If Only the Boy had Been a Stone

She was saying, as a lie which no shadow follows
And an illness which her step accompanies not
The apple has no name, only that which I say

I am cursed
For no one walks to the meaning but I

She was saying

And I was seeking my hand in her chest

She was concealing the face of God between two songs

O Lord

When she walked she confused the children in my heart

And she would, by the conversation’s details,

Once again make the apples the victims, heading for the meaning

She accused the metaphor of the boy

“If only the boy had been a stone.”

And I…was just myself

I tried to be like others

Clearly, or with faded steps

Catching his shadow by the legs

And retuning the violin, your blouse

Then I tried

But I was…just myself

Mine the parchment boat

I push it against the river of time

My collar is turned up and I return from myself

And mine the violet's doubt

When it climbs the stairs of walls

And throws the poem between the woman’s breasts

In order to be reassured of the words,

Of the details – I think they are insignificant like me –

Like the position of the shirt’s button on the breast

The colour of your hand’s discussion

The movement of two moons in the body's ocean

She was saying

And birds gathered on my lips

As if...no shadow followed her
And no trace accompanied her step

A stone on my heart

And if only the girl could send back the trees from her dress

A stone on my heart

“If only the boy had been a stone.”

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‘If only the boy had been a stone’ was a phrase used by the Arabian poet Tamim bin Muqbil. With the advent of Islam he became a Muslim, but on discovering that his way of life would have to change he decided it would have been preferable if he had been a stone rather than human before that.