Palestinian Poet Mahmoud Darwish Poems

Mahmoud Darwish poems are powerful poems that often address themes of identity, homeland, and exile.

Mahmoud Darwish مَحمُود دَرْوِيْش was a Palestinian poet and author who was Palestine’s national poet. He won many awards for his work. He is the author of over 30 books of poetry.

Mahmoud Darwish’s love poetry is known for its expressive qualities. He is celebrated for his works, which explore themes of love, loss, and the Palestinian experience.

His poetry reflects a deep connection to his homeland and the struggles of the Palestinian people. To My Mother” is one of Darwish’s most famous poems.

It was written when he was in an Israeli prison. He had dedicated a series of love poems to an Israeli Jewish woman whom he had met in Haifa in his early twenties.

In this poetry collection, we have collected some of the famous Mahmoud Dervish poems about love. Let’s enjoy them.

Palestine Poem By Mahmoud Darwish

This land gives us
all that makes life worth living:
April’s blushing advances,
the aroma of bread at dawn,
a woman’s haranguing of men,
the poetry of Aeschylus,
love’s trembling beginning,
moss on a stone
mothers dancing on a flute’s thread
and the invaders’ fear of memories.

This land give us
all that makes life worth living:
September’s rustling end,
a woman leaving forty behind with her apricots,
an hour of sunlight in prison,
clouds reflecting swarms of insects,
a people’s applause for those who laugh at their erasure,
and the tyrant’s fear of songs.

This land give us
all that makes life worth living:
Lady Earth, mother of all beginnings and endings,
She was called Palestine
and she is still called Palestine.
My Lady, because you are my Lady, I deserve life.

A Lover From Palestine

Her eyes are Palestinian
Her name is Palestinian
Her dress and sorrow Palestinian
Her kerchief, her feet, and body Palestinian
Her words and silence Palestinian
Her voice Palestinian
Her birth and her death Palestinian

I Come From

I come from there and I have memories
Born as mortals are, I have a mother
And a house with many windows,
I have brothers, friends,
And a prison cell with a cold window.
Mine is the wave, snatched by sea-gulls,
I have my own view,
And an extra blade of grass.
Mine is the moon at the far edge of the words,
And the bounty of birds,
And the immortal olive tree.
I walked this land before the swords
Turned its living body into a laden table.

I come from there. I render the sky unto her mother
When the sky weeps for her mother.
And I weep to make myself known
To a returning cloud.
I learnt all the words worthy of the Court of blood
So that I could break the rule.
I learnt all the words and broke them up
To make a single word: homeland…

Psalm 9

O rose beyond the reach of time and of the senses
O kiss enveloped in the scarves of all the winds
surprise me with one dream
that my madness will recoil from you
Recoiling from you
In order to approach you
I discovered time
Approaching you
in order to recoil form you
I discovered my senses
Between approach and recoil
there is a stone the size of a dream
It does not approach
It does not recoil
You are my country
A stone is not what I am
therefor I do not like to face the sky
not do I die level with the ground
but I am a stranger, always a stranger

My Mother

I long for my mother’s bread
My mother’s coffee
Her touch
Childhood memories grow up in me
Day after day
I must be worth my life
At the hour of my death
Worth the tears of my mother.

And if I come back one day
Take me as a veil to your eyelashes
Cover my bones with the grass
Blessed by your footsteps
Bind us together
With a lock of your hair
With a thread that trails from the back of your dress
I might become immortal
Become a God
If I touch the depths of your heart.

If I come back
Use me as wood to feed your fire
As the clothesline on the roof of your house
Without your blessing
I am too weak to stand.

I am old
Give me back the star maps of childhood
So that I
Along with the swallows
Can chart the path
Back to your waiting nest.

The Horse Fell Off the Poem

The horse fell off the poem
and the Galilean women were wet
with butterflies and dew,
dancing above chrysanthemum

The two absent ones: you and I
you and I are the two absent ones

A pair of white doves
chatting on the branches of a holm oak

No love, but I love ancient
love poems that guard
the sick moon from smoke

I attack and retreat, like the violin in quatrains
I get far from my time when I am near
the topography of place …

There is no margin in modern language left
to celebrate what we love,
because all that will be … was

The horse fell bloodied
with my poem
and I fell bloodied
with the horse’s blood …

Pride and Fury

O Homeland! O Eagle,
Plunging, through the bars of my cell,
Your fiery beak in my eyes!
All I possess in the presence of death
Is pride and fury.

