MUHAMMAD GADDAFI MASOUD
Muhammad Gaddafi Masoud (conosciuto come Abu Salah), nato nel 1978 a Gharyan, in Libia, ha conseguito un diploma in teatro presso l’Istituto Jamal Al-Din Al-Miladi di Tripoli (2000) ed è autore di diverse raccolte, tra cui poesia lirica (Ci siamo svegliati nella gioia, 2006) e dialoghi giornalistici (I miei dialoghi con loro, 2008). Pubblicato ampiamente nel mondo arabo, il suo lavoro è stato tradotto in numerose lingue — inglese, cinese, spagnolo, polacco, francese, italiano e albanese — ed è apparso in riviste internazionali, sia cartacee che online, dalla Spagna all’Argentina. Nel 2024 è stato selezionato tra 72 poeti di tutto il mondo per un’antologia in lingua italiana curata da Angela Costa, a testimonianza della sua crescente presenza letteraria transnazionale.
Translation Dr . Salwa Goda
The poet
Muhammad Gaddafi Masoud (known as Abu Salah), born in 1978 in Gharyan, Libya, holds a theater diploma from Tripoli’s Jamal Al-Din Al-Miladi Institute (2000) and is the author of several collections, including lyrical poetry (We Woke Up to Joy, 2006) and journalistic dialogues (My Dialogues with Them, 2008). Widely published across the Arab world, his work has been translated into numerous languages—English, Chinese, Spanish, Polish, French, Italian, and Albanian—and appeared in international print and online journals from Spain to Argentina. In 2024, he was selected as one of 72 global poets for an Italian-language anthology curated by Angela Costa, reflecting his broadening transnational literary presence.
Ghosts Coming Home
A question plants its roots
deep in the dirt,
grows in the rain of being far from home.
My heart calls out to its own beat
until I hit the point
where a mountain of trouble gives way.
I come back, wanting a meeting
set in the frame of "never can be,"
whispering to the strings of feeling,
spinning glances from threads.
Every time I grit my teeth and step toward it,
stride confident,
I try to catch a moment that time washes away,
yanked back by a wire of fear,
laughed at by how things are.
Like the road to Jerusalem,
the road to you feels impossible.
In my town, suspicions
are sharp tongues.
Love's ghosts come home
carrying disappointments.
For you, my heart drifts in daydreams,
looking for a nest bullets can't find,
a road where the poet meets
a rose named Fatima.
Her nails are short, won't scratch what's proper,
her tongue is soft,
dripping honey-words.
Nothing in front of me, nothing behind.
All the talking's done...
just silver linings of sadness.
No sweetheart do I trust
who's fluent in every tongue.
Every time the sun comes close,
I fail to catch a ride on my own shadow.
Naked with Certainty
One nap-time,
she pulled back the curtains of her glare,
let her sadness go naked.
Layla doesn't give mirrors a chance
to catch what's alike and not alike.
She became one with the clear rain,
curled into laughter on the skyline,
she knew the wolf's kiss was danger.
First to arrive, a knight
carrying baskets of myths,
wiping away alone-ness.
Oh, the running away of names from their names,
and the end of questions where they start.
I whispered in autumn's ear,
"Hide from the seasons' calm."
Rain stitches the earth a shirt
for those naked with certainty.
On the House's Hip
We write on the house's hip:
We are here.
We chew on the street's loneliness
'til the alley turns
into a moon on the soul's shoulder.
The wind's wound...
you tell it like a secret.
Lightning drinks its glass,
and we drink down the question.
Sparrows soften the bitter cold.
What's the point of staying...?
The olive tree left it to the windows
to tell what's left
of the shouting inside us,
tossing it in the grinder.
Wheat of Words
Rain draws up
houses in the clouds,
chairs made of light.
Angels plow the night
of happiness.
They plant songs in
the brass threshing-floors,
beating the wheat of words.