And Her Name Is Madeleine

By Tarek Hashem

Translated by Ashraf Aboul-Yazid

And Her Name Is Madeleine
And you know her well.
She was our neighbor in Gaza.
Every morning,
she would take the sea into her arms
so it wouldn’t leave the shore.

She would tie it by its feet
to keep it from fleeing the shelling
toward another land.

Yes, I loved her—
and I am forgiven for that.
For her eyes
are not something a sorrowful soul like mine
can leave behind.

They were the home,
the night,
the closeness,
the grain we once watered
until it grew into a tree.

The scent of bread escaping her gaze,
the freedom that wiped its feet
on a tear we left on the threshold,
the butterflies that made a pillow for wanderers
from her dance—
and so many other things.

Yes, I loved Madeleine.
I loved her—
and you must understand.

Her silhouette splitting the sea
toward a long-awaited daybreak
has captivated me since childhood.

She knows my blood, and its rhythms.
She knows my coffee—and its bitterness.
My song that the falcon stole
from my grandmother’s tales—
she knows where he hid it.

So forgive me
for loving her instead of you.

Madeleine prefers
to pat the shoulders of the displaced
rather than go
to Mall of Arabia.

She can tell the difference
between the murderer
who built a city of killing
on the ruins of his victims,
and the free soul
who chose to carve his spirit
into a monument for the massacre.

My love,
I swear to you by God,
do not blame me—
do not leave me alone at night—
because I loved her more than you.

I loved Madeleine,
who knows the sea
as my father knows his coat,
his son’s secret,
and the measure of our sorrow—
especially mine.

For I was not
among those who lived aboard Madeleine.

Why didn’t fate
choose another path for me—
to be a fisherman, perhaps,
or someone who knows the sea’s roads,
so I could meet her there,
and we could dance together
the dance of freedom—
that freedom reduced
to a wretched statue
in an invented land
built on the corpses
of the murdered and displaced.

What if I were a pavement
that could meet Madeleine
in secret at dusk—
to share coffee as companions
reunited after a long loss?

Or if I were a sailor
who left his sorrow and his beloved
to open a new embrace
sealed by storms
and seasonal winds?

Or a city that traveled
in search of its heroes
among the stars?

Or an oar
that meets Madeleine’s hand
and rows
toward Gaza.