Perishing “Muhammad”, “Ali”, “Hussain”, “Ahmed”… The names go on!

Written in 1948, by Paul Eluard, “Gabriel Peri” (Some translations say, “Perished Gabriel”, this poem was written at the time of World War II and the occupation of France to commemorate the detention and subsequent shooting of a journalist Gabriel Peri by the Germans in 1941.

It was meant to highlight the sacrifice made by an ordinary man with ordinary dreams and means and was used to motivate the resistance. Technically, this poem is nothing more than the name of a man, but it is this distinction of being just a man that makes the reading so powerful.

Fast forward, 60-odd years and this name could be substituted by any of the Arab names or ones like them, given above with no distinction of gender or age in Lebanon or Palestine. Simple, ordinary men, women and children embracing bombs and bullets, taking with them their hopes and aspirations of an ordinary life in an extraordinary death while we go on in our pathetic ordinary ways!

- Gabriel Peri -

A man has died who had no other shield

Than his arms open wide to life

A man has died who had no other road

Than the road where rifles are hated

A man has died who battles still

Against death against oblivion

For all the things he wanted

We wanted too

We want them to-day

Happiness to be the light

Within the heart within the eyes

And justice on earth

There are words that help us to live

And they are plain words

The word warmth the word trust

Love justice and the word freedom

The word child and the word kindness

The names of certain flowers and certain fruits

The word courage and the word discover

The word brother and the word comrade

The name of certain lands and villages

The names of women and friends

Now let us add the name of Peri

Peri has died for all that gives us life

Let’s call him friend his chest is bullet-torn

But thanks to him we know each other better

Let’s call each other friend his hope lives on.

- Paul Eluard -