How to See the Columns as Palm Trees

Book. 2020

This publication is the seventh in the Kayfa Ta book series, comprising a single verse of poetry on “Abdallāh -The Slain” (Abdallāh al Qateel), a poet who was killed by the last thing he saw: the columns of the castle as palm trees. The book, is composed from the footnotes around the works of this poet, who only exists on the margins of the arabic literary canon. The text extends to reflect on monumentality, architectural descriptions, disappearance of texts and histories, and the different ways a metaphor could kill it's poet. 

“For so it happens that when the poets speak, objects appear closer to their own shadows.  The poet’s mouth fills up with horses and marble, and his verses start to shine like rivers.  These rivers as such then flow through the palace as depicted.  The poet’s own words begin to weigh down on him, as though he were holding up a palace with his palms. Thus his word has become a palace—a newborn image that he relays across town and country.  Each person that hears the poem and memorizes a few verses will go on to share it with his people, and the palace is carried along their lips.  Then, as people release the poetry from their lips, they forget some parts or add their own.  In this manner it reaches the major recensionists, who write it down in books.  Lesser recensionists copy it from there, and either add to it or subtract but minor details,I so that the image changes a thousand times.” (*)
 

(*)Excerpt from the book.