Never a bird had fairer scientific name than Upupa epops, the jaunty hoopoe, for which the Arabic is hudhud. “Heron” is balaSHUN.

I experience this delicate lyric written in Arabic as all signal with no noise. If it alludes to other than what it says, I’m clueless. The poem exalts confusion, and being humbly confused is divine in my book. Wallowing in certainty is where mischief lies. Only today I read this: … Stay with the questions and entertain doubt as the unlikely bedrock of understanding.

The translation to English and transliteration of the Arabic text are mine.

2013-8-16
I sing of you, O bird, migrating heron.
I sing of your whiteness, and your unhurried gait in fallow land.
I sing of you also, O hoopoe, who are resident.
I sing of your little crown as you gather seeds in the plowed field.
I am like this, my song is confused;
it puts one foot in the fallow land
and another in the plowed land.
One time I say the prayer of the resident,
another the prayer of the traveler.
(Zakaria Mohammed, Poetry, September 2023)

‘uḡannī-ka yā ṭā’ir(a)-l-balašūn(a)-l-muhājir(a).
‘uḡannī bayāḍ(a)-ka, wa-mišyaẗ(a)-ka-l-mutamahhilaẗ(a) fī-l-‘arḍ(i)-l-būr(i).
wa-‘uḡannī-ka ‘anta ‘aiḍ(an) yā hudhud(a)-l-‘iqāmaẗ(i).
‘uḡannī tuwaij(a)-ka wa-‘anta talquṭ(u)-l-ḥab(a) fī-l-‘arḍ(i)-l-maḥrūṯaẗ(i).
‘anā hakaḏā ‘uḡnīyaẗī mubalbalaẗ(un)
taḍa^(u) qadam(an) fī-l-‘arḍ(i)-l-būr(i)
wa-‘uẖrā fī-l-‘arḍ(i)-l-maḥrūṯaẗ(i).
marraẗ(an) ‘uṣallī ṣalāẗ(a)-l-muqīm(i)
wa-‘uẖrā ṣalāẗ(a)-l-musāfir(i).

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