BEIRUT: Maroun al-Nashef is perched on a tub of Persil washing powder, in front of a doughnut shop and a bank. In front of him is a hand-painted sign stating, in red and green letters, “I want to sing so I can live.

A job in hand, there is none. Come hear my song. I sing for a little change.” A tarboush atop his head, he plays the oud and sings Umm Kulthum’s “Ma Khatartich Ala Balak.” He is almost completely still, save his fingers and mouth. He stares straight ahead of him.

Nashef is originally from the south Lebanon village of Maghdouche, and says he learned to play the oud 52 or 53 years ago “from God.” Since then, he has been playing music and earning his living in what he calls “the European way,” busking.

This Beirut bard is a father of seven, but despite his large family he says he is lonely and mourns loves lost, from both the recent and more distant past. His wife died nine months ago. And he still misses a woman he knew many years ago, who he calls “love of my heart.” Nashef’s flips through an orange spiral-bound notebook, filled with song lyrics handwritten in pencil. “I wrote a song once about [her], the blonde woman with green eyes,” he says.

He reads some of the lyrics aloud: “The blonde one, her hair curly/When I see her, she bewitches me/And I no longer know what I want/I praise the creator/For this brilliant beauty/Who stops all passersby.”

Although he is still writing and singing about his wife and a long-gone light-haired woman, Nashef is actively looking for new female companionship.

He says he meets lots of people in his line of work. “Most of the people who approach me enjoy my company. They laugh with me … some of them hug me and kiss me.” As he speaks from just off of Achrafieh’s Sassine Square, several pedestrians bid him familiar hellos.

“There are a lot of beautiful women who love music, they pass by and they kiss me. They love traditional Arabic music. And when they tell me I have a beautiful voice, I sing even more. They tell me that I have a nice face, I’m cute, I play beautifully … it’s true that I play beautifully and I have a nice voice and a nice face.”

Nashef says he makes enough money to support himself and his family from his music. In addition to playing for tips, he also occasionally plays at private parties and events. For this purpose, his mobile number is listed on his sign, a nod to modernity by a man whose tarboush and oud seem to place him in a past era.

He says that he is looking for “a woman who would be my girlfriend genuinely, and not because she wants my money.”

Nashef does not see his advanced age as his main obstacle in finding a wife. Rather, he worries about his shyness, an affliction that is unexpected in a man who makes his living pouring his heart out to strangers on Beirut’s streets. “It would be difficult [to find a wife] now,” he says. “I would love to become close with a beautiful woman. Is it possible if one passes by and I have my eye on her … that she would know what I want? It’s not possible, unless I tell her.”

“I’m afraid to tell a woman I love her,” he says. “Maybe she will throw her shoe at me.”