IN THE STREET OF PAINTED FLOWERS
When will the whirl of this wheel be done?
Does the Spinner dream, and my shroud unspun?
I am spent with the lust of greedy nights,
The fitful flame, and greying lights
Masking joy, in this devil’s dance,
That has tripped my feet on the road of Chance.
My song is hushed, and once it sped,
As water ripples the river’s bed,
Through laughing days in the gay bazars,
And freed my soul beneath the stars.
Now I am bought, as then I was sold,
But Allah witness, this is not gold,
But tinsel coin, that eats my heart,
And sets me aside, a thing apart.
Does Heaven sleep, that it lets me be,
And blinds my eyes, that I may not see
The sun, that came to kiss my cheek
When I stepped from my tent to the waiting Sheik?
I am sick for the sound of camels’ feet
Padding their way through the languid heat,
The scent of cool on the evening air,
And the grip of the muezzin’s call to prayer.
In those desert nights, where the shadows clung
To the blowing sand, that swirled and stung,
When my lord bent down and I knew his lips,
I was fulfilled to my finger tips.
Then, I was slave to a king, at least,
Now, I am slave to a furtive beast.
Did Allah mock, when he stilled my breath,
Then called me back from the paths of death,
To dance to the tune of reeling spheres,
With only a dream to bridge the years?
Ash is the flame of my painted shell,
I have no heart save the desert’s spell,
Mine is the fugitive soul of a slave,
And I would go back to my sand-swept grave.