Is There a Translator in the House?

Artwork by Ilona Yusuf. Courtesy: ArtChowk Gallery.

Sudan’s great poet, dead?

Mahjoub Sharif?

Why hadn’t we heard him?

Why didn’t we crowd the streets,

mourning like the people of his city?

Mahjoub Sharif, the revolutionary

dictators could not suppress,

freedom’s bell

prison could not stifle,

hope’s flower

hard earth could not deny.

Mahjoub Sharif, the people’s prophet

lamenting his riven homeland—

“The Trees Have Passed”;

declaring bullets are not life’s seeds—

“Born Are the Beautiful Children”;

and scorning a despot clinging to power—

“Buffoon”.

Mahjoub Sharif, who viewed life

through the lens of conscience,

one’s soul undying.

Sanguine, inspiriting, egalitarian:

Mahjoub Sharif stands just beyond our door.

How long must he wait outside?

~ Darrell Petska

Darrell Petska worked more than 30 years as an editor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Before academia he worked as a psychiatric tech/caseworker and nursing home evaluator. His poetry has appeared in ‘Otoliths’, ‘About Place Journal’, ‘Lummox’, ‘HEArt Online’, ‘Blast Furnace’, ‘The New Verse News’ and elsewhere.