Tismẓay n Tayri: The Seasons of Love [Aram]

Even if we were presented with evidence to the contrary, we could still easily convince ourselves that love was at the inception of poetry. Doesn't the heart—the "liver" too!—sing without music, when love comes blundering about, on its way in or out? Hymns be damned, no god made the heart sing the way a (be)lover does—mystic poetry aside, precisely! Passion raises the voice in song, to delight, exult, rejoice, swoon, languish, fret, pine, grieve, holler, rage, snipe, etc. It holds the key to the poet's heart and words. Where I am from, there is a story that tells of how poetry sprung into the world, a "poetogony" of sorts. Not surprisingly, it is a story of star-crossed lovers, whose thwarted passion leads to the ultimate end, and only then does their "community" reunite them in death by burying them side-by-side. Reeds grow out of the young man's grave, and a vine from the young woman's; they intertwine, and when the wind blows they whisper to each other, and sing of love. One can  easily hear a shepherd's flute sing, as a prelude to a tamawayt, a type of poem. The story is rich in symbols and archetypal myth making stuff: Love is only realized in death as poetry, through metamorphosis and under an animating spirit. We can reverse the grammar and say: poetry emerges when the self is transformed and animated: the breath of the wind both daimon and song. But let me leave it to the poet to (un)pack:

            Awa giġ tin uġanim ur digi adif
            a yazwu ur digi may tssrgigiyt

            I am hollowed and without marrow, like a reed

            there is nothing for you to shake, o wind!

One more word to close this exordium: in Tashlḥiyt and Tamaziɣt, one of the words used to mean poetry is /amarg/; it also means "love, yearning, melancholy, sadness".

Below are a few izlan (verses) from the Central Atlas region of Morocco. They span the gamut of feelings love triggers and spurs the mouth to sing. These verses were transcribed by Bassou Hamri in La Poésie amazighe de l'Atlas central marocain (IRCAM, Fasc. No: 19). Some are of his own collecting, others are Michael Peyron's in Isaffen Ghbanin. I have overall kept to Hamri's transcription: /y/=/g/, /c/=/k/

1. Figurations of love

            Amarg amm rrami dinna y icti wul taḥyyaḥt
            ini ɛari ac id inġ a luḥc

            Love is like a hunter; when the heart yearns for the chase
            he runs up the mountain to bring down the beast

            Amarg amm ṭṭikuk ur igi lɛc
            ur yuru tiglay, ur iyi rbbi gg winns 
            ġas axlidj nna xf izdġ
            ar isnyuddu llġa 

            Love is like a cuckoo bird: nestless
            no egg laid, and not a care for its own ;
            in whichever tree it settles
            it hops in song !

2. Burning Fires

            Ulinw icmḍ aggʷu wrt id ikkin
            lɛafit usmun llattawġ jaj iġṣan inw

            I see no smoke, though my heart is burning
            it is my love's fire grazing in my bones

            Ulinw amm ubrrad ar inggʷa

            iy usmun amm ṛṛabus iḥḍut s uṣuṭ

            My heart, a kettle whistling on embers
            my love is the bellows kindling the fire 

3. Exuberance

            A yajḍiḍ nɛari ḍrd ad awn inix
            sslam gg ifr awit inn i wḥbib ar taxamt

            Mountain bird, drop down for a word
            greetings on your wing, take them to my lover's tent

            Nnix ac tammt imi uḥbib ay tlla
            umma tizizwa xs da ttawġ tuga wxttuf

            Honey is  in my lover's mouth, I tell you
            bees only get to forage in wild weeds

            a ṭṭalb a sidi ca wḥbib ay ġuri
            ttcx imtmi nns ṛmḍan
            is ur igi lmɛṣiyt ?

           Jurist, Sir! I do have a lover
            I swallowed his saliva and it is Ramadan
            is it not a sin ?

4. Nesting & Cold Pragmatism

            a yasmun taxamt nnc ay ḥdadjax
            umma lmiɛad n ɛari ur ax ibrrid ul

            My love it is your tent I crave

            mountain rendezvous do not soothe my heart

            tirit rix c maca ṭṭmɛ adda wr iḥaḍṛ walu 
            add ur as tcid i wḥdadi lɛlf ur c yusiy

            I love you, I do, but where is the livelihood?
            A stallion not properly fed cannot ride!

5. Things fall apart

            ttcix tijdjiyin n tuga nnm a talmut
            qqar nġdd tqqimid dġi gam nssawġ

            Prairie, I have eaten your flowering buds

            you can dry up now that I have grazed

            a way nḥubba nw a bu wrbi n tiddukla
            max is nya izzyar ad ittawġ ca dat ca ?!

            My love, your lovers are armfuls

            are we bovines to graze one after another?

            a talxatmt ikkan aḍaḍ inw
            ur cm iṭfar wul
           nsikka cm yad i wfus inw 

            Ring I have worn around my finger

            my heart no longer follows

            now that you've been thru my hands

Perhaps, this vengeful bunch should have heeded this counsel:

            a yasmun lɛar nnun agga (y) ifsti
            mc ax bḍant lmqadir iwa y amm nkkin 

            My love silence is in your trust

            if fate tears us apart, do as I would.

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