Tonight's Poems from Ahmad Al-khatat

Tonight's poems from Ahmad Al-khatat take a different turn.  I am sure that you will enjoy them.  It's always interesting to see a poet grow and develop.

Close the Book

Ahmad Al-Khatat

It’s the time to close
the book of negativity
Stop flipping over the
pages of wasted years
and stand in front of
-waves of confidence

It’s the time to close
the book of remorse
Start creating a place
for satisfaction above
-some dark thoughts
of attempting suicides

It’s the time to close
the book of long isolation
I want to feel like I am loved
to my country, back to my life
Smile again without wearing an
emotional smile that lasts forever

Be Stronger

Stronger than before
I’m here under rainfall
Getting stronger than
before, because of you

Stronger than feelings
I’m wiser, and faster than
the curious heart breaker
We’re stronger than love

You once made me happy
I melted my heart into steel
Just to always remember you
Harder, better than memories

Your friendship made me
-stronger than the old times
When I hear your voice alone
I become stronger than death

No more castles and empires
Together we are stronger than
greater, higher than old figures
You make the heart grow healthier

But the wind of your sweet scent
-were stronger than a drunk soul
Between us there is no intimacy
we strongly keep on shining respect

I Am Human

I am human
from all races
I am looking
for respect,
condition
-attitude
and good
behaviours

I am human
dancing with
no silky touch
but on my own
for no reason
sometimes, I
am trying to
live like a human

My name is
human being
My age is the
numbers of
days of the
dead fighter
My soul is
already taken

Another human
I once met her;
she is the reason
why the night is
sad, no matter
what I do aside
from writing a
poem or a song

Can someone
walk me home
I am blind to
trust strangers
I am a silent
human listening
to dreamers talking
to machine believers

Ahmad Al-Khatat was born in Baghdad, Iraq. His work has appeared in print and online journals globally, and his poems have been translated into several languages. He has been nominated for Best of the Net 2018. He is the author of The Bleeding Heart Poet, Love On The War’s Frontline, Gas Chamber, Wounds from Iraq, Roofs of Dreams, and The Grey Revolution. He lives in Montreal, Canada.

This time I'm going to post a few videos of Sonny Rollins from his album The Bridge.  Let's start with the title song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1doeIsl7utk&list=PL0q2VleZJVEljT52xpNPlT2zyXvMNrvSA&index=5&t=0s

"Without a Song" actually appears to be the first cut on the album:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8Mluu7eGZ0&list=PL0q2VleZJVEljT52xpNPlT2zyXvMNrvSA&index=1

I'll finish with a very familiar song, "God Bless the Child":  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzL2b4oaDhg&list=PL0q2VleZJVEljT52xpNPlT2zyXvMNrvSA&index=5

Review of Ethan Goffman's Words for Things Left Unsaid

 From time to time, I publish reviews of poetry books to draw attention to the good work that poets are doing.  Tonight is one of these times.

“Words for Things Left Unsaid”; Ethan Goffman; Kelsay Books 2020.

Ethan Goffman’s debut collection contains multitudes. His poems address the concerns of the human heart as well as the concerns of the planet we share with other living creatures. Goffman sometimes uses blunt, uncompromising language to convey his angst over a world which seems to have gone terribly awry. referencing the myth of Eve’s primal temptation in his opening poem, Goffman writes “ This bite of apple / this flight too close to the sun ... will be our doom.”

But Goffman’s vision is not entirely clouded with gloom; his voice can ring light with laughter and tremble with tenderness.  In the sequence “The Book of Thelma”, he imagines his household cat as an incarnation of Vishnu, steps back to marvel at his own fragile sense of triumph at managing to corral his pet and stuff  her “squirming body / into the cat carrier ... I / Judas Iscariot Goffman ....” In another poem in this cycle, he mourns the roadside death of a cat resembling his beloved Thelma” “In life you had been /  sleek and black / a fleeting shadow / glimpsed from the window”, then takes the living feline, Thelma, in his arms — “her purring shakes the air, shakes my heart”.

This poet brings a sardonic light ever to ear on the foibles and pretensions of human animals, himself included in that number. “I am an embarrassment to myself,” he confesses, explaining “I am the guy in the red shirt in every episode of Star Trek / who dies in the first scene or two”.  But look past the self-effacement; there is a sweet reverence for life underlying this poet’s work. The brevity of human existence plays out against a broad cosmic backdrop as Goffman rests on a futon couch “in this small room we had built / for the child we never had”.

Open this book and prepare to walk precarious paths beneath a panoply of stars.

