What becomes of these fleeting reunions?
Do they wash away with the sea salted sand
and becomes fragments of a conversation once had
Do they transform into the sugar in your coffee,
or the honey in your tea,
and compel you to never forget about me?
Or do they live in this rustling wind
that picks fights with your consciousness
and leaves you in a state of rumination
between the present and the past?

Two withering souls
Lost in downtown fog
With their stories written in neon lights
And their destinies tied together
Gazing at each other
Through the reflection
Of blazing streetlights
In hidden puddