My poet friend Hagop Kazazian sent me this article in a magazine from recent times:
End Note Comments by me: —I wonder what she said about Columbus discovering America in her first speech at this college; I’d mention him myself often mostly metaphorically…
—I believe her brother mentioned here died as a young child and was her only baby brother and sibling as told in her poem, “Lacrymosa” and not at the later time of her parents and Gibran.
*

— Excerpt from a poetic letter included in May’s book, Fleurs de Reve (1911) translated by me—and then a verse poem that suggests to me that her pet canary might’ve been named Mimi and was a cheerful companion either way:
I was reading and I laughed; my canary has stopped singing to look at me with an air of thinking: “Why is my great friend laughing like that?” Poor little one – I educated him well already, but for the instruction ma fisch.
I’m talking about my canary, as if everyone knows him. So, I have to introduce him. My little canary is golden yellow with silver highlights and a long white tail; he has cute little pink paws, graceful little all-black eyes, blacker than ebony and jet, and a pink beak with a brown dot of beauty I call “Mimi”. Needless to say, I love and spoil him. He is very sweet and even more of a pixie. I speak to him and he answers me…in canary.
Poor little one, sometimes I pity him because he does not know freedom; but he seems very happy!
So much the better! !
—by Miss May Ziadeh
(1911)
*’ma fisch’—’There’s no more / Got nothing.’ (feesh, interjection, Egypt)
…
(a short excerpt from a verse poem May wrote with ‘characters;’ this last part stands on its own too):
And you, my beautiful friend
With the intoxicating smile?—
They call me ‘Mimi’
In the hours of delirium;
And they love my eyes
That point to the azure sky
And my voice….home-like,
….pure,
Spring gave me to May
And I was born
Then I was ordained,
Now I am a priest.
Now my name is….
And my light wings carry me
Away from the Convent
to the foreign lands.
I love to see this
Laughing Nile
chaste, azure,
and I bathe my eyelashes,
my heart,
my golden forehead.
written by Miss May Ziadeh (1911)
words from a poem she wrote.
—This canary was described as golden-yellow (I wonder if the golden forehead in above poem refers to him, kind of fantasy-like. He probably also danced, I’d imagine. 😊🎊 )
—I have always felt human at the core and female, so am not suggesting I was this bird as joked with in a fun / philosophical past poem I’d written on the blog, but in any situation, I find him a great character as part of her life (and he was an artist too, with his songs.)