Fathieh Saudi

Fathieh Saudi was born in Jordan.  She lives in London. Having completed her medical studies in France, she worked as a consultant paediatrician in Jordan and Lebanon; mainly with Palestinian and Lebanese refugees, and disadvantaged children. For more than 30 years she has been working for peace and the defence of human rights in national and international contexts. Fathieh also maintains a keen interest in women’s voices, and in the interfaith movement, dialogue, language and literary translation.
Her published full length poetry collections include: "Prophetic Children Abraham Moses Jesus Mohammed" (with a foreword by John Berger), "Daughter of the Thames" (a semi autobiographical collection drawing on issues of identity, trauma, language and hope), and "Bint Alnaher" in Arabic. She has translated several books from English and French into Arabic, including the novel "From A to X” by John Berger. Her previous other publications include "l'Oubli rebelle", memoirs in French, and "Days of Amber", memoirs in Arabic.
She gave several poetry readings or performances in the United Kingdom, France, Columbia, Jordan, and Morocco...etc.

Fathieh is the recipient of several awards for her social, cultural and humanitarian work, notably the Chevalier de L’Order du Merite, from France.
She lives in London.

 

Looking for me  

 

My homeland was far away,

my father was dead,

my mother left behind,

my friends were scattered

my loved ones had gone away.

 

I stopped receiving letters.

My inbox was empty.

My phone fell silent.

The four corners of the world

turned pale.

 

My body was suddenly ageing.

My mind, emptied of memories,

slammed the door of thought.

The wind alone whispered at my window.

 

from faraway an alphabet came

shattering the silence

into a necklace of words.

 

A winged word was looking for me,

I caught sight of it flying just above my head.

 

Beirut

 

My childhood taught me the alphabet.

Beirut taught me the language of life,

 

for her I raise an altar in my heart.

 

How does a city come to be in pain,

like you and I?

 

Beirut city of the soul, my body embraces you.

What am I- 

 

observer or  witness?

Can I stop consciousness knocking at my heart?

 

What can we do to stem the flood?

 

In Beirut I saw the walls of the world

built with bombs, with molten iron.

 

In Beirut I understood the meaning of life.

I touched the essence of humanity.

 

Beirut, o remain with me

protect the rhythm of my soul,

 

for the sake of hope,

of a just world without walls.

 

Jaikour

 

On my twentieth birthday, I dreamt

my daughter’s name would be Jaikour.

 

I imagined her beautiful, graceful

shiny black hair,

a smile that outshone a comet,

a heart that melted pearls.

She would always be generous.

 

Jaikour, Jaikour.

I never ventured there,

a small village next to the Euphrates,

birthplace of Alsayab, my favourite

poet a long time ago.

 

In his dreams, between cries of pain,

from his hospital bed in London,

he called incessantly “Jaikour, Jaikour…”

 

I gave Jaikour a soul.

Today, thirty years later,

though my child is not yet born,

though Jaikour was erased by wars,

I continue to love the mystery of this word.

Jaikour, Jaikour.

 

Jaikour is the birth place of the Iraqi poet Bader Shaker Alsayab. In his poetry, Jaikour is a symbol of fertility and salvation.

 

 

Vertical    

To Sylvia Plath

 

Desperate, I ask the blind to show me

the way. I long to save my life.

 

She wasn’t my mother

yet she gave me life again.

 

I contemplate her face,

glimpse her tears, sense her anger.

 

I reach the space around her,

I grasp the stars of life.

 

She teaches me

to step towards my river,

 

walk on water like a seagull,

leap onto a transparent line of life,

 

build a home from the alphabet,

fly with broken wings.

 

She teaches me

to cross a bridge at the edge of life,

 

survive a storm,

yet remain vertical.

 

Vertical.

 

Meeting with the king

Tonight, tonight

will it be my last night?

 

I will be in the arms of the angry king,

he will crush my lungs. An unspoken word

will be my last breath.

 

Which word will it be,

which word will end my life,

In what language?

 

Will it be a  piercing scream or silent?

Will it be painful?

 

My steps dragged me to his palace

a westerly wind blew on my face

the  palm trees ached with cold.

 

I saw my death screaming in his eyes

he had already killed me

yet I continued to be alive!

 

Suddenly a rebel grew inside me:

deadened feelings can’t decide my end,

I would choose my own death.

 

The king said: what last wish do you utter?

I murmured: a glass of water.

 

The drops of water turned into a lake

the lake into a river

the river into a sea

I was in a womb again.

 

With my last sip of water

an unknown voice formed within me

words flowed to my lips like pearls

opening into many shapes.

 

I had never heard my voice before

my words were tender, whispering

stories from faraway lands:

babies born from a rainbow

wounds healed by a smile

the moon dropping rain

the sun warming midnight,

 

humans born from water

flying mountains embracing the clouds

grass growing tall to shelter lovers

hearts speaking through time and space.

 

How many months, years

had passed away? The king’s eyes

remained open. A white feather

has touched his heart.

 

Tonight I know, the king can’t  break my life

tonight is the last of the thousand and one nights

tonight I will leave his palace

tonight my life is mine.

 

 

One hundred fingers

 

Her wings were full of dust. She plummeted

into mother earth.

 

She held her breath,

scrabbled deep in the rocks

so much to remove, to push away,

 

digging with her ten fingers,

with her hundred fingers.

Her heart shrank.

 

The earth’s womb was filled with fire and rock.

No water to quench the blaze.

 

Her last breath, an eruption of strength,

a tiny space opened between layers of rock,

she forced the tip of one finger through,

 

found a space to pass, then another and another,

until from the darkness her hand emerged.

 

Her body felt a fresh

breath coming from a shy sun.

 

A butterfly moved inside,

another flutter of her wings,

and rocks around crumbled.

 

She was resurrected

on the earth.