#arabic-poetry

¶ Al-Ma’arri gave up meat, milk and honey, and wrote a poem telling us why

Abu al-'Ala al-Ma'arri (973–1057) lost his sight to smallpox as a child and called himself the prisoner of two prisons, his blindness and his house in Ma'arrat al-Nu'man. I read him first for his fury. I stayed for his ethics. In his…