The poet is the conscience of his time

A critical study of the poet Mahjoub Sharif’s collection “Children and Soldiers”

Introduction written by the late Dr. Gilly Abdul Rahman’s collection of poetry by the poet Mahjoub Sharif, which was published by the Cultural Office of the Sudanese Students Union in the Soviet Union. At that time, the deceased was preparing his doctoral thesis at the Gorky Institute of Literature in Moscow. Truth be told, Brother Suleiman Muhammad Ibrahim, the cultural official of the Union at the time, was the first to propose the idea of issuing the Diwan and he pursued the idea with insistence with Brother Dr. Ibrahim Al-Nur, who was then Vice President of the International Youth Federation, was enthusiastic about the idea and agreed to publish the collection with the support of the International Youth Federation, and he was the one who stood behind the idea of this presentation written by the late.

We are not exaggerating if we say that this collection - which is some of its author's poetry - represents the pinnacle of authentic revolutionary art that is integrated artistically and democratically in Sudan, and it exploded like a hurricane in the midst of the mass tide that directed our people with the uprising of July 19, 1971 AD. It is one of the phenomena of social nature, then... that began its throes with the Mahdist revolution, and completed an upward cycle in the revolution of 1924 AD. Then it reached a new peak with the emergence of the national movement - and Marxism in particular - after the Second World War to liquidate British colonialism... then the completion of the national democratic revolution... and its new characteristics began to become clear in the storm of October 1964... and we do not say that this art exploded in a powerful hurricane in the seventies for the sake of Graphic embellishment... by this we mean that its legitimate views and characteristics in form and content have acquired a new quality and birth.

This art did not fall to its knees, or lower its head, and as Mahjoub Sharif likes to say, his sword was not broken... This sword is not worn by a nobleman from the feudal lineage or a noble “shaver” from the Hadandawa tribes... Such swords and horses have passed their time... But the sword of red hair is satin, a symbol that it derives from popular heritage and enriches with rich human connotations... and the mistress for whom this sword fights. It is the sky of Khartoum, the purity of the soil, and the honor of the homeland... And if there is a muse waiting for him, then it is united with the sky, the soil, and the honor, otherwise there is no connection between him and her... And if this art did not recede with apostasy... but rather turned it back on its heels, and placed it in the dock... Rather, it became a judge who restores the upended situations to their correct order... and loads the guns with bullets to direct them into the chests of the traitors... and the saying is rejected in the fathers of the saying. The loser by subjugating the revolution - which we will explain in some detail later - we say that this sword does not beg for hope, or beat copper for the weak and defiant, but it is a witness and the conscience of its time... it turns the dream into reality... and fights a battle in which the martyr is destined to be a bridegroom, the cry is destined to be a cry, and the accused is a judge... and strips the criminal of his rank and badges to lie in his place of rubbish, stained with blood, with the gallows that he erected hanging around his neck. For the honorable.

With embraces, we welcome this collection, which warms our hearts with the melody of the homeland and the scent of the blood of the martyrs... We will not stop at the insults that poetry may be exposed to when it composes its poems in prisons when paper is scarce, or what appears in the collection of a high tone that sometimes verges on chanting or repetition... These insults in no way diminish the prestigious status and the artistic foundations that poetry has laid in its revolutionary path.

In two poems from the tops of the Diwan, Mahjoub Sharif affirms his humanity... Rather, his ribs pour out in them - pain and hope - mixed in the dialectic of conflict, and they are “Love and Revolution” and “A Letter to Maryam Mahmoud” as if he was saying them with effective revolutionary purity - after mobilizing the resolve and raising the banner of defiance and disobedience - Here I am, a simple human being, and a loving God, as deep as love and longing are... it is not These emotions are yours alone, O poets devoted to the sanctuary of isolation... No... We free them and they enrich us, but my love embraces the revolution. Maryam embodies the authentic Sudanese mother who does not accept the “disgrace” and shame of her son... The symbol rises and rises until his lover and mother becomes all he possesses of heritage, smells and memories.

I miss you so much, I swear

And for the neighbors and for Hilla

Also, Qatar, the struggle is over

And it's too expensive for me

This is not an empty position that he wants to record, but he longs for it very much - and he swears to his neighbors and homes... and he will not leave the train of struggle, without that moral death... and to whom will he leave his comrades? What a shame to return!

Is Mahjoub Sharif sitting behind bars, content with negative optimism? Or is it a world rippling with life, memories, warmth, and agony... The present here is an extension of the past... and the future is their outcome... and his call to his companion is a revolutionary love that the imaginary romanticism immersed in the self and the self alone has never known!

