Chronicles of Majnun Layla and Selected Poems Quotes

“I sing of Layla,
of the slain
of our blood squandered,
of the beast-friend
of the lure of lovers,
of wakefulness seeking night
and two children timid to meet.”
― Qassim Haddad, Chronicles of Majnun Layla and Selected Poems

“What she uttered next
erased from his book
all despair
just as it was nearly crushing
all hope.”
― Qassim Haddad, Chronicles of Majnun Layla and Selected Poems

“O Qays
either you've driven me mad
or else it's you who's mad,
both of us night-blood
soaked in the remnants of the qasida.”
― Qassim Haddad, Chronicles of Majnun Layla and Selected Poems

“I sing of Qays
of a paradise
disappearing between my eyes.

I sing
of when he clutched me in his mind,
when I wandered in him
proud to celebrate our merging,
the rapturous love on which the Hijaz languishes,
which the Gulf shores
love in turn.”
― Qassim Haddad, Chronicles of Majnun Layla and Selected Poems

“Proclaim while they slumber
in dreams:
you will see in the desert narcissus,
in the lute’s melody,
in the mist of poetry,
narration and wreckage.
proclaim it: It is Love
and what collapses, collapses,
there being naught beyond perfumed spice
except the unknown of deserts,
the details of escape,
naught but the sand-crown
deposed at our feet.
The eye of the dust reads
what is left for us
and what has no end,
Let it not end
like death’s secret.”
― Qassim Haddad, Chronicles of Majnun Layla and Selected Poems