Sleeping Woman

___________________

Her book,

open and overturned like a small tent,

her glasses, her ashtray,

her exhaustion hanging in the room

like the shadows of a lamp she had forgotten to switch off

before she went to bed,

her green aspirin strip

with four pills missing,

our late night argument,

which ended in confusion and compassion

still hanging in the obscurity of this dawn

that will now pass

from darkness to the sun,

everything

brought her so suddenly to mind

that I could hardly believe

she was still asleep.

(Translated by Radwa Ashour)

From A Mad Night, (1996)