A station... a station you remember

Your eyes while we are in exile

And remember your handkerchiefs

Its red threads... what a coincidence

And remember your question to me

Matin, the country's wound is healing

Sama Al-Khartoum laughs

Our beloved and Metin Tasfa?

Such love emanates from a human heart, which does not only accommodate his own person... but it accommodates the concerns of the poor for whom he was sent to prison. It is love, the issue, the situation... and there is no generality. He wove the relationship with red threads, by asking her about the red wound, and the sky of Khartoum whose darkness is disturbed... His humanity overflows and he forgives her even if she forgets him or sheds tears on his cloud... but he incites them against him if he throws down his sword. He betrayed the revolution... and for my life, there is no stronger commitment, or purer revolutionary humanity, than that sublimity... and asking the question in itself is a dramatic expression of what he is suffering... it illuminates the opposite... and penetrates the event, giving it penetrating influence and eloquence... “I will forgive your weakness... but beware of accepting my humiliation and humiliation.”

I forgive you if you forget me and insult me

And you cried over me

If one day I throw away my sword

I raised my hands

I betrayed the revolution... I came with humiliation in my eyes

It is forbidden for your eyes to please me and welcome me

It is forbidden for you to sleep again in my hands

It is not sadism that appeals to him, or psychological torture... but it is revolutionary purity, legitimate honesty, and if it is defiled in the mire of betrayal... it will hardly tickle him with familiarity.

The train symbolizes rush, exile is a symbol of imposed oppression, the sword symbolizes resistance, and dialogue is an expression of conflict and determination that are convincing in artistry and sincerity, and the rhymes are delicate and scattered throughout the poem “He draws us closer and tortures us” “Achille Shelley,” “You forgot me, and you insulted me,” which gives it a sweetness and a whisper... and from the dialectic of the relationship... and the opposition, and the opposite pacts with the moon of his night

And the life of our mother Khartoum

I remove my shell and my tricks

And I will die standing still

And I tell you, my dearest people

The old promise is coming

Between revolution and knife

Communists

To death communists

Does this loudness cause harm to sensitive ears? She was not accustomed to that obnoxious arrogance after the eloquent words continued and disappeared behind the premature metaphors and the artificial fog... But Mahjoub scratches her delicate faces and shouts... Communists, to death, Communists!

This art announces a new characteristic, which is clarity of poetic vision, or what we call revolutionary loudness... It is completely different from the classical summation and sermons that some Arabic poetry knew at the beginning of this century in Sudan directly in the poetry of Al-Abbasi, Abdullah Abdul Rahman and others... This directness has suffered from the epidemics of superficiality and determination in ready-made expressions and wisdom, sermons and resorting to the depths of books, and therefore it lacked vitality and honest expression of reality with its contradictions. Many.

This new directness differs from the Sudanese realism that broke into the fifties... and imposed its legitimacy at that time... because that realism did not get rid of general slogans, drowning in details, and drawing reality photographically (clay and nails, poems from Sudan... for example), despite its pioneering role in quenching Arab poetry with the flavor and taste of reality... and integration into the class struggle that was not of this size and specificity... and polarization, and if we take Al-Fitouri's "Songs of Africa" is a more typical example of the realism of the fifties. We see Africa as a mental blurry vision... and the details indicating the continent are so general that they do not indicate a lived experience... Africa lacks class dimensions and social conflict... the realism of the fifties exploded in the cradle of the revolutionary movement and performed its function without a doubt... but Mahjoub Sharif's clarity shines at the peak of its maturity and fierce battles.

Most of the endings in the poems of the fifties were sudden and contrived...a happy ending, of course, "more like a cliché", but hope here permeates from the first verse...and if the ending happens to be more resounding...it is because it is a culmination of the artistic fabric that preceded it.

This hope is not purely arbitrary and forced, but rather an organic, dynamic formation.

What are the phrasing tools used by the poet to express his vibrant experience in the poem “Love and Revolution”?

He expressed details that resemble fine hairs, internal monologue, dialogue, and the interplay of meanings, which gave the poem extreme vitality and dynamism. With skill, the rhymes and iambics are varied and combined in an orchestral structure... These are victories for the new poetry... But the bold characteristic that announced its artistic birth is this “revolutionary loudness” that embodies itself in new artistic standards and specifications.

