The Doors

Acrylic On Canvas Painting by : 

Yasmeen Abdullah -

It is the door, behind it lies the garden of the heart.

Our things— everything that is ours merges together.

And a door is the door, the door of metaphor, the door of story.

A door that refines September.

A door that returns the fields to the first wheat.

There is no door to the door, yet I can enter into my exterior, loving what I see and what I do not see.

Is there on earth this tenderness and this beauty, yet no door to the door?

My cell illuminates nothing but my interior...

And peace be upon me, peace upon the wall of sound.

I composed ten poems in praise of my freedom here or there.

 I love the crumbs of sky that slip through the prison window—a meter of light in which horses swim.

 I love nature between autumn and winter, and our jailer's children, and the magazines on the distant sidewalk.

And I composed twenty songs in satire of the place where there is no place for us.

My freedom: to be as they do not want me to be.

And my freedom: to expand my cell: to continue the song of the door: a door is the door: there is no door to the door, yet I can exit into my interior.

Mahmoud Darwish