Upon hearing that Mahmoud Darwish was ill

and I hear that you are in a hospital near Paris
and I hear that you are very ill
and I feel my hair chilling
and I say no I cant write a poem about Darwish
he is my enemy
but I know He is not my enemy
I am just afraid of what the others will say
It's one thing to say that
Darwish is the best Israeli poet
just to see their half smiles
saying that I am crazy
and another to write about you
and I have loved you poems
you, like me,
an exile in the world
when the world is all exile
when the words are all aliens
and I loved when you said in an interview
that
had you known your poems would be translated
to so many European languages
you would have written them differently
with less symbolism and clearer
I loved you when you said that a poet has to
write his poems clear
I loved when you wrote about El Andalus
and making love in the afternoon.
May god be with you, Mahmoud,
my friend not my enemy
my fighter with words
stronger than weapons
may Allah be your healer
may you live many years to come
and may you rest when the time has come
in the gardens of Eden.

by Moshe ben Aroch

Please forgive me moon if I awaken your dreams

Upon a rocky lake , a dew drop rained , and the wicked reflected the sadness. He walked there , his legs dragging the earth that half man half laughter , yet for all his laughter he never looked upon the face of the deep. A puddle there a sea here , jumped that figure over salt and blood. Why do we dance on the dead , make love on the dead ? sing , jump hysterically on the dead and decaying and not yet dead but decaying. Hmm , the silvery moon just thinks we're silly and swims aways on its bed of silver , while lovers moan from the dust swirling into the air hugging the firnament with orgasmic nausea until the wave breaks , and the moon turns its back.

What a farce our mistakes are , our horrid terrible mistakes , like the wings of a fly.I love you , I love nothing outside you and beyond you and before you , in you time bursts with giggles and hearts beat to the moon , the slow quiet round moon. Jealous of the moon ? The moon is our bread, our sweat , our tea leaves soaked in flower water , the moon is one of your breasts, nay there are two moons!

Shout it on rooftops , in dark alleys , to every grain of sand and gleam of eye : There are two moons !

Don't cry my love , don't dry away in the middle of the sahara , or give your milk to the wolf ... let the half man half laughter suckle that milky light for although all grown up and proud an infant still are his hands , as soft as decay. Nurture hoplessness , nurture him who masturbates on words for what use are words for the terrible eyes of Pan.

And the lover turns away , covering her moons and planets and stars and suns in disgust , the lover turns blacker than sour milk , the lover dissolves his heart and freezes his lips , the lover unwinds the universe.

I will never forget her , will never forget her ashes , the ahses of her ashes , and when both my soul and your fragrance dance on a beam of moonlight in a silvery night on another world I suckle your milk still my love , till the death of eternity.