A New Translation by Alana Marie Levinson-LaBrosse

Alana Marie Levinson-LaBrosse (poetry, ’12), with Soran Azad, has a new translation, of a poem by Jamal Khambar in Words Without Borders:

If You See Fatima

Translators’ note: Maria was the name of a girl murdered in an honor killing in Sweden; Fatima Shahindal was killed for the same reason a few years before Maria.

Maria,
If you see Fatima, tell her
They are still here, the women-killers, still here with knives,
Waiting.
Tell her still
This darkness, this killing devours us, all our seasons.
Tell Fatima
This atmosphere changes from one song to another,
One sea flies to another,
One garden gives rain to another.

….

Read more at Words Without Borders.