I Have No Power Nizar Qabbani


'I have no power to change you 
or explain your ways 
Never believe a man can change a woman 
Those men are pretenders 
who think 
that they created woman 
from one of their ribs 
Woman does not emerge from a man's rib's, not ever, 
it's he who emerges from her womb 
like a fish rising from depths of water 
and like streams that branch away from a river 
It's he who circles the sun of her eyes 
and imagines he is fixed in place 

I have no power to tame you 
or domesticate you 
or mitigate your first instincts 
This task is impossible 
I've tested my intelligence on you 
also my dumbness 
Nothing worked with you, neither guidance 
nor temptation 
Stay primitive as you are 

I have no power to break your habits 
for thirty years you have been like this 
for three hundred years 
a storm trapping in a bottle 
a body by nature sensing the scent of a man 
assaults it by nature 
triumphs over it by nature 

Never believe what a man says about himself 
that he is the one who makes the poems 
and makes the children 
It is the woman who writes the poems 
and the man who signs his name to them 
It is the woman who bears the children 
and the man who signs at the maternity hospital 
that he is the father 

I have no power to change your nature 
my books are of no use to you 
and my convictions do not convince you 
nor does my fatherly council do you any good 
you are the queen of anarchy, of madness, of belonging 
to no one 
Stay that way 
You are the tree of femininity that grows in the dark 
needs no sun or water 
you the sea princess who has loved all men 
and loved no one 
slept with all men… and slept with no one 
you are the Bedouin woman who went with all the tribes 
and returned a virgin 
Stay that way.'

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