يمكن لو

يمكن لو في بيني وبينك حكي.. كنا حكينا
يمكن لو في بيني وبينك دمع.. كنا بكينا
لو كان في طريق تودي شوي شوي كنا مشينا
أو كان في شي درب يوصل بيني وبينك كنا لقينا
يمكن لو في بيني وبينك قصص .. كنا قرينا
يمكن لو في بيني وبينك صلاة .. كنا دعينا
يمكن لو في بيني وبينك حلم.. كنا غفينا
يمكن لو في بيني وبينك سِلِم.. كنا نسينا
يمكن في نغمة وحدة بيني وبينك عم بتعيد
يمكن في ناس كتيرة بيني وبينك مابتفيد
يمكن في قمر أو في شجر أو شي جسر حديد
يمكن في سهل أو في جبل أو في شي وادي بعيد

يمكن في طريق جديدة بيني وبينك نحنا مش شايفينا

لما إنت ناوي

لما انت ناوي تغيب على طول مش كنت آخر مره تقول
بالليل اسيب نفسي لهمي ولأفكاري افضل افكر فيك وانت ما انت داري

Blasphemy

"When you can do good and you just don't, this is blasphemy." ~ The Companion.

It's in the zaatar, honey!

Every time I take the first bite of zaatar w zeit (whether as mana'eesh or as a dip with bread), it takes me back years and years in the past, to the time I was in my first school years.. It might not be a comfort food, but it is definitely a security food...

The title of this post came from a friend/relative who gave this answer to me more than 10 years ago when I wondered why Palestinians are usually better performers academically (all Palestinian/Lebanese mothers feed their children zaatar sandwiches before exams because it is rumored to improve memory). So maybe it really improves memory or maybe it doesn't, but it definitely triggers memories.

maskeen

مسكين وحالي عدم من كتر هجرانك
ياللي تركت الوطن و الاهل على شانك
قول لي على ورد خدك
و قول لي على حالك
اسمح وطمن فؤادي يا ضياء عيني
وجود بقربك وخليني على بالك


I have always had a love hate relationship with this song for as long as I can remember. I hate the victimization tone, turns me off, but maybe it is Abdelwahab's performance that makes it less weak/pleading than it sounds.

في الشارع

اللي على الناس بيجرى

غاير من اللي هواك قبلي ولو كنت جاهله
يا هل ترى نال رضاك وصادف الحب أهله
مين ده اللي متع عينيه وقلبه بالحب قبلي
ومال فؤادك إليه وصان لك الود مثلي

إن قلت مات اللي فات والقلب عاش من جديد
أقول وفين الثبات وفين صيانة العهود
نسيت غيري وبكره تنسى وأشوف الأسيه
واللي على الناس بيجرى لا بد يجرى علي

أحمد رامي و محمد عبد الوهاب

my phone..

so the thing pissing me the most about my phone with a death screen is not the lost sms history (since there was none, except for a couple of messages that are better lost than kept), is not the last 1.5 yrs contacts, is not the lost BBM list, but it is the fact that I had a comprehensive list of all the books I need/plan to buy...

This, I could not get back.

Blukh.

Défoulement

انتكاسة

Watch while the queen
In one false move
Turns herself into a pawn
Sleepy and shaken
And watching while the blurry night
Turns into a very clear dawn
Do you love any, do you love none,
Do you love many, can you love one,
Do you love me?

One false move
And a secret prophecy
Well, if you hold it against her,
First hold it up and see
That it's one side stone
One side fire
Standing alone among all men's desire

And if you wonder
What I am doing
As I am heading
For the sink
I am spitting out all the bitterness
Along with half of my last drink

I am thinking
Of your woman
Who is crying in the hall
It's like drinking gasoline
To quench a thirst
Until there's nothing there left at all

"Walk on the blind side"?
Was the answer to the joke
It's said there isn't a political bone
In her body
She would rather be a riddle
But she keeps challenging the future
With a profound lack of history

********************************************************

"Tu fais battre mon coeur plus forte que les vagues quand le ciel est sombre. D'abord tu me dis oui et, tout doucement, tu me fais mourir." ~ Bratsch

********************************************************

I have a confession. I hate the color orange. I almost hate it with a passion. I hate the combination of orange and brown.

storyteller

The only way to let it die is to let it out. But this Scheherazade will not keep her stories to the Shah anymore.

my new retro living room

I redecorated here again.. we could call that my own blue period..

5 yrs studying computer science, and I could not change my post titles' color (I still cannot find the html variable for it, want to make it a darker shade)!! Also cannot remove that pattern-less box in the rightmost area since it is part of the image I used as background template.. sad sad..

T., my nemesis, is leaving to Australia for a few months, and even though we barely meet except by chance, I feel I will miss her.

also, for some reason I am obsessed right now with owning a blue Vespa! Super cute.

