yesterday i was the moon Read online

  where i come from

  where i have been

  and where i am going

  i share a legacy

  with the sky

  we both know how to carry

  some unanswered prayers

  and some unshed tears

  {the sky & i}

  in pieces

  yet at peace

  i am a building

  in a post-war city

  {survival}

  you’re the moon

  and the world is

  a lonely wolf; it cries

  at the sight of you

  for you are glorious

  and so out of reach

  no i didn’t forgive you

  out of love

  mercy or sympathy

  i forgave because

  i knew i would

  need to be forgiven

  by someone like me

  and if i kept my forgiveness

  to myself

  in the future

  that someone like me

  would also keep

  their forgiveness

  and it would

  kill me

  {forgiveness}

  isn’t it absolutely

  terrifyingly, shockingly

  amazing

  how words

  those tiny little sounds

  in this chemical-filled air

  those shapeless weird marks

  on stark white paper

  can make or break

  living breathing people

  stab them at heart

  without a single weapon

  push them off

  their strong firm feet

  take away the earth

  they used to stand on

  words; they’re powerlessly powerful

  so use yours

  well

  a piece of cloth on my head

  screams an identity

  louder than words printed

  on any document

  even the sky outside knows

  where i come from

  {hijab}

  it’s okay

  if you’re burning

  with anger

  or sadness

  or both

  it is necessary

  for you to collapse

  so you can learn

  how phoenixes are

  reborn

  when they burn

  and rise again

  from the ashes of

  their existence

  there is a hurricane

  inside my ribcage

  where a heart

  used to be

  {change}

  my bones carry

  calmness and chaos equally

  before every war; i sound

  like peace

  after every fall; i rise

  a hurricane-shaped masterpiece

  bravery was the lullaby

  i was put to sleep with

  tangled in my mother’s words

  it has been an old friend

  i hum it in silence; it screams

  in me in crowds

  i was supposed to be a city

  with busy streets and twinkling lights

  but i wanted to be a house

  full of warm sunlight

  and dried flowers gracing its vases

  i’m neither today but

  a hollow skeleton of progress

  where everyday something

  builds and collapses

  i am happier in this

  {a work in progress}

  teach your heart

  how to not be like glass

  it shatters; delicately

  a beautiful tragedy

  toughen it with fire

  of strength and bravery

  so it couldn’t break

  that easily

  {teaching survival to my heart}

  art doesn’t ask

  to be perfect

  poetic

  precise

  it asks to exist

  to breathe

  to be

  this is what it has always been about

  the most beautiful thing in this world isn’t made

  up of particles. it’s the strength of a person who

  has seen the collapse of their world, everything

  they held dear crashing down in a million pieces.

  yet every morning, they wake up and build their

  life, all over again. mourning their loss in a

  tranquil silence. i haven’t yet seen

  anything more astonishingly beautiful.

  the price of leaving

  is everything

  you do not return to a place

  but to a memory; soundless

  a home becomes another house

  a face becomes another name

  a city becomes another geographical location

  when you leave

  my homeland gifted me

  a language with soft corners

  it feels like sugar in my mouth

  and the language i learned to speak

  is made up of wax; it often melts

  and burns my mouth

  leaving my words

  soundless

  shapeless

  helpless

  and i cannot help but sound like

  someone utterly unknown

  {accent}

  in my accounting class, we were taught how

  to make balance sheets. in those lessons, the

  credit part had to be equal to the debit part

  for your balance sheet to be complete. it

  was beautiful; the balance of everything ever

  spent, ever accumulated, ever given. this

  concept made me fall in love with balance.

  so i learned to balance things in my

  life as it would happen in those balance sheets.

  if i told a lie, i had to speak a bitter truth

  next time. if i spent more than i was supposed

  to, i donated some amount to charity

  next time. if i said something not-so-nice, i would

  find words to say something extra-nice

  next time. i learned to pay for things i had

  done. i learned to create the balance.

  {creating the balance}

  last night i whispered

  a thank you note to the universe

  for it made oceans and stars

  equally beautiful and accessible

  for all of us; i breathe the same air

  as the people i love and the people i lose

  the particles of their existence are still

  surrounding me and this is how loneliness

  doesn’t know how to find me alone

  {a thank you note to the universe}

  home murmurs

  where have you been?

  and i can’t help but say

  away; looking for you

  when everything comes crashing down

  i hope you’re wearing

  that faint little smile

  for an end is near

  and a start is nearer

  wear your past with grace

  present with care

  and future with delight

  nothing gleams better

  when three of them

  are carefully combined

  you asked me

  how i made art

  and

  i used all

  long, shiny, pretentious

  words

  but the truth

  is different

  i never made art

  i brought the hurricanes

  sobs, revenge, stories

&n
bsp; on the stark white sheet

  and it looked

  something like

  art

  {it was art}

  falling in love with cities is risky.

  they’ll welcome you with spectacular sunsets

  and stunning skyscrapers and a skyline that

  lights up the whole sky. but when they’re angry,

  they will burn themselves down to fuel a riot

  that’d run loose on their streets. they will

  remind you that if you love a city with

  its lights on, you will have to love it

  even when it is on fire.

