Liber Veneris - Chapter 25

Verses

Verse 33

By Zohra when she loosens the blue veil of evening, I swear the night has a pulse.

Verse 34

We jinn heard her before men named her: one silver note above the roofs, and every brass lamp trembled.

Verse 35

The king asked, What instrument is she playing? I said, Majesty, perhaps we are the instrument.

Verse 36

Then he ordered the musicians to imitate her. Seven strings broke from embarrassment.

Verse 37

Perfume is the memory of a flower after the flower has escaped. Desire is the perfume of a world we cannot keep.

Verse 38

I loved a woman who wore no jewels except the reflected planet in her cup.

Verse 39

When she drank, Venus shattered. When she set the cup down, Venus returned. Thus I learned how cheaply heavens are broken.

Verse 40

Do not trust the poet who says love is eternal. Pay him after breakfast and ask again.

Verse 41

Yet do not trust the cynic either. He has merely been singing in a lower key.

Verse 42

Zohra, bright musician, bend one note toward the earth and make the accountants forget addition.

Verse 43

Bend another toward the grave and make the dead complain of unfinished dancing.

Verse 44

Our city has a gate for merchants, a gate for soldiers, and a gate for lovers. Only the lovers climb the wall.

Verse 45

The guard asked why. They said, Gates imply permission.

Verse 46

A cat crossed the palace roof while the moon was thin. Every astrologer wrote an omen; the cat wrote nothing and reached the kitchen.

Verse 47

I asked the cat what Venus means. It bit me gently, which is a complete theory of affection.

Verse 48

Some nights Zohra is a bride. Some mornings she is a knife with light on it.

Verse 49

If you insist these are contradictions, you have never loved anyone awake.

Verse 50

We call copper the metal of her house because it carries warmth and remembers the hammer.

Verse 51

A heart should be like copper: conductive, workable, and not mistaken for gold.

Verse 52

The sultan commissioned a mirror so perfect that whoever looked in it saw the face they most desired.

Verse 53

Within a month the court was empty. Everyone had eloped with themselves.

Verse 54

The mirror remained, terribly lonely and absolutely accurate.

Verse 55

There is no song without distance between notes. There is no longing without distance between bodies.

Verse 56

Perhaps paradise is not the abolition of distance but the art of making distance sing.

Verse 57

At dawn the muezzin of no mosque called from the horizon: Wake, sleepers, the beautiful liar has returned.

Verse 58

We asked, Which liar? He answered, Whichever one you are already hoping for.

Verse 59

I praise Zohra not because she is merciful. Wine is not merciful; music is not merciful; beauty has never signed such a contract.

Verse 60

I praise her because for one instant she makes the cage remember it was made of light.

Verse 61

Then morning opens its ordinary shops, and I owe three creditors.