• W. Luther Jett

 To order Ethan's book, please see this link: https://www.amazon.com/Words-Things-Unsaid-Ethan-Goffman/dp/1950462781

If you would like to review a book for The Song Is...especially recent books by Bill Cushing, Ann Christine Tabaka, Catfish McDaris, Ryan Quinn Flanagan, Ahmad Al-khatat, Bryn Fortey, Will Mayo, and others, please drop me a line at thesongis at gmail dot com.   Thanks!

Now let me play some music for you.

I'll start with Jason Marsalis' "Bourbon Street Ain't Mardi Gras": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZKwBKxjLFI&list=PL8mErPgG9CPiShnZvyz7MMZdL9QpHh3M 

This is Marsalis' "21st Century Trad Band": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoWyZJSCTBQ&list=PL8mErPgG9CPiShnZvyz7MMZdL9QpHh3M_

Here Jason plays drums while his brother Delfeayo plays trombone on "What a Wonderful World": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xN--yTnS45Q

I'll finish with Jason's "Offbeat Personality": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wt_ri_sIWWU

 

Welcome to Mendes Biondo!

Recently the Italian poet and publisher Mendes Biondo has joined my poetry group for its events on Zoom.  Not only did he read at the open mic but he also participated in the workshop.   I am thrilled to be publishing his poems from our May 30 workshop tonight.  The first poem memorializes Leilani "Butterfly" Jordan, a 27 year old grocery clerk from Maryland.  Her picture is above.

Heavenly Flowers

(to Leilani Johnson)

the flight of a butterfly

is a kind of beating

just a few can hear

it's a sad lament

the beginning of the end

the vibe of everything that dies too early

flowers are bringing the coffin made of dust

I see you they said swinging

for the last time with bright colors

I see you the mother of a butterfly

is never able to say it

to her children

when fruits fall from branches

the emptied tree will remember the butterfly

nearby a slow river of tears will flow

See the link below for a story about Leilani: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/grocery-store-worker-leilani-jordan-died-coroanvirus-kept-working-wanted-to-help-people/

Twenty-eight year old Navajo activist and mother Valentina Blackhorse was the subject of Mendes' second poem from the workshop.

A Lullaby for Valentina

(to Valentina Blackhorse)

a blackhorse on the hill

a sad lament lost with the wind

people will play drums

they will stomp their feet

they will ask the anchestors

to tell them more about the next dusk

the sunset shining on rocks

a salamander blinked her eyes

she will come with the rain

and the earth will lull her

then the salamander run away

the moon was shining in the black sky

For more about Valentina, please see this story: https://www.npr.org/2020/05/03/849732465/remembering-navajo-nations-valentina-blackhorse-who-died-from-covid-at-28

Mendes also sent the poems that he read at our open mic.

Base Calling Moon

 

we

people of a rock solid planet

are still wearing fear masks

to protect us from pain

to save us from every day life

 

we

people of a planet made of plastic

faces are fighting for a smile

hidden behind the blue

or other colors

politics is killing the colors

 

we

people of shattered mirrors

we forgot about Alice and the White rabbit

there's a hole for every one of us

where to hide

 

we

people of I-still-have-not-understood-what

are lost and alone

 

do you have found your inner india?

do you still run behind kites in that black sky?

do you feel like us

moon?

Flourishing


how many days have passed
since the last time
we made love?

spring has blossomed all around
now we see it behind a glass
with the breath that fogs the window

is it all a bad dream?
the army takes the coffins away
the weeping of the living suffocated by masks

do you remember our kisses
our warm caresses?
now there is the cold wind to rock nightmares

eyes are kneaded with fear
the soul hid in quarantine
inside a palace of flesh and blood

where are you going? don't you know it is forbidden?
and the balconies become watchtowers
and we become prisoners

do you remember sweat after sex?
now I can't even tighten
the hands of those I don't know

the wind blows hard – they say it's the devil
but it smells like flowers and laundry
and the animals call their land back home

our lovely gazes – do you remember them?
the time of the landing will come and everywhere
we will call it home sweet home again

don't fear the roll of the earth
we are sailing in a storm
now rest and dream about  that night

the night when we will all return naked
to make love and to tell us stories
of the new sun that rises and warms our heart

Big Mama Is Dancing On The Purple Tide

 

 

eyes of stone

people dying without the caress of a gaze

hearts of plastic

beating a music no one wants to play

hands closed

seeds won’t come from those fingers of cement

 

birds know we are alone

so they try to keep our moral up

fishes are waiting for our holy bath

meanwhile they laugh silently

 

peace seems a lost island

the one cartographers put on maps

just to make their work look different

just to drive sailors crazy

 

a black woman

wide breasts full of ivory milk

is smiling to her holy baby

a lullaby in the air

is the half-moon chilling the wind

 

