from The Manifestations of the Voyage

my house’s stairway is seized

with vertigo.

Matter having forsaken its laws,

we land in hell,

ascending to heaven.

Shadows move along ladders

under the silence of ordinary things

there is another silence:

it belongs neither to the leaves nor to the

dead

with a crown of birds circling

him

a child is running in an abandoned

house

the stairway takes the measure of

its own emptiness

I myself am the stairway that

Time has used in its

funeral course

wheels lift water in the

gardens of Hama

and come down

not waiting for the river

to put out the fire

Here we are left with

the river Seine and Paris’s poisons.

I prefer gardens where

linden trees get ready for

a lunar voyage

The stairway that separates my

room from my memory

whispers in my ear . . .

I am not at the mercy of men

since trees live in my fantasies

men and trees long for fire

and call for the rain

I love rains which carry desires

oceans.

Between one airplane and

another

space is disoriented

stars sneak into holes and brides

go naked to wells

their innocence wanes under

our eyes

You and I are made from a

worm-eaten wood

The Word has sunk

we are left with no cry gesture

or gaze

silence to us is forbidden.

We are threatened neither by life

nor by death

nor forced to admire the Spring

I found earth-castles on the edge

of the desert’s torrents

I took their marble stairs

but could not find my way either

up or down

then I understood that I was

in a state of non-reason

and non-madness

and that the gardens of Andalusia

were standing

ready to die.

Two cities Two tears

Let insanity keep between

its skirts

legs

within its black eyes

the fright of my adolescence

and the nocturnal walk on the hills:

which hill?

I mean the kingdom that a man carries

in his gut when

his love’s fulfilled.

Two cities which are neither Beirut

nor Damascus

two tears: neither of alcohol nor of

rain

Yes there has been a truck

and a blue-eyed woman

from Russia

—grey olive tree—

I was a butterfly caught by

a fire:

neither the day’s not the night’s

but the

incandescence that radiates

from the body like a

receding sickness,

Let tombs stay open!

The stairway which leads to my

room

borrows its metals from Babylon

The Prophet’s Ascension

had two movements

we fell into whirlpools

of mud

and the wind followed his horse

A tempest went after

the sun’s steps

The Prophet swam through waves

of clouds

a river of gold carried his

vessel

and away from the sun he reached Paradise

a Paradise made of light.

The stairway which leads to my room

leads to an observatory

I own two telescopes

to observe stars and black holes

and take mechanized stairs

which advance with no advance

my hair spins with

sunflowers

Illegitimate is this linden tree

which shakes by my door

let us get ready for Hell!

Cursed be messengers

tossing about water’s tranquility

and building forest fences

Oh that the wind go quicker than us!

that we be smothered by light!

This linden tree standing by my door

weights heavy on my days

I will finally marry it

and we shall bring children

condemned to terror

this tree looks at me

with insistence:

It will be kept waiting

until Time’s end.

Copyright Credit: Etel Adnan, from “The Manifestations of the Voyage” from The Spring Flowers Own & The Manifestations of the Voyage. Copyright © 1990 by Etel Adnan. Reprinted by permission of Post-Apollo Press.

Source: The Spring Flowers Own & The Manifestations of the Voyage (The Post-Apollo Press, 1990)

Poetry and Feminism