The Invisible Arm of Peace

Poetry December 2022 ISBN 978-1-936628-93-3 78 pages Softcover, 6" x 9"

Accents Publishing is proud to bring to you an English language collection by Jordanian-Bulgarian poet Khairi Hamdan, selected and translated by Katerina Stoykova. In these poems you will find the sand of the Sahara Desert, the Bedouin, the Dervish, and unmediated conversations with God. You will encounter destroyed temples, refugee camps, border patrol, children with nontraditional names. You will also find lyrical poetry of intimate tenderness and the unrelenting drive to be a better human being.

bulgarian faith translation

From the Book

Date at Border Patrol

We'll get together soon—I said—
in a moment, a second, a year, a century,
after one more migration
of stupefied birds, ready
to pay again the due
in front of the grey door
of the border patrol.
The parched lips of the day,
the sleep, dissipated between fleeting nightmares,
the directions, aching for road signs
quicken the encounter of the species.
A bored wanderer, a dispirited artist
who drew God on the back
of an empty box of cigarettes.

A thin blade separates north from south.

Painful embraces,
damp kisses,
crumpled sheets,
bitter coffee,
we sink into the bastion
of the grim daily routine.
We'll get together—I said—
at the edge of the cliff,
next to the slippery step
at the entrance to the cave.

What Others Say

The Invisible Arm of Peace is a gem of a collection, and Katerina Stoykova's deft hand in translation cracks open this quiet box of wisdoms and measurements, "On the way to your bed— / thorns, a lonesome moon, / a rudderless bike, / scattered pages / from a dictionary." During Holy Week in Andalucía, penetentes shouldering heavy floats through narrow cobbled streets periodically drop to their knees and sing a saeta, an arrow, of praise or longing. Khairi Hamdan's poems read like lyric saetas, "golden pearls in the calendar," and I am grateful to Stoykova for her work in bringing international poets to an American audience. "You can force the sun / to crawl in your shadow, / the moon—to carry your bags / as you travel," Hamdan observes. "Contrary to all the laws of physics, / I ignite every time when / with my waters I water your gardens, / put out fires, you.

— Karen Schubert

When we read writers from other lands, too often we want them to exemplify a single, simple culture. We sometimes forget to pay attention to the complexity of individual voices, especially one that crosses borders. With these poems of Khairi Hamdan, who is both Palestinian and Bulgarian, Katerina Stoykova carefully brings into English a very individual poet, one whose anarchic heart senses a tornado and yet safely returns to itself.

— J Kates

When has the voice of the immigrant been so needed and urgent? This book by an immigrant translated by an immigrant is fresh and alive as a new dawn. It allows us to see with new eyes. "unrained cloud" "diaries of God". Highly recommended.

— Pat Owen

About the Author

Khairi Hamdan

Poet, writer and translator Khairi Hamdan was born in 1962 in the city of Dier Sharaf, on the West Bank of the Jordan River. In 1967, his family emigrated to Jordan, where he lived until 1982. Since then, Khairi Hamdan has lived and worked in Bulgaria. He is the author of a number of books published in Bulgarian and Arabic, most recently the novel Chestnut Gardens and the poetry collection The Water Lilies of Memory. Hamdan translates poetry and prose between Arabic and Bulgarian and has been awarded several international honors for his translations, as well as for his original work.