From a poem by Badr Shakir As-Sayyab in the 1960s (my translation):
"Death in the streets,
barrenness in the farms
Whatever we love dies.
Water has been restricted inside the homes,
And streams are running out of breath from drought.
The Tatars* have come,
a hemorrhage looms over the horizon,
our sun is blood, and our provisions are blood.
And Muhammad, the orphan, was put on fire,
and the night is brightened from his fire,
blood has boiled out of his feet, his hands, and his eyes,
and god was burnt down in his eyes.
...Is this my city, these potholes?
these bones?
Darkness emerges from its houses,
and blood is painted with gloom,
to erase its traces, so no passer-by can see..
Is this my city? With injured domes?"
*[a reference to those who sacked
