A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry

THE RECOIL FROM ROMANTICISM 254

subject of the poem: the rain, first to its joyful life-giving qualities, 'the
chuckles of children amid vine trellises', the excitement of birds on trees as
drops of rain fall, then to the negative side of rain, on the personal level:
evening yawning and clouds weeping heavy tears just as he had done as a
child, in his ravings before falling asleep about his recently dead mother
lying in a grave on the hillside, eating dust and drinking rain'. The personal
grief eventually turns into national:

I can almost hear the palm trees drinking rain

In Iraq, the villages groan, and exiles

With oars and sails struggling against the gusts

And thunders of the Gulf, chanting:

Rain. Rain.

Famine in Iraq.

At harvest time corn is scattered

To feed ravens and locusts

In the fields goes round

A mill, grinding grain and rock

With people around

Rain. Rain...

Not a year has passed without famine in Iraq

Rain. Rain.

In every drop of rain

A red or yellow flower bud

Every tear drop of the hungry and naked

Every blood drop of the enslaved

Is a smile awaiting new lips

Or a roseate nipple in the mouth of a newborn

In the youthful world of tomorrow, giver of life

Rain. Rain.

Iraq will grow green with the rainfall!

The word 'rain' (in Arabic it is the almost onomatopoeic matar) is repeated
several times like a refrain at the end of each section of the poem with a
hypnotic effect and creates an almost magical atmosphere in which the poet
is confident that his prayer for life-giving rain (i.e. political salvation) for
the whole of his country will be answered. It is interesting that the last section
of the poem contains no more than these words: 'And rain pours down.'
The complexity of themes, the tight organization, the swiftly moving imagery
which is strictly functional and not merely decorative, the use of obliquities
and symbols, to say nothing of the subtle internal music and rhythm and the
incantatory effect of the language — all these features make 'Hymn to Rain'
one of the most interesting poems in modern Arabic.