The Dress and Grapes
By: Dr. William Nassar
Translated by: Adib S. Kawar
In between the Nazarene women’s dresses and the Galilee vineyards there are threads of dawn and magic… thus it is impossible to find a Canaanite woman that denies the relation between her holy breasts and the grapes of Nazareth, as is the case with our brothers of Bethlehem who can never deny the relation between the womb and the wine of Cana and the august Nazarene of the Galilee.
Glorified is the creator… glorified is beauty…
Blessed is dew and bunch of grapes…
From the old Canaanite grandmother down to the lady of the Intifadah…
From the Sabra and Chatila massacre down to the peace puzzle…
And from the peace puzzle down to the massacres of Qana of the Galilee and the triple crucifixion of Christ…
And from Qana of the Galilee up to the siege and assassination of Gaza “for the protection of progressivism of the Palestinian cause”.
And from the assassination and the siege of Gaza up to granting the “Ramallah president” the green light for the liquidation of “The Right of Return” we are still fighting with gods about the dress and grapes…
Yes… since the first Canaanite god we are still quarrelling with the other nation’s gods about the dress and grapes…
And from the first sparkle and up to its death in grief about negotiations, conciliation, and recognition of the enemy state we are still quarrelling with ourselves about the dress and grapes…
O… global Canaanite god… when would your left or whatever is left of it, that in spite of the multiplicity of the dress the homeland is still one…
You…or whatever is left of the Palestinian left…
Would I be guilty if I declare that I am the last person left of the holy Canaanite progeny…
And if I was guilty… it would be better if you consider me guilty rather then that the homeland to considers me so… or that Um AL-Izz (mother of glory) would consider me so!!!
In exile O my dear enemy comrades, and so as I wouldn’t die of subjugation… I shall hold to things that I inherited from my maternal grandmother… hearing about a homeland that I love without knowing it…
I keep a big portrait of an old woman that live in the Khan Younis refugee camp, which I received by E-mail from her son that I was fraternized with…
A brother who my mother didn’t give birth to, Izz El-Dine, who brought me a handful of soil from the land of Canaan when we met… But the night watchers and guards of Camp David closed in his face the cross pass so as the handful of soil would not reach me…
Does any of you my enemy comrades reserve anything from our homeland?
In my undertaken exile, I carry the homeland all round the clock… my maternal grandfather’s home key… or a mawal ataba* song… the portrait of Assdoud Canaanite Um Al-Izz… And sometimes a rosary made of holy Canaanite olivewood…
What do you carry?
*****
In my voluntary exile O my enemy comrades… Sometimes I am cheerful and cry any time I see the picture of a Palestinian dress worn by a lofty old woman…
O my enemy comrades…
Do you know that the embroidery on dresses originated from warm hearts and the topographic reliefs of vineyard?
And the stitch on dresses borrows charm from dew drops on a grape before sunrise and before birds wakeup and fly?
This is my passion for Nazarene women’s dresses… what would you say if I talk about dresses of Assdoud, Haifa, Jaffa, Lid, Safad, Al-Quds and Akka that I hold on my head?
What do you think if I talk to you about my worship for the stitch in the Ghazawi dress?
Blessed is God…
A homeland given to those who doesn’t deserve… and the dress remains mine…
O my homeland…
How many times did you mount the back of the sun and the chords of my harp were broken?
How many times did you walk of the sheets of the winds and I didn’t find you?
O… you dress…
Do I love my homeland or the homeland kills me?
O… you dress…
Did you tell the homeland to be silent in my chest… My homeland now is postponed…
My homeland is asleep in its underwear… exactly like my old comrades…
And I am exactly like my former comrades… I need to sleep… But in my military fatigue and ready for action…
Thus my enemy comrades… leave me alone to sleep…
For maybe I wake up on a dress…
Or on a grape…
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Dr. William Nassar… composer and political singer living in exile…
Member of the high committee for Al-Quds an Arab Cultural capita 2009.
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