“Black Lives Matter” by Anis Chouchene

Following the murder of George Floyd in 2020, an eruption of anti-brutality riots commenced across the U.S. in support of Black lives. As the riots began to spread outside of Minnesota and the United States and into other parts of the world, the celebrated Tunisian poet, Anis Chouchene, known for his outspokenness regarding anti-Blackness in the Arab world, released a scathing poem titled Black Lives Matter. In the work, he discusses the history of inequality Black communities face and the farcical denial of racism towards Black people. To read the accompanying interview Mizna conducted with Chouchene, click here. For the English translation of this poem please scroll below.

حياة السّود مهمّة

نعيش في عالم
حياة السود فيه لا تسوى
كأن للسود شبه حياة
او كأن السود للحياة لا تهوى
هذه الدنيا
تحولت للسود مقبرة
فالسود تباع
السود تشترى
لكن لا أحد يسمع
لا أحد يرى
بل الكل يسأل
أهناك عنصرية يا ترى
كأن التاريخ لا يشهد
على ألف ألف مجزرة
على بشر يستعبدون بشر
قرون من الإبادات
و ذنوب لا تغتفر
و للآن أغنى بقاع الأرض
في الفقر و الجوع تحتضر
قارة منهوبة
مجرمون بلا عقوبة
وإنسانية مغلوبة
للحق لم تنتصر
و إفريقيا سجينة
لظلمهم رهينة
بروحها الحزينة
لأحرارها تنتظر
و أبيض لأسود
ما يوما إعتذر
و كيف يعتذر
و هو نصب نفسه
العرق السامي
أبيض ينهب أرضى
و يغلق الحدود أمامي
أبيض يسرق و يقتل و يسلب
و يصادر أحلامي
أبيض يدعي التنوير و التحرر
و هو مؤسس الفكر الظلامي

فالظلام لا دين له
و لو له
فدينه إجرامي
يا إخوتي الكرام
معذرة إن أطلت في الكلام
معذرة على ازعاج ضمائر نيام
و نهاية نقول
حياة السود مهمة
و على البيض النزول من القمة
قمة مقيتة
قمة مسمومة مسمة
ختاما
نذكر إنسانية متناسية
بحقيقة كالجبال راسية
بحقيقة على البعض كانت قاسية
كلنا أبناء آدم
و كلنا سواسية
سلام لكل فكر يريد التنفس
فالفكر حر
والحر لا يخرس

Black Lives Matter

We live in a world
Where Black lives don’t matter,
As if Black people had partial lives
Or lives unworthy of love.
This world’s become a Black graveyard,
A place where Black people
Are bought and sold,
Though no one hears it
And no one sees it.
Still, everyone asks: Do you really think
Racism is real?

As if history never witnessed
Thousands of massacres,
Humans enslaving other humans,
Centuries of genocides
And unforgivable sins,
While to this day in the richest corners of the world
People waste away
In poverty and hunger.
A pillaged continent,
Criminals who go unpunished,
And a vanquished humanity
That fails to uphold the truth
While Africa’s imprisoned,
A hostage to their oppression,
Her sorrowful soul waiting
For her people to be free.
A white man’s never
Said sorry to a Black man.
How could he,
After crowning himself
The superior race?
A white man’s plundering my land
And closing the borders before me.
A white man’s pillaging, looting, murdering,
he’s confiscating my dreams.
A white man professes enlightenment, emancipation,
Though he’s the founder of dark and unjust thought:
Darkness has no religion,
But if it did
That religion would be a crime.
My dear brothers, I’m sorry
If I’ve spoken for too long,
I’m sorry
For disturbing any sleeping consciences.
In the end, we speak it:
Black lives matter,

And whites must come down from their heights,
Their heights of abomination,
Poisoned and poisonous.
And in conclusion
We remind a forgetful humanity
Of a truth as deeply rooted as the mountains,
A truth that may seem cruel to some:
We are all Adam’s children,
And we are all equals.
So salutations to any idea
That seeks to breathe —
Ideas live freely, and that which is free
Will never be silenced.

English translation by Abed Awad and Kareem James Abu-Zeid