A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry

MUTRAN 75

tion between man and nature acquires a philosophic significance and the

whole universe is felt to be bound together in a harmonious order by means

of love, much in the manner of Shelley's vision. The idea is stated even more

explicitly by Mutran in his poem "Exculpation' (i,53):

Invisible atoms coming together

Revealing themselves in visible forms

Seeds are hugged by the earth

Which renders them as gardens in bloom.

And yonder stars, are they not pearls

Floating on teeming seas?

Scattered, yet strung together in orderly constellations

Love binding them to one another

And each is perpetually seeking its like?

The intensity of Mutran's feeling for nature is intimately bound up
with the depth of his love-passion. Mutran had an unhappy and unfulfilled
love affair early in his life, for the woman he loved died tragically young.^15
The experience had a profound and lasting effect upon him, and, as a result he
remained unmarried until his death at the age of seventy-seven. In a series
of love poems under the general heading 'A Tale ofTwo Lovers'(1897—1903)
he recorded the genesis and dramatic developments of this love, tracing its
course starting from their chance meeting in a park where she was stung
by a bee, to the happy times they enjoyed together, her departure as a
result of malicious interference by others, to the news of her illness which
led to her death and his reaction to her death. Referring to her under dif-
ferent names as Salma, Hind, Maria and Laila, Mutran gives expression to
the many facets of his highly idealized and spiritualized love. In one poem
(i,191) he claims that it is love that makes man 'real' and that without love
man remains like a shadow flitting across the surface of life, with no more
substance than that possessed by 'an image on a mirror'. In another (i, 194)
he assures his beloved that when he can no longer see her with his eyes he
can still see her with his heart. In a third (i,201) he wishes he had the spon-
taneity and freedom of the art of a bird, so that he could borrow the bird's
wings in order to fly from the troubled world of man to the carefree horizons
and to drink of their liquid light. The death of his beloved inspired much
moving poetry. In one poem, for instance, he says(i,216):

What use is the cup that remains

Now that the wine has gone?

Passion, the youth of the soul, has fled,

Hope has died; there is no joy

In either sleep or wakeftilness.