Famous First Words

إكتئاب ولا انشغال ولا مجرد إهمال

...

the rules of duality and the curse of forgetting.

Little Deaths

وكثيرا ما كنت أسأل نفسي حين اسمعهن يروين مناماتهن: لماذا نقتل من نحب في مناماتنا؟ هل هو الخوف من الموت الذي وحده يفقدنا من نحب، أو أننا نقتله في المنام كي لا يتركنا في الحياة، يفلت منا ويغادرنا، وتصير حياتنا خاوية وميتة بدونه؟ وهل بالحب وحده نكتشف الموت، أم نذهب إليه لنعيد إكتشاف ذلك الحب في ذروة خسارته وفقدانه؟ هل هو عبء الحب يا ترى، أم عبء الموت الذي نكتشف أننا ممتلئون به في جسدنا وحياتنا إذا ما انزاح عنا ذلك الحب؟

علوية صبح - دنيا

I wondered the same, when I kill people in my dreams (not kill, but have them die).. I have learned from Mama to say "enkatablo 3omr jdeed" when someone alive dies in a dream. But sometimes we are just training ourselves for the loss, and yet when it comes, we are never prepared. In my most recent and most vivid "dream death", I woke up to think "enkatablo 3omr jdeed, I'd rather lose people in life than experience their deaths" but I also felt all the pain, the dream pain was real, like I recalled the feeling and relived it all over. And I insisted on recounting my dream, ending it with letting go (just don't die in my dreams!), and then trying to analyze ("this dream is really about someone else").

It doesn't matter. Maybe you died in my dream because it is the easy way out.

China Doll

I will not condemn you
nor yet would I deny

I would ask the same of you
but failing will not die

Take up your china doll
it's only fractured -
and just a little nervous
from the fall.

a stolen PS of Farthest Happiness and Hallucination

From an abandoned letter:

"I know this must've been disturbing. This unbelievable combination of fear, happiness, desire, hatred, satisfaction, rejection, disgust, hesitation, peacefulness, despise, safety, agony, longing, denial, joy, laughter and laughter again is clearly unprecedented. I shall ask for forgiveness and forgetfulness for the harm I've caused, and remembrance of the smiles. Let this be an improved version of the 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'. Don't just erase all of it."

my problem with Nizar

I have always had a problem with Nizar's poetry. There was something that bothered me but I just could not pinpoint it. So the man loves women, to the point of adoration even, what is MY problem with that exactly?

I cannot deny I liked some of his poetry. I would not seek it though, I would only read what comes my way -whether by chance or recommended-. I have one small booklet for him that a friend bought for me last year (as a joke I think, or as a symbol).

And then, a couple of days back, Mourid Barghouthi is on TV with Radwa Ashour, and he refers to Nizar's opinion about women, and I finally get what has been bothering me. Nizar talks about the perfect woman:

يصف نزار قباني على إنه شاعر الذكر العربي، الذي يصور المرأة دائما ككائن من "مرمر ودانتيل" فلا يعكس في شعره الوجود الواقعي للمرأة ترتدي نظارة أو تقرأ جريدة

This is EXACTLY it. When this person/friend referred me to Nizar, that was my issue. I do not want the "woman/muse" model.. I do not have an issue with being an inspiration or a muse, in fact who wouldn't want to! But I do have an issue with this being what defines me. I have an issue with this forming a screen between "who I am" and "how you perceive me to be". Because I must stay young, and lovely, and sweet, and happy. I _must_ stay this person. I must not worry or doubt or question. I must not feel insecure. Even when you like my imperfections, you like them as part of my muse-being, just like you would admire a chip in the body of a lovely sculpture, just like you admire Venus without arms.


Thank you, 3ammo Mourid.

The Fullness then the Emptiness

And the teacher said, "Bible mysteriously describes the time where Christ came as being "mel2 el zaman", la pleinitude du temps, the fullness of times. There is absolutely no explanation to why this was the fullness of times."

And then he talked of my fullness of time, "You will know when the fullness of times comes. You will feel peaceful."

But I did not. I felt turmoil, disorder, confusion. But since we see things as we want to see them; we saw this as peace.. And for a while there was some inner peace, but only for a while. This was the sugar coating. The core was pushiness, demands, and self-deceit leading to my self-deceit.

And only now, when the emptiness swept over me, did I feel peaceful.

And I was right. This was overrated.

More Broken Promises

I promise...
To give what is to Caesar to Caesar, what is to God to God...
To be a background musical theme...
Don't know when it will fade out though, to be replaced by a main theme...
I promise to divert from my route, with the intention of joining back my path...
Don't know whether life's tenderness will bring back the two ends together soon or late though...
I promise I won't regret a thing... I don't do regrets... Not anymore...
I don't know whether there would be things worth regretting though...
I promise...
What I have in hand...
But I don't promise on behalf of destiny... La fatalite... though.