Those Who Pass Between Fleeting Words
Mahmoud Darwish
In 1988, this poem, "Those Who Pass Between Fleeting Words", was angrily cited in the Knesset by Yitzhak Shamir. Written during the First Intifada, the poem includes the text: "Live anywhere but do not live among us... and do not die among us". It was interpreted by many Jewish Israelis as demanding that they leave the 1948 territories, although Darwish said that he meant the West Bank and Gaza. Adel Usta, a specialist on Darwish's poetry, said the poem had been misunderstood and mistranslated. Poet and translator Ammiel Alcalay wrote that "the hysterical overreaction to the poem simply serves as a remarkably accurate litmus test of the Israeli psyche ... (the poem) is an adamant refusal to accept the language of the occupation and the terms under which the land is defined."
O those who pass between fleeting words
carry your names, and be gone
Rid our time of your hours, and be gone
Steal what you will from the blueness of the sea
And the sand of memory
Take what pictures you will, so that you understand
That which you never will:
How a stone from our land builds the ceiling of our sky.
From you steel and fire, from us our flesh
From you yet another tank, from us stones
From you teargas, from us rain...
It is time for you to be gone
Live wherever you like, but do not live among us
It is time for you to be gone
Die wherever you like, but do not die among us
For we have work to do in our land.
O those who pass between fleeting words
It is time for you to be gone
Live wherever you like, but do not live among us
It is time for you to be gone
Die wherever you like, but do not die among us
For we have work to do in our land
So leave our country
Our land, our sea
Our wheat, our salt, our wounds
Everything, and leave
The memories of memory
those who pass between fleeting words!
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