" Knotweed by Rosa Jamali
I've turned to an annual plant, shielded and armed, from the genus of hollyhocks and broad leaves
Whole five-thousand-year history is turning over my head
It was the moment that you were buried with no shroud
And I'm the weeds and icicles of this land, …
Had been climbing over the flames, it was a black ladder, burning my sole feet
It was the moment that I had chopped my heart, you had sucked my blood in that woundless bowl
Had been growing like a wildflower, had been living for millions of years
In Syriac over my body:
Nail-shaped herbs had written some letters.
I'm the genius of thorns with wounded heels of thousands of miles travelling in the oasis
My blistered feet, weary and my parched lips
Shattered by the mountain ranges I had been fighting with my claws
My roots are extended with the fluent liquid in the vessels
Lilacs had grown over my arms and now I've turned to the ivy as if burning in the fire
I left my name on the land I stepped, …
And who's this weeping human child, lamenting two thousand years in my arms? Still weeping? ! Always weeping? !
I've been raising this child for six thousand years
I've grown this Persian hero to send him to the battlefield
Breastfed him
And he has grown out of my eyes
This extreme light which has blinded me…
(TRANSLATED From original Persian to English by the Poet) "
― Rosa Jamali , Selected Poems of Rosa Jamali