(for my wife, Huda)
As on the wings of time, I fly,
And pass over the years
with no sigh,
Winning and losing
with no cry,
This prayer I make and try:
That I lose not your face
night and day,
And find you by my side all
the way,
Then come what come may,
I shall have kept all gloom
at bay.
Born in Mogadishu, Somalia, the poet was raised in a politically prominent family; yet in his early teens, the poet and his family emigrated to the United States, where the poet lived for nearly two decades. The poet now lives in his land of birth and works as a freelance journalist and writer. He feels a particular attachment to John Keats and Percy Shelley for their vehement opposition to the inhumane effects on ordinary people such as the consequences of industrial development in their lifetimes–and reminds us that technological progress today does the same: ‘Weep, for the world is wrong!’ (Percy Shelley, “Dirge”)