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كَذَّبَتْ عَادٌ فَكَيْفَ كَانَ عَذَابِي وَنُذُرِ
Ad denied, then how have been
My penance and warnings.
Qur'an 54:18
Hark and hear this shrilling cry...
The echo listened, did repeat, and died;
The candles faded in forgotten church,
Upon it crows do shout and croak.
Their swarm covered every tree,
As tar doth flow and flood the streets;
And sinketh all in this black moor,
At sky hath petrified, congealed the moon;
And stars array'd themselves in mourning palls,
For trumpet had already blown.
Their fanes are wasted - empty walls,
The like of frescos hath no life at all;
'Twas wrought on gold of blood,
Thine outer piety won't save you, not.
A cloud of daws had stolen sun,
A sullen moonless night hath come.
Say then, where is thy vineyard and thy garden?
They are profaned, and scorned, and trampled.
Thy rivers - their stream is mud -
Bile, treachery, deception, fraud;
A stint is everywhere, the stint of rot.
The surly owls are hooting all night long,
"Foredoomed this land, it will not see the dawn!"
For sunrise swallowed, doleful night is on...
Their mighty - sons of envy and the lie -
Had mown all flowers with rusty scythe,
Each blooming tree they did uproot,
From sadness seared splattering brook.
And people of this hapless clime
From penury hath wreaked a sigh.
But their mighty - they care not -
They celebrate, clad in brocade and gold.
They say, "Do nothing, wait,
Soon night will fade, and ye then see a day;
And they who sigh, they are not patriots, -
They are the traitors and the idiots.
Around are fools, only we dost know
Why sun arises, where winds do blow."
And every discontent, each voice will be suppressed,
Praetorians are ready, - troop of wrath.
Their mighty know how to divide, how to hide
Behind the mask of virtue, how to sow a strife.
They waited spring, alas, hath fallen snow, -
The snow of sorrow and the dole.
Bleak wind hath brought the clouds -
The clouds of yelling crows...
And raven, black as ábyss, on the tinder tree
Screams, "Flee! Escape and flee!"
And angel on the gloomy sky
Inscribed, "Repent to God, or ye shall whine!"
The tempest of the fury, thus, is near;
But ye are blind, you do not hear.
Cry, cry o'er this errand land -
Land which despises man.
April 2017
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