GeorgeNicolasEl-Hage.com
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  • Professional Profile
    • Who is George Nicolas El-Hage
  • Publications
    • "Aqlam Muhajirah" The voice of the New Pen League (NPL)
    • Literary Criticism >
      • Books (English) >
        • A Labor of Love: Our Lebanon Family Home Renovation Project
        • Gibran Kahlil Gibran: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
        • Eliya Abu Madi: The Distinguished Poet of al-Rabita al-Qalamiya
        • A Brief History of Arabic Literature: Volume One: Pre-Islamic to the Abbaasid Age
        • A Brief History of Arabic Literature: Volume Two: Andalusia to the Modern Age
        • William Blake and Kahlil Gibran: Poets of Prophetic Vision
        • Gibran Kahlil Gibran: The Man Versus the Legend
        • Essays on Literature and Language
        • Ibn al-Farid's "Khamriyya" ("Ode on Wine")
        • Nizar Qabbani: Women in My Poetry and in My Life
        • Nizar Qabbani: My Story with Poetry - "An Autobiography"
        • Nizar Qabbani: Journal of An Indifferent Woman
        • Ghada al-Samman's Beirut '75: An Autobiographical Interpretation
        • English Translation of Selected Letters of Badr Shakir al-Sayyab
        • Khalil Hawi: Letters of Love and Life
        • Immortal Quotes from Ameen al-Rihani’s Masterpiece The Book of Khalid
        • Ameen al-Rihani: Eastern and Western Figures
        • Ameen al-Rihani’s The Register of Repentance: Four Short Stories and a Play
        • Selected Letters of Ameen al-Rihani: Translated with an Introduction and Notes
        • Ameen al-Rihani: You...The Poets
        • Ameen al-Rihani: My Story with May
        • Ameen al-Rihani: The Muleteer and the Priest
      • Books (Arabic) >
        • al-Zajal al-Lubnani wa Zaghloul al-Damour fi Beit Meri: (Lebanese Zajal and Zaghloul al-Damour in Beit Meri)
        • Madkhal ila-l-'alam al-shi 'ri 'inda Khalil Hawi usluban wa madmunan: (An Introduction to the Poetic Universe of Khalil Hawi)
        • al-Nabi bayna 'adu al-Masih wa al-Insan al-Ilah
        • Sahifat "al-Risala" al-Lubnaniya al-Mahjariya: (The "al-Risala" Newspaper and the Lebanese Press in Diaspora)
        • Gibran Kahlil Gibran wa William Blake: Sha'ira al-Ru'ya: (Gibran Kahlil Gibran and William Blake: Poets of Prophetic Vision)
        • The Trilogy of Heroism, Redemption, and Triumph: The Press in Diaspora, Khalil Hawi, Zaghloul al-Damour
    • Textbooks & Articles on Teaching & Learning Arabic >
      • marHaba III: A Course in Levantine & Modern Standard Arabic (LMSA) >
        • marHaba III: PART ONE Audio Files
        • marHaba III: PART TWO Audio Files
        • marHaba III: PART FOUR Audio Files
      • marHaba II: A Course in Levantine Arabic - Lebanese Dialect - Intermediate Level >
        • A Companion Book to marHaba II: English Translation & Transliteration of All Lessons in marHaba II
      • marHaba: A Course in Levantine Arabic - Lebanese Dialect >
        • marHaba: Practice Workbooks
      • MABROUK: A Course in Modern Standard Arabic (Elementary & Intermediate Levels) >
        • Study Guide: MABROUK
      • The Story of Sami and Warda
    • Lebanese Nursery Rhymes
    • Books (Poetry in English/Arabic) >
      • Love Surpassed: A Book of Poetry
      • Letters to My Son: An Immigrant's Saga
      • Lebanese Hymns of Love and War
    • Books (Poetry in Arabic) >
      • Love Poems from Beirut
      • Awdat al-Faris wa Qiyamat al-Madina
      • al-Ghurba wa Mawasim al-Dhalam
      • Law Kunti Li
      • Qasa’id Bila Tarikh (Undated Poems) >
        • Mikhail Naimy: Fathers and Sons - A Play in Four Acts
      • Maw’id wa-liqa’
      • anti wal atfaalu fi Beirut: You and the Children in Beirut
      • You and the Children in Beirut
    • Poems (English) >
      • To Mary Ann with Love: A Book of Poetry
      • Birth of a Princess
      • Forty Years of Bliss
      • Thinking of You
      • You are My Christmas
      • A Poem for Mother's Day
      • To Mary Ann on Her Birthday
    • Poems (Arabic) >
      • Arabic Poems in MSA >
        • Beirut Speaks - song
        • A Tribute to Beirut
        • Lubnaniyat
        • The Garden of Visions
        • Najwa
        • Kunna ibtada’na
      • Arabic Poems in Lebanese Dialect >
        • Hilwit libnan
    • My Poetry (Translated from Arabic to English) >
      • Beirut Speaks
      • The Book of Death, #28
      • Journey of Illusion
      • Letter to a Country With No Frontier
      • A Letter to the Children of Qana
      • My People
      • You, Beirut and the Children
      • Introduction to If You Were Mine
      • Sufiya: A Mystical Poem
      • Surprise Attack
      • Exile
      • Chariot of Light
    • My Translations of Other Poets'/Writers' Works >
      • May Ziyadeh: The Return of the Wave
      • Said Akl: When Lebanon Speaks
      • Ameen Albert Rihani: A Train and No Station
      • Mikhail Naimy: Once Upon A Time
      • Mikhail Naimy: Abu Batta and Other Stories
      • Mikhail Naimy: Fathers and Sons - A Play in Four Acts
      • Mikhail Naimy: Inspired by Christ
      • Mikhail Naimy: Sab‘un (Seventy) An Autobiography
      • Mikhail Naimy: al-Ghirbal (The Sieve): Selections Translated into English with an Introduction
      • Tawfiq Yusuf Awwad: A Loaf of Bread (al-Raghif)
      • Tawfiq Yusuf Awwad: The Lame Boy and Other Stories
      • Maroun Abboud: Faces and Stories
      • Maroun Abboud: The Red Prince - A Lebanese Tale
      • Maroun Abboud: Tales from the Village
      • al-Rihaniyyat
      • Munajayat Al-Sab‘in
      • Mahmud Darwish’s poem, “Antithesis”
      • ‘Abd al-Wahhab al-Bayati’s: The Byzantine Poems of Abu Firas
      • Gibran’s Unpublished Letters to Archbishop Antonious Bashir
    • Personal Reflections >
      • First Impressions of Lebanon in June 2013
      • The Collapse of a Tradition
  • Professional Activities
    • Lectures
    • Poetry Readings
    • Interviews
    • Conferences
    • Memberships/Committees
    • Management Enrichment
  • Curriculum Vitae
  • Contact Information
Letters to My Son:  Second Letter


