—Since he was a boy—
By the paralysis of his limbs
But his hand
Was all of their hands
And all legs
Were his leg
Since he was young
He found the usurpers at his door
They plundered his land
His honor
And violated the dreams of his youth.
He was not defeated by despair
Nor did hope within him die
And he gripped the sword of words
He kept repeating:
He who has no homeland in this earth
Shall have no grave within it
And stories will be lost
And the dreams
The remnants
The lingering breath
The mother’s tears
The father’s tenderness
The trees of affection
The files of a lifetime are lost
He kept repeating:
He who owns nothing becomes property
He who concedes
Becomes deserving of the stab wounds
He kept fighting with words
When the missile struck him
He was repeating:
Your land is your honor
And freedom is the most precious possession
When the missile struck him
The earth was quenched with the Elder’s blood
And the words were instilled in the people
Chariot of Time
Move on,
O chariot of time,
Move on,
And take me
Away from these cities
That deceive the eyes
Take me.
I was a fool
When I wrote upon its page:
“I adore you”
With my blood I inscribed:
“I love you, O untouched cities”
I swear, I was courting her
She promised to remain pure for me
And smiled in my face
When we pledged to one another
That I would plant dreams beneath its soil
And leave my heart in its hands
But it drifted away
Plunged a dagger in my back
And smiled for another companion.
So move on,
O chariot of time,
Move on,
And take me
From a bitter time
An anxious time
Pass through
Pass through
Break free
That I may overtake this era
And walk upon its shoulders
And carve upon its cheeks
Question marks
Pass by
Pass by
Move on,
And take me
To ages not yet formed
Shores without boundaries
Perhaps as I wander there
I might stumble upon a human
I might stumble
there
upon
A human.
© Ahmad Nabawi
Ahmed Nabawi is an Egyptian poet and academic renowned for his exploration of humanitarian themes in his poetry. He embarked on his poetic journey in the early 1990s and has since published five collections: Testimony of Love, Wounds Have Tributaries, Flames of Questions, Scenes from the Refugee Camp, The Flourishment of Colors and two forthcoming works titled An Ant Said and The Doors. Beyond his poetry, Nabawi has authored several critical books, including The Poet’s Culture and the Production of Significance, The Poetics of Small Details, The Contemplative Tendency in Andalusian Poetry, and The Heritage Tributaries in Andalusian Poetry.
Dr Salwa Gouda is an accomplished Egyptian literary translator, critic, and academic affiliated with the English Language and Literature Department at Ain Shams University. Holding a PhD in English literature and criticism, Dr. Gouda pursued her education at both Ain Shams University and California State University, San Bernardino. She has authored several academic works, including Lectures in English Poetry and Introduction to Modern Literary Criticism, among others. Dr. Gouda also played a significant role in translating The Arab Encyclopedia for Pioneers, a comprehensive project featuring poets, philosophers, historians, and literary figures, conducted under the auspices of UNESCO. Recently, her poetry translations have been featured in a poetry anthology published by Alien Buddha Press in Arizona, USA. Her work has also appeared in numerous international literary magazines, further solidifying her contributions to the field of literary translation and criticism.