I have willed that my heart be planted as a tree,
That my forehead become an abode for skylarks.
O eagle,
I am unworthy of your lofty wing,
I prefer a crown of flame.

O homeland!
We were born and raised in your wound,
And ate the fruit of your trees,
To witness the birth of your daybreak.
O eagle unjustly languishing in chains,
O legendary death which once was sought,
Your fiery beak is still plunged in my eye.

A Man And A Fawn Play Together In A Garden

A man and a fawn play together in a garden…
I say to my friend: ‘Where did this little one
come from? ‘ He says: ‘From Heaven – perhaps he’s
the prophet John come back to me in my loneliness.
I’ve been blessed with his company. He has no mother
to nurture him so I became his mother, I give him
goat’s milk mixed with a spoonful of scented honey
and carry him like a lover’s cloud through an oak forest.’
I said to my friend: ‘Has he become familiar with
this house of yours, filled with voices and utensils? ‘
My friend said: ‘He even lies in my bed when he’s ill.
I become sickly when he does. I hallucinate:
O orphaned child, I’m your father and mother,
get up and teach me tranquility.’ I waited one month
before visiting my friend’s rural home. And his words
came with tears, strong Solomon wept for the first time,
telling me in a quivering voice:
‘This son of the father deer and the mother deer
died in my arms. He couldn’t adjust to a domestic life.
But his death isn’t like yours or mine.’ I said nothing
to my desolate friend. He didn’t bid me goodbye
with a recitation of verse, as usual. He walked to the tomb
of the white deer. He gathered sand in his hands
and cried: ‘Rise up, my son, so your father can sleep
in your bed – only there can I know tranquility.’
He is asleep in the fawn’s grave and I have
a small past in this place…
A man and a fawn lie together in a garden…

The Pigeons Fly

The pigeons fly,
the pigeons come down…

Prepare a place for me to rest.
I love you unto weariness,
your morning is fruit for songs
and this evening is precious gold
the shadows are strong as marble.
When I see myself,
it is hanging upon a neck that embraces only the clouds,
you are the air that undresses in front of me like tears of the grape,
you are the beginning of the family of waves held by the shore.
I love you, you are the beginning of my soul, and you are the end…
the pigeons fly
the pigeons come down…

I am for my lover I am. And my lover is for his wandering star
Sleep my love
on you my hair braids, peace be with you…
the pigeons fly
the pigeons come down…

Oh, my love, where are you taking me away from my parents,
from my trees, small bed and from my weariness,
from my visions, from my light, from my memories and pleasant evenings,
from my dress and my shyness,
where are you taking me my love, where?
You take me, set me on fire, and then leave me
in the vain path of the air
that is a sin … that is a sin…
the pigeons fly
the pigeons come down…

My love, I fear the silence of your hands.
Scratch my blood so the horse can sleep.
My love, female birds fly to you
take me as a wife and breathe.
My love I will stay and breasts will grow for you
The guards take me out of your way
my love, I will cry upon you, upon you, upon you.
because you are die surface of my sky.
My body is the land,
the place for you…
the pigeons fly
the pigeons come down.

We have a big collection of Mahmoud Derwaish’s love poetry, which he left. He once said, You are killing me, and you are keeping me from dying. That is love.

Mahmoud Darwish Love Poems

O those who pass between fleeting words
Carry your names, and be gone
Rid our time of your hours, and be gone
…
It is time for you to be gone
Live wherever you like, but do not live among us
It is time for you to be gone
Die wherever you like, but do not die among us

My Past

If you have taken this rubble for my past
raking through it for fragments you could sell
know that I long ago moved on
deeper into the heart of the matter
If you think you can grasp me, think again:
my story flows in more than one direction
a delta springing from the riverbed
with its five fingers spread

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