“A letter to Maryam Mahmoud,” that simple mother from millions of mothers in Sudan, was elevated by the poet from a symbol that embodies the special relationship between a son and his mother to a general symbol, a more comprehensive, effective, and profound symbol. This comprehensiveness goes from the specific to the general, from the partial to the essential... In the end, the poem - which derived its entire composition from human emotions, snapshots and simple tools - transcends this particular logic to become a comprehensive experience that the recipient is moved by... It summarized his experience, if not provided him with a new experience that spared him the need to struggle with it, and its framework is obscured by short focused passages... Its ending, “the static meme”, confirms the tragedy, and reveals its dimensions and torments.

This poem testifies that the poet is not led by a dogmatic view, or a foolish mysticism... He did not reduce his emotions or cancel them... On the contrary, he deepened them and returned like a child in his mother’s arms, babbling with her and kissing her... and wiping her tears in his heart when the “thief soldier” stood between him and his “ssaq” heart.

What sweetness exudes this monologue?! Was it possible for another language to penetrate the walls of the heart and seep into it with such spontaneity, simplicity, and innocence, if the language of the people that Mahjoub chose was not his formulation tool?

Oh mother, Mary

O full of kindness

How much do I have like you?

What good intentions?

I miss and have no regrets

Be patient a little longer

Oh mother, Mary

Concentrating the syllables into two or three syllables... was not a coincidence... but it was the spontaneity of speaking specifically to “Maryam” so that she would be aware of what her son wanted to say in her ears... And the mention of the mother’s name did not come out of the mind either... Rather, it is a repetition of a sweet word that hits in the poet’s psychological history on the one hand, and also gives this unknown humanity its status and weight, so that his speech penetrates into her heart, and facilitates for her “the most complex” of the issue that she is unable to understand. In the simplest words of the world, clearly and brightly

Mani Al-Walid Al-Aqq

No betrayal, no thief

And the military parting

Between your heart and your legs

And between me, it is the bindam

You didn't have a daughter

Oh mother, Mary

And before proverbs were used, the friendliness of Al-Zein and the steeliness of his companions, and the legendary sacrifices flowed before the poem with a wonderful spontaneity, did not work in it... but rather touched the roots of human conscience and shook it violently.

I know your tenderness for me

Please tell me

You always imitate me

And in Al Ain, Cellini

They met him in the middle of the night

Your heart warms me

Stay on evil

It was said in my years

He talks about her heart that warms her, and her shadow that took refuge in his spaciousness from the desert of life, and then he exchanges the same love for her... which is the selfless devotion of a righteous son to his people... so how could he not pass by his mother, or say “fuck” to her, or rebuke her... This inhuman separation was imposed on him... the military imposed it when he sacrificed his humanity, but it is blocked in the midst of this emotion by slapping him, so the police will not get what he wants.

If you knew me, I would

If you knew me

I love you so much

And the military is the separation between your heart and the legs..

And between me, it is the bindam

You didn't have a daughter

Oh mother, Mary

The poet immerses himself in pure human emotions... suddenly revealing the heroism of steadfastness... not steadfastness without a price or a journey into the wilderness, not false heroism... but pain to the core... without surrendering or fading in his strength... What he gives to Maryam is that big heart that was filled with the sorrows and longings of his people.

All day and night

In my eyes, how are you?

But I am very resourceful

Fear is looming

Here's my heart for you, a handkerchief

The tear when it flows

Say it, Maryam

If “Wad Al-Zein” was the only one who did not stand up to say goodbye to her, then the killers kidnapped him, so the poet would not bring shame to his mother if they made him drink blood... The rest of the poem is a monument to witness, which generations will not forget... a picture that he does not paint for Maryam Mahmoud alone... but rather for the history of heroism.

There is no doubt that these two poems will remain a towering building in our Sudanese literature.

The second characteristic that Mahjoub Sharif emphasizes is rejection... He rejects reality, and the death that was imposed by the points of spears and the ropes of the gallows... and with it he turns the dream into reality, and reality into a dream... and that is a new formulation tool through the organic unity between them. Death, life, dream and reality are in a dialectical interpenetration in which the painting becomes the embodiment of something beyond doubt.

Believe me, I found it yesterday

I was not dreaming or going

He was smiling and proud as usual

The same steps to walk

The same sarcastic words

He excludes everything that happened from the martyrdom and bravery of Abdel Khaleq and his companions... and from the lies of the radio and the disgusting yellow newspapers, the fear of Al-Sonki and the nightmare that befell Khartoum, then he returns to rejection again in this dialogue that exudes vitality and realism, in simple and friendly language.

Oh our brother, how are you?

