Convivencia, poems by Annelinde Metzner

For this post, I’ve collected five of my poems from the past ten years up to the present, which are centered around the people and cultures of the Middle East. Like the region, the poems are filled with hope and unspeakable grief.

Convivencia

The three musicians on the stage-
     the Trio Sefardi,
     music of the Jews of Iberia.
Forced out of Spain in 1492, they spread to the diaspora,
     France, Morocco, Turkey, Yugoslavia.
Drifting deep into the Ladino songs,
     I blink and I’m walking a cobblestone street
     in my Medieval village.
Children kick a ball, carry bread dough, fetch water.
     I wave hello and I hear it!  
     I hear the music!
On the village square, three musicians play,
     the lute, the daff, the rebec,
     chanting songs of love and history.
A single word comes to me,
     full, full, full of tears and longing: convivencia.
Hundreds of  years of music and peaceful coexistence,
   Muslim, Christian, Jew,
     here in these cobblestone streets of Spain,
     France, Morocco, Egypt,
     these ancient Mediterranean lands
     where all the faiths lived comfortably, side-by-side.
Enjoying each other, living, thriving,
     the oud, the lute, the guitar,
     loving their common language, music.
Convivencia,
     living together in peace.

Annelinde Metzner, June 2019

The Platter of Dates

This is the Holy Month of Ramadan,
a time to dwell on Scripture, and to pray.
Heaven is wide open.
A time to fast all day ‘til the sun goes down.
I remember, touring Morocco,
our gala nights of dancing and singing,
the Sufi Issawa.
Praising God all night long.
The repetition of the chants, call and response,
the hypnotizing movements of the body,
the long, slow, beckoning solo,
pulling us into each song.
As we danced and sang, young people
roamed the floor with platters of dates,
assuring we would not faint in ecstasy. 
Today on the radio, a Muslim woman
remembers her father’s store in New York,
owned by Muslims, staffed by Jews and Hispanics.
At dusk, everyone broke the fast together!
She carried a platter of dates,
to break the fast with all who would partake.
This is the world of possibility.
This is the soft bed of my dreams.
The platter of dates at dusk,
the smiles and thank you’s all around,
the long sacred days devoted to God,
the oneness of our holiness, all one, everyone.
The touch of a soft scarf against my neck.
The generous hand of a young woman,
her platter of dates.

Annelinde Metzner, June 2016

Burying the Dead

Mahmoud digs the grave of his mother, his father,
two brothers and a sister.
“Thud, thud,” we hear on the radio,
as the shovel digs at the hardened earth.
Asha, in her seventies,
has dug the graves of her daughter and her grandchildren.
“Thud, thud.”  We hear the steady sound
of grief, of overwhelm,
of terror, of exhaustion, in Gaza.
Families obliterated by bombs from the sky.
“Bombs, bombs, all we hear is bombs,”
says the twelve-year-old, picking his way through the rubble.
Asha now lives in a tent
beside the cemetery, beside her family’s graves,
the only space left in the crowded refugee camp.
There is a blindness, a berserker madness,
a one-pointed focus
that sees only enemies and no one else,
blind to the innocent masses who hover near.
Forty thousand killed.
It’s in one man’s character, in his DNA, 
to see only the enemies,
blind to all else.
Nothing can penetrate this blindness, 
not even the thousand wails of women
dying, or burying their dead.

Annelinde Metzner, August 2024

Malala’s Birthday Speech

“In the name of God, the most beneficent, the most merciful…”
Malala Yousafzai in her birthday address to the UN Youth Assembly, July 9, 2013

A pink lacy shawl frames her dark hair and determined face. She is sixteen!
Confident and convivial, she commands the podium in front of the world’s leaders.
Sixteen! Malala has survived a gunshot at close range,
on her schoolbus in Pakistan,
a target of the Taliban for speaking her strong mind.
She has survived!

“Respected elders, and my dear brothers and sisters, Salaam Aleichem.”

She fingers her delicate shawl, bequeathed from Benazir Bhutto,
one woman to another, a gift of strength from across time and beyond the veil.
“This time, we women will do it for ourselves.
Thank you to God, for whom we are all equal!
I speak so that those without voice can be heard.”

Her mother wipes away tears.
Men in suits stare, making space in their consciousness for Malala,
for this empowered young woman who has enraptured the world.

“Weakness, fear and hopelessness died.
Strength, fervor and courage were born.”

The room breaks out in emotion-filled applause.
Imbued with ahimsa, forgiveness and non-violence,
her strength uplifts us all.

Annelinde Metzner, July 2013

Dancing with Swords

It seemed like water was everywhere-
     the shimmer of scarves,
     the shimmy of womanly bellies, muscular and yet soft.
Skin billowing wave-like to the beats.
The dancer carried water upon her head,
     blessing us, blessing us, healing our ills,
     casting water upon the Earth for its deep magick.
The room grew quiet, and a dark-haired dancer emerged,
     black skirts and gold, black leather, pearls in her hair,
     and-  what’s that?
     around her waist and shoulder, a snake.
Dancing with her!  The snake in love with her,
     this watery undulation hers too,
     the power of the serpentine.  
Soft power.
And all at once it’s long ago,
     women gathering to share this,
     this movement, this joy, uniting us
     with our bodies, with our Earth.
The Goddess is here!  Six women dancing with swords!
There is such power…
And the Goddess says, “Do not forget me!”
Thousands of years have passed
     since Inanna first dropped her veils
     to the tune of the ancient modes, with santur, oud and dumbek.
“Do not be ignorant of Me,” She cries across the ages,
with the seven swords balanced.
“Be wise. Be aware.”

Annelinde Metzner, March 2015

Below is the link for my arrangement, “For the Holy Land,” performed by Abraham Jam in 2019.