Ancient Songs of the Women of Fez

This comes from an anthology of women poets and a compilation of old traditional songs from the area of Fez that would be sung by a chorus of women.  In the original format, they are quatrains (“roubai”).  I like how earthy it is and of what would be important for a culture at the edge of the desert: water and greenery: and such an abundance of each that one would have gardeners and both cold AND hot water.  And who couldn’t use a masseur?



Ancient Songs of the Women of Fez

I want to be in a garden with my love,
empty.  Not even a gardener.
I want to be in a bath with my love,
empty.  Not even a masseur,
and I’ll bring him all the hot and cold water
he wishes.
even his sweat I’ll collect and put in flasks
so it will make me alive.
the day I am blind from crying,
I will paint my eyes with tears instead of kohl.

                                                               
                                                               Collected by Mohammed el Fasi, transl by Willis Barnstone
                                                                                  
                                                                                   

Anonymous - Ancient Egypt

This is another of the poems translated into English by Ezra Pound and Noel Stock from Italian text translated, in turn, from hieroglyphic texts dating from between 1567 B.C. to 1085 B.C.). The Italian version is called "Liriche Amorose Degli Antichi Egizioni" (Milan, 1957).  Though the author will never be known, her sentiments are timeless and fresh across three millennia.  The plainness of the images reminds me of Archibald Macleish’s poem (also posted) to his wife.

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Untitled

                    Transl. By Ezra Pound and Noel Stock

I find my love fishing

His feet in the shallows.

We have breakfast together

And drink beer.

I offer him the magic of my thighs

He is caught in the spell.