  you’re not only a she

  or a her

  make your name sound

  like something

  completely terrifyingly, beautifully

  out of this world

  {azeez aurton — dear women}

  some mornings

  my hometown breathes in me

  my mind: chaotic like its traffic jams

  reminding me how i said

  whoever leaves first will be free

  but when you leave a city

  it doesn’t mean it will leave you in return

  its name forever with mine

  mine forever with a city i haven’t been to

  until it’s the time to go

  i will return to ask its moon to die

  with me; the lights that saw me first

  must also see the last of me

  do not worry

  about people

  they’re wearing the same flesh

  breathing the same chemicals

  walking on the same solid earth

  as you

  so why should it matter

  when

  you are them and they are you

  the universe is a brilliant writer

  it wrote your name

  in my stars

  before any of us existed

  so when the time comes

  they’ll light up your path

  and lead you straight to me

  {nikah}

  you wanted to know about the art i created and

  the melancholy behind the words but i couldn’t

  tell you how and why those shades and words

  found their way on that crisp white graceful

  paper because sometimes some things do not

  have a story and artists spill their tears and

  blood and sweat on a canvas just so we

  could keep art alive even when we don’t have

  a story telling you why because if art were to be

  explained you would know how empty

  everything is; from creations to the hearts that

  created.

  {the artists and their art}

  broken homes produce

  walking, talking wars

  their residents

  either become their own cities

  or their own ruins

  distance becomes

  a name; a living thing; a breathing tragedy

  when two people are apart

  not by cities or countries or continents

  but by the lack of words

  and abundance of silence

  someday

  something

  will go

  terribly, utterly, horribly

  wrong

  one day

  everything

  will be fine

  our lives

  swing between

  that one day

  and someday

  so why do you worry

  about it

  everyday

  when you’ve heard the

  heartbreak coming

  do not close the door

  invite it in

  make it a big warm mug

  of your favorite tea

  ask why it came

  and ask how would it like

  to leave

  let your heartbreak know

  that it has arrived

  at the very wrong door

  that the dweller here isn’t

  afraid of the things

  that have been broken before

  {heartbreak}

  no you don’t

  have to be all this nice

  all this time

  scream, break, and shatter

  till your lungs have pumped out

  all the words you had to swallow

  all the pain that froze your blood

  all the worries that tainted your skin

  and when you’re done

  freeing yourself

  please go and be nice

  {before being nice}

  sadness

  it’s in the air of the city i loved and left

  to never return. it’s the smell of leaving.

  it’s a shapeshifter. it looks like a face i do not

  want to remember. then suddenly it is a face i

  cannot forget. a dishonest performer.

  when you’ve lost everything and everyone,

  meet defeat with open arms. shake hands with

  it; warmly, firmly, happily. it has taught you all

  the things you shouldn’t do if you want victory

  next time—embrace it. your defeats are not a

  sign of your weaknesses; they never were and

  they will never be. they are the medals you need

  to decorate in your living room for the world to

  see so they can know where you are coming

  from, because in the end the victor and the

  defeated are kind of the same; one has won the

  battle and the other one knows how exactly

  it is won.

  {welcoming defeat}

  next time i’m asked

  about my confidence that glimmers

  and whether it’s there in me because

  the men of my family were too liberal

  i will tell them one thing

  the men weren’t there when i was growing up

  but women

  they walk with grace and fire dances

  with their cooking pans

  their words are loud and eyes even louder;

  woven with intelligence and history

  the women in my family are shaped with

  glass and love wrapped in silk

  they teach their kids to speak with

  kindness and firmness

  so when they speak

  they do so without hesitation

  {women of my family}

  when ache arrives

  put it on paper

  it is here to hurt your heart

  use it to save your art

  how dare you call

  an arrangement of bricks my home

  home is the comfort

  built with my mother’s words

  home is the art piece

  my sister hung on the wall

  and

  home is all the people

  who make my heart feel at ease

  you had a face

  that looked like serenity

  and words

  that did not smell

  of contempt

  and your existence

  reminded me

  of sunsets and ocean waves

  yet

  you still wonder

  what it took

  for me to fall

  for someone like

  you

  i fled

  forgave and forgot

  people

  for this hurricane in me

  could either ruin

  all of them

  or save

  all of me

  and i

  chose me
>
  you have been away

  from home for so long

  in my dreams you look like

  a lonely building in a curfew-imposed city

  {absence}

  strong

  is not only a word; it’s a compliment

  for all the women of my generation

  who couldn’t be anything

  but strong

  at a point that

  saved their lives

  i am fighting

  my losses

  trauma

  and everything bringing ache

  because i don’t want

  to look in the mirror

  and see a tragedy staring back

  no fire

  could collapse the pillars

  you have built yourself on

  with tremendous artistry

  with startling bravery

  the sunset looked way too pigmented—as if

  the color palette of sorrow had been thrown on

  it. yes, if sorrow had colors, they would be lilac

  mixed with pinks and some sneaky whites like

  the clouds at twilight. i thought it was a

  masterpiece; a way for nature to share that at the

  end of the day, each sobbed whisper goes

  directly to the skies. but before that, it leaves

  its color on the canvas of earth one last time.

  {the color of whispers}

  i am putting together

  a future for me

  that gleams with the lights