August 1988
Monterey, CA

The day that I decided to write to you, my love, I simply wanted to record my stories that I relayed to you during our intimate moments together. I wanted you to know who you are and where you came from. An urgent desire compelled me to bring you into my private world so you can, consciously and willingly, relate to my history and my background. I was actually attempting to uproot you from a lonely, foreign present, and plant you in a past filled with family, relatives and friends. Perhaps my desperate attempt was in reality my personal escape from my own exile, so I could sail in my memory to my own roots, my beginnings, the warm womb of my motherland, and my home country. Inadvertently, I have bestowed on you my own fears and loneliness. I have burdened you with my own yearning even though I wanted to protect you from the barrenness of my own exile and longing.

Actually, who claimed that you are a stranger in America? You were born here. You live your childhood here. This is your world, your continent and your life. What have you to do with Lebanon, with Mansourieh and even with the Arabic Language? Yours is my present, and here, now, is my present, and perhaps, my future. What is wrong with me that I continue to pull you back to a past that is dead and to long gone memories? To a Lebanon that has already expired and to Beirut, a damaged city in whose heart the song of love and compassion has long died. But be patient, my child. I still fear for you to grow up here in a land where you have no past, no deep roots and no history.

Both your grandparents are back there and their roots are deeply entrenched in that land. As for your father, he is tormented and beaten daily by his painful longing for his suffering country. You are mine, created after my own image, and I wanted you to go back with me. As for your mother, she was a lone flower and I plucked her, and we departed on our blessed journey together. My tragedy is that I wanted you to live my own childhood because it was beautiful, peaceful and safe, filled with family and neighbors, and on the expanse of its boundaries, there grew flowers of love and trees of friendship, and the birds of contentment sang their most beautiful hymns.

Have I been daydreaming, my little one? How dare I compare the Lebanon of today with that of yesterday? And to which Lebanon do we return? My Lebanon has been erased and theirs, as it is today, is not worthy to even wear the shoes of my Lebanon. Please forgive me. Your present in this diaspora is much better than their present in their tormented country.

We, poets, are like the birds of the sky. Our universe is endless. We are global beings capable of acclimating wherever we live. So, why do we need a Lebanon? My country is my paper, my inkpot and my plume, and the whole world is my extended family. So, why do I dwell on lamenting my Lebanon?

This new land was, and still is, generous. It hosted me the day I left my country. It offered me an education, a job, money and a home. It offered me an address, a citizenship, and my wife, the love of my life. It offered me a future when Lebanon refused to give me even a present and when Lebanon told me that all that was sacred and beautiful on its land was naught but lies and dark ashes. Blessed be this new found land that gave me your precious life and your angelic face. You were born an American citizen. This is your identity, and here is your address and country. You shall grow up and be raised according to the laws and norms of this great country. You shall not be a stranger and an immigrant like me. You shall not suffer from a schizophrenic personality like me. You shall not worship two gods like me. You shall not suffer a marginal existence like me. You and your mother are immune to such feelings and nightmares. This is my cross that I alone shall bare. Why would I carry you to my country? Why would I uproot you and carry you away from the truth of your birth, from the realities of your childhood and plant you in an evil world that even I refuse to belong to now?

Forgive me, my little one. Let destiny chart a path for us, and we will surely walk that path, and in God will be our faith and trust.

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