basements الاقبية by Mai Mageed ميمجيد and Ayat Hussein آياتحسين

There are no basements in my village. Must be something to do with the soil.
                                                                                                           لا توجد أقبية في قريتي. يمكن بسبب التربة.
Down by the garages, my neighbor and I lock eyes 
                                                                                        تحت، بجانب الكراجات، أنا وجاري نحدق في بعضنا البعض
in the warm air,
                                                                                                                                           في الهواء الدافئ،
among the cardboard boxes and the dirty tennis shoes.
                                                                                                                 محاطين بصناديق وأحذية رياضية قذرة.
I wonder what his basement would look like. And mine.
                                                                                                            وسألت نفسي كيف يكون شكل قبوي و قبوه.



On the terraces there are clotheslines, 
                                                                                                                                    علي الشُرُفَات توجد مناشر،
on the clotheslines there are robins and wool socks 
                                                                                                   و فوق المناشر توجد طيور أبو الحناء و جوارب صوفيه
basking in the summer heat
                                                                                                                                 يتشمسون في حرارة الصيف
in a way that makes them beautiful. 
                                                                                                                                          بطريقة تجعلها جميلة.
Anyone else would just sweat. 
                                                                                                                          أي شخص آخر سوف يتعرق منها. 

The cheerleaders are rehearsing before the big game.
                                                                                                                   المشجعات يتدربون قبل المباراة الكبرى.
The captain wipes the pearls dripping from her forehead. 
                                                                                                     و زعيمة الفريق تمسح لآلئ العرق من على جبينها.

Now they jump.
                                                                                                                                                  الآن يقفزون.
How they jump.
                                                                                                                                              و كيف يقفزون.

The rocky grounds of my village tremble beneath them.
                                                                                                           و الأرض الصخرية ترتعد من تحتهم في قريتي.

Note on Translation:

“basements” is a poem about the people and treasures we bury, the keepsakes that live beneath the surface of our houses and our selves. From the moment I began writing it, I knew I wanted to see it translated into Arabic, a language I’ve spoken my whole life despite rarely diving into its literature. If it were possible to quantify proficiency in a language not only by fluency but by beauty, I believe that my mother, Ayat, would be the most capable of wielding Arabic’s grace and poetry. Her translation here is a testament to that.

                                                                                                                       – Mai Mageed

Mai Mageed is a writer from Texas. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Cornell University, where she won the George Harmon Coxe Award for Fiction and was a two-time recipient of the Arthur Lynn Andrews Award for Fiction. She now teaches creative and pop culture writing at Cornell. Her fiction appears and is forthcoming in Gulf Coast, The Rumpus, Greensboro Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, and Chestnut Review, is nominated for 2025 Best of the Net, and was a finalist for the Henry Dumas Fiction Prize. As a writer, she is inspired by Wikipedia deep dives, public fights, and ’80s Europop music.

15 June 2026