Darwish: an analysis

"Darwish’s last period begins, most critics would agree, with Mural, a long poem published in 2000, two years after the poet underwent open heart surgery that nearly killed him (and eight years before another heart operation finally did take his life). Mural is a scarred monument to this brush with extinction, and much of the verse that followed it is also concerned with the imminence of death, an eventuality the poet regards with a combination of defiance, gallows humour and stylised indifference. In one late lyric an idiot questioner asks the poet what he would do if he knew he would die that evening. “I will comb my hair,” Darwish answers, “and throw the poem, this poem / in the rubbish bin / put on the latest shirt from Italy / say my final farewell to myself with a backing of Spanish violins / then / walk / to the graveyard!”" (thanks Jonathan)