Contemporary Arab poetry
Ustura (myth)
If time was to begin all over again And water flooded the face of life And the earth shook and God hastened Requesting of me, "Noah, save The living!" I would not heed God's words. I would roam in my ark Clearing pebble and mud from the eyes of the dead. I would open out their depths to the flood. I would whisper in their veins that we Are back from the wilderness, out of the cave, That we have altered the firmanment of years, And that we sail undereterrd by fear, And do not listen to the words of God.
--Adunis (1930- )
