Naqus
Pin disappointment onto proverb
Prompted by failure proclaim
دقّ الماء ماء:
“Pelt, pummel, pound,
And pestle water;
Water persists—unchanged.”
The ancestral whip.
The crop marks the logic of idiom.
Pruning performs wisdom. Go.
Stand before the West
End of the cloister and bang
On stagnant water.
Hammer triplets at each of the four corners then
Once more in the center. The water remains,
But the monks recognize the music.
They will come for the fall.
They will come with arms.
Copyright © 2026 by Hamed Sinno. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on May 15, 2026, by the Academy of American Poets.
“‘Naqus’ is an excerpt from Nyquist, an in-process text and audio performance that triangulates the erotic resonances of sound, romance, and political insurgency. The naqus is a pre-Islamic percussion instrument still used in some Eastern Christian traditions to call worshippers to prayer. While it was also used by early Muslims, it was abandoned for the adhān, and its sound has since been a site of cultural tension around what constitutes noise in pluralist soundscapes, prompting early legal attempts to regulate its use.”
—Hamed Sinno
Hamed Sinno
Hamed Sinno is a writer and sound artist. An instructor in Dartmouth College’s sonic practice MFA program, they live between New Hampshire and New York.