Iraqi Art and Poetry 

 

 

 

 

 AL A'TABA

 

(The Threshold)

 


* This Night In Fallujah

* I Am Fallujah

* Freedom carol

* Dragon's Teeth (Lawrence Ferlinghetti)

* Sura- Mn -Ra’a

* Ya Ali

* The Way the War Gets Born


The art of  Hashim Al-Tawil

Hashim Al-Tawil is Professor of Art History at Henry Ford Community College, Michigan (USA). He completed his education in Iraq and in the USA, and worked in Iraq in the seventies and eighties on the faculty of the college of Fine arts, University of Baghdad, and was active in the Iraqi visual art and cultural scene. His research interests are directed towards history, art, and visual culture of the Arab world and Islam. As a visual artist, much of his work is derived from the subject of his research. His recent focus is on the hybridity of the Mediterranean culture in medieval time. He received a Fulbright senior research grant for 2007 in Italy, and a fellowship from Nantes Institute for Advanced Studies, France for 2011. Since the invasion of Iraq he has given tens of lectures and presentations on the destruction of Iraqi culture and more specifically in the area of the systematic and deliberate dismantling of Iraq's diverse and inclusive modern art landscape.


the greed of death

a poem by john bart gerald 

 

what is stronger than the greed of death ?

who can resist its armies in the field ?

who buys off the terror of its acquisition ?

where are the iraqis  haitians  sudanese

peoples of rwanda  congo, guatemala  peru

coined for profit to the daily lives of strangers ?

how far is your distance from this pain ?

where does the greed come from

that denies another life for a moment's comfort ?

that burns a people for their birthright ?

that makes white of black and

those who have ?

 

taste of lemon 

a hummingbird

a hungry child  

mangoes in a crate

fifty slabs of cod 

cans of tomato sauce like shell casings stacked high

a bag of rice

child's hand on first nourishment

given

 

but what is stronger than the greed of death ?

are the fields the peoples ?

is the land - are the streets ?
are the halls of government ?

courts that serve strangers ?

the grey corridors of pain ?

people needing love puzzled by shame

generations bent to obscurity on a path of  light

forced to repetition of no exit but

death the rule that claims everyone

 

who is stronger than the greed of death ?

je ne les laisse pas entrer l'oublie

it's never of the people this greed

people only ask for freedom

so many choosing together are freedom

what is stronger than the greed of death ?

 

we take on death piece by piece

and at the death of greed rejoice