Hello, welcome... Yes, please

He called me

I greeted you with my heart and my arms

A man of joke...deep and polite

Very wonderful...and humane

And when he gathered me and encouraged me

You asked in surprise what happened

This dialogue depicted the deep, polite, and sober personality of Abdul Khaleq... It is normal for the absent person to ask those who are still alive... what will happen, or for the poet to send words of condolences and consolation to the martyr... but what is unusual is for the absent person to be more present, or steadfast, and more aware when he asks him about what is happening... This is the miraculous language of art, and the artist’s true touch that prepares the event in dramatic preparation... and thereby confirms rejection, and denies death... age is not measured by time. The limited...but with the true existence that man leaves behind.

- He interrupted me... meaning execution

- The people decide who is alive and who is dead

Then he advises him to be careful, vigilant, and courageous, and the street is once again filled with people, workers, vanguards, and leaflets... Here again, he restores the street to its slogans and to their correct order, puts things in perspective, and brings rhythm, harmony, and logic to life.

The poet’s rejection was not metaphysical or mental... Rather, it was a conscious rejection of the laws of history, the movement of development, and the continuity of life... And in “A Song for Abdul Khaleq,” Mahjoub paints a truly unique painting... No one has preceded him... And if we approach it artistically, it surpasses, in dramatic terms, all aesthetic analysis.

The knight is suspended... nor is death suspended

The hero confused us

Oh people, it's happening

A rope flew over me

Death came and passed away... let death hang in the balance

Abdul Khaleq triumphed over death... This is an ordinary sentence that may come to the mind of any citizen, but how did our poet embody it in a sensual, vibrant image, like a living panorama? Death and Abdul-Khaleq were not the same... Abdul-Khaleq split death and hung behind him... behind the gallows and the killers and with them shame and death... and he flew soaring like an angel... not to the sky, but to land in the Communist Party.

The poet does not reject death out of a wish or desire... but rather out of deep awareness, as we mentioned above... Abdul Khaleq derives his survival from the party that built his edifice, just as the party is an extension of Abdul Khaleq... So death here is something incidental, secondary, and imposed... The essence is that Abdul Khaleq descended and the resolve, pulse and determination returned to him not by a force outside the scope of nature, but by his human insistence, will and choice.

In our eyes, Pat

He descended among the people

In the Communist Party

Underground seed

Above the sun is important

In the Communist Party

And from all the pillows

And in the pulse of poems

I consider him my beloved Ayed

Among adversity

In the heat of the night

Rest in peace

In the street relationship

He has lived a long time in this world

He became more handsome in the eyes

Rejection and awareness of historical extension are two pillars of the poet’s art - and even of the poetry that exploded in the seventies - but they fall under a more general characteristic... the poet’s artistic characteristic, and not general slogans and loud phrases. Poetry insists on the characteristics of rejection and extension, making them more clear, and deepening their human significance in other poems.

In his poem about the immortal martyr of the working class, “The Intercessor,” he and his life companion Fatima are happy for this death... The death of the intercessor is a festival, a real wedding... This funeral becomes a wedding because life explodes with martyrdom and glows... This is a conscious rejection of a fabricated death.

And my solution is me and my solution

How are you, how are you?

I die a martyr wounded by Bilali

Intercessor, O Fatima, in the neighborhood

In factories and in the countryside

She stopped and said: “Aha.”

What a harvest and raw green

The people and my father were satisfied with him

He died a martyr, me and my family

Ahmed symbolizes expansion, the generation to which the intercessor gave his life... The wedding here is not an embodiment of a picturesque hope, or a pretentious rhetorical invitation... but a reality formulated by life itself... embodied in a human being of the flesh and blood of the martyr, the poet’s prophecy in his extrapolation and elucidation of the future.

Ahmed.. Ahmed, you are getting arrogant

The horse and the long sword

Your father's line is of noble blood

Every page and page is a wreath

He died a martyr and died

With this poem, Mahjoub Sharif develops the songs that emerged in the 1924 revolution and makes their source his irrigation and supply after the revolution moved from the category of the petty bourgeoisie to “the workshops, the railways, the race, the oil, and the factories.”

The revolutionaries of 1924 were singing to the mother of braids

Oh mother of braids, Goody halter

Its origin is death above monotony

With the rising youth in the morning

Strengthen your mind and die comfortably

Be pure, long live the homeland

It was bullets or it was bayonets

Say goodbye to your family and continue the struggle

Above your shrine, the mariner cries

Above the shrine of the intercessor whose mere presence terrifies enemies, the mariners do not cry, but ululate for the happy day ahead...

