A Ladder to the Unknown

Laila is looking for a record for her past life,

At the outskirts of time,

While I am looking for the straying morning

Of a dream

To take me to my far-off palms.

She struggled so long in quest for a string

To accompany her flute while soaring towards the song.

I got tired of my feet walking endlessly

Towards the profound void of the unknown.

After all, we could not find the dawn of our vague morning.

Our exile, allied with delusion, has alienated our souls,

Altogether.

ð

Laila dwells on the rug of night

Cursing her fortune.

Laila counts the planets of my longing to embrace her lost past.

Her countless memories

Hinder her from staying in my fields,

Close to the sheaves of my heart.

I also have enough reasons pushing me to follow her flock

At sunset.

ð

Laila recalls her voice, lost in the deserts of silence,

To return from the exile of its fires;

From its clay.

Laila used to travel in the springtime,

Putting wings of words

In the everlasting echoes,

That carried her wretched shadow far beyond.

But, she possesses no deep desire

To hold the tree of hope,

When absence flows down.

Laila stares at the dream broken in my eyes,

When she visits me,

As I stare at “Good Evening” when she pronounces it.

A faint cord of her shy letters

Stirs the horses of desire I have buried inwardly for so long.

And tempts me to jump over the fences I built

With my hands

In the fretful seasons.

ð

We never admitted what our visions have committed

At the verge of sands, last time.

She did nor rebuke me

When I mistakenly pronounced my name

Naked from its old longing.

But I was wrong to enter from the backward gates of echoes

To graze the goats of dream

On plains overlooking the gardens of her sleep.

ð

Time has passed away;

No longer, we can bridge the breach between two chasms.

No longer, we can stand at our distant outskirts.

We were about to find, in the seas of our drowning eyes,

A shawl of stars

To inspire our souls,

And fill them with new pulses

To praise both the morning and the memories;

But we did not have a lifebuoy to save us from oblivion

And enable us to rise from the abyss of fortune.

ð

Why don’t you believe,

When you stare at the mirror,

That you are dead after she is gone?

Laila, whom you loved, is besieged by desolation.

The wandering wilderness has squandered her shadow away.

No more, she would be a star in your night;

No more, too, you would be her moon …

Ali Alhazmi

SAUDI ARABIA

Born in Damadd, Saudi Arabia, Ali Alhazmi obtained a degree in Arabic Language and Literature at Umm Al-Qura University, Faculty of Arabic Language. As early as 1985, Ali started publishing his poetry in a variety of local and Arabic international cultural publications including The Seventh Day (Paris), Creativity (Cairo), Nazoa (Amman) and The New Text. He has participated various International Poetry Festivals including; Costa Rica (2013), Spain (2014), Uruguay (2015), Cuba, Colombia and Turkey (2016), Italy and Romania (2017) and Spain (2018). His work has been translated into many languages, and his publications include: A Gate for the Body (1993), Loss (2000), Deer Drink Its Own Image (2004), Comfortable on the Edge (2009), and Now in the Past (2018). His awards include: Medal of Poetry (Uruguay, 2015), The World Grand Prize for Poetry, (Romania 2017), the Verbumlandi Prize (Italy, 2017) and Best International Poet (China, 2018). Global IconAward  (Italy, 2020). Italian Prize “Colors of the Soul” (Italy, 2021)