I know you

you’re the one who cried yesterday

when a little boat was shipping from the harbor

on a purple calm ocean

 

you said

how beautiful

and tears fell down

because all was so calm and chill

your heart found the path to peace island

 

no one was there to say

ha ha you dumb boy

you’re crying like a sissy girl

 

the ocean tide grew

your flood brought a vein of gold into it

sun setting on the horizon

 

I heard the wind blowing your voice

I found the stairway to the great vibration

you said

 

and everything was in peace

for a moment

forever

-----------------------------------------------------------

I'll start the music with Herbie Hancock's "Butterfly": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_mSzscIhyg

The next song is Jonny Lipford's "Dancing Stardust," which he plays on a Native American flute: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3dr9P3X--s

This is Craig Chaquico's "Navajo Stars": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CimmgY74u8w

As soon as I started playing Manu Dibango's "Soul Makossa," I knew that I had heard it before!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0CeFX6E2yI. Dibango is among the musicians who have died of COVID-19.  For more information about him, please see this link: https://www.npr.org/2020/03/24/820598340/afro-funk-saxophonist-manu-dibango-dies-of-covid-19

"Soir au Village" is another of his songs:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pg2_Nq4u7Mg&list=PLOI5Qhp3BD0cJF5lPXu4ALSNdwdjus0Fr

Catching up with Ahmad Al-khatat

Tonight the prolific young poet Ahmad Al-khatat has returned to The Song Is...  He sings a different variation on the immigrant's song.

Cried on My Own

I said a few
silly jokes,
people laughed at me

I shared
my pain,
people judged me

I tried to focus
on my happiness,
but I failed terribly

I learned to
write poetry
and cried on my own

Write My Name

O Baghdad, write down my name
on a list of young dead civilians
being alive doesn't always mean
everything is alright with me

I talk with tears falling on my heart
I listen with tears falling on my face
I see with tears falling on my spirit
my life has been worse than it seems

my shadow loses me whenever I want
to walk to the cemetery, only because
I have missed my friends who are no
longer around me; nor longer in this world

O Montreal, forgive me for my weakness
I am just tired of being strong for too long
write my name on the waiting list of death
So, I can sleep with my open wounds

Sensitive

The clouds are coming back
With a seasonal race between
the holy rain and my salty tears
creating a bridge to chase me away
only because I have been sensitive

I am all alone under the drops of rain
singing my misery to a broken tree
since we are broken, waiting on death
people say that I should more open
friends are just actors in my journey

I'm thirty years and still cannot stop crying
thirty years filled with thorns of sorrows
thirty years filled with worse decisions
thirty years filled with bleeding wounds
thirty years filled with pieces of broken dreams

I walk behind the mirror hiding my feelings
I blindfold my sights from my sad emotions
if love comes softly, why do I walk to the

cemetery, attending my life funeral by myself
just because I am sensitive and lost

One Rusty Immigrant

It's amazing how people act nowadays
they talk, eat, and laugh as if they are drunk,
they judge from listening to silly jokes

I hurt you and you did not say a single word
then you hurt me deep in my veins and heart
I cry a river of sorrows, or a cloud on a miserable day

Your smile is my weakness, help me to smile
I'm one rusty immigrant, living and dying every day
I smile, and my wounds open up deeply

I have no hate because my country hates me
I have no black spots in my heart toward anyone
only because I am dead from the moment I have

my Canadian citizenship, since then people are
wonderful with me, they ignore my thirst,
they ignore my hunger, and if I die, they ignore me

Yes, my problem is I love to shine bright under
the clouds of autumn, I also adore blooming as peace
above by the moon and stars for all the kissing couples

Here I am, alone drunk as hell from today’s society
feeling numb to continue walking towards my journey,
I wish to sleep and never wake up again 

Bio

Ahmad Al-Khatat was born in Baghdad, Iraq. His work has appeared in print and online journals globally and has poems translated into several languages. He has been nominated for Best of the Net 2018. He is the author of The Bleeding Heart Poet, Love On The War’s Frontline, Gas Chamber, Wounds from Iraq, and Roofs of Dreams. He lives in Montreal, Canada.

Since this bio is from last year, I think that I may have missed a chapbook or two from Ahmad!

I am looking for the right young artists to pair with Ahmad's poems.  

Here the Felix Rossy Quartet performs "Incandescent" with Rita Payes on vocals:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0ScS3_sgW4

On the cut above Davis Whitfield plays piano.  In the video below he is playing the piano in "Medgar Evers' Blues": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4XDR_wm6EI

This is an untitled video from the Josh Evans Quintet at Smalls.  Do you recognize the song?  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Od03Onjsm84

This video of Evans with a (mostly) different quintet is a bit longer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9MfL1MjJMs