There is a feature of this poetry that is almost the main feature of the collection... which is revolutionary incitement... and in the incitement the language plays the role of drums, brass, chanting, and ululations. The poet adapts it and uses it with mastery and skill... It bears the “colloquial dialect” when all its strings are pulled, and the treasures it stores are exploited, including the depth, complexity, originality, and awareness of the modern experience. The poet raises the most contemporary issues of his people through colloquial language... but words from the “classical” dictionary and the language of books and newspapers sneak in to intersperse other words from the heart of the environment, and there is nothing strange here between the overlap in the dialect of the city and the village, and the classical words, because this overlap is an expression of the revolutionary class fusion of workers, peasants, and intellectuals. Therefore, the poet’s language expresses this “front,” so to speak. On the other hand, his language rises to the level of the theory he preaches, which means modernization and social change.

And the internal music...and the esoteric rhymes in the poem “October” are not ornamental inlays and diversifications, but rather a new function of the language in its love for the idea of incitement. It is an enthusiastic march that not only stimulates singing, but also encourages martyrdom?

October is our dynamism

Our dynamic is zero hour

The pillar of our home

Street color

Street taste

The grip of our sword

And our great height

The poet continues his touches and inner music, and the harmony in the rhyme, which is almost identical and turns the tone into a pure melody, similar to a legendary dance around the fire... What is strange is that we do not feel the slightest affectation in it... on the contrary, we feel its artistic necessity.

Our stature

Our resurrection

Our remaining life if we die

For whom do we build our front?

And our people changed us

Our truth, our cast, our insight, our path...etc.

Perhaps the poem “The First Notebook” is also a wonderful example of the poetry of revolutionary incitement, and it is, as we said, a main feature of the collection... in which the poet challenges the prisoner and the jailer... and addresses the convoys of martyrs as they go carrying the banners in brief and focused passages.

We filled out the first notebook

We loaded the second notebook

With all dignity and humanity

We loaded the millionth notebook

And we transform

Men who guided death's shoulder

And they are our living sun

Daily revolution songs

The jailer's defiance intersects with the refusal to die, becoming one earth-shattering challenge

And still, Abdul Khaleq Al-Maghwar

Leading the class

We are behind him, hand upon hand

And Hashem crosses both borders

It still fills the eye

If we are in the field of alluding to the new features that this poetry carries, there is no doubt that the feature of good news and glad tidings is one of the most prominent features of the collection... It is represented as a model in the poems “The Love Song of Khartoum” and “Our Daughters Sing”, and when the poet denounces sadness, he does not beg for singing or initiate it... but he actually sings martyrdom... He stands in the forefront carrying a guitar, and his tears are joy, festival, and wedding.

He sang, Khartoum, and he sang

He pulled the singer's strings

Light from the forehead of your martyr

Have a good evening and rest assured

Why does Khartoum sing? For the wind that blew and darkened the faces of the traitors... for the martyrs who returned... and with them the groups of fighters who returned from exile... Is it a legendary return... or is the artist turning the dream into reality? This is the magic that remains in high art

And we, dear lady

Of your fruits

In the paths of the night, your day

Before you wait too long

We are jenna

And they said we were tempted

They told people we are done

We came as we were, your embrace... contained us

We would have liked to pause for a moment and analyze that tonal condensation in the poem “The Bridegroom of the Fever,” in which the poet skillfully exploited a single rhyme to depict for us one of the most difficult and violent moments, the moment of martyrdom... turning it into a wedding and a cheer... So how can pain turn into hope, a cry into a trill, and despair into a revolution? This is the vision of the valiant artist who believed in his people and did not lower his flag... But we leave the reader to the collection to explore the influence, the magic of the language, the dramatic preparation for the event, and the realism of the dialogue.

We will not discuss eloquent poems... and the shortcomings they may contain in language, melody, or rhyme. This is not the scope of comparing the eloquent to the colloquial... The poet has paved a new path in colloquial poetry, or to say new popular literature.

Let us taste together the sweetness of the melody, the splendor of determination, and the pure music in these verses from the poem “Welcome, Welcome to the Holidays,” where he addresses history.

Despite our hurt

We passed the ordeal

We are more steadfast tonight

Greetings to Mahjoub Sharif on his journey in which his strings touched the sun.

D. My generation Abdul Rahman

In the collection of Mahjoub Sharif

Continued: ID card; Your prisoners; A letter to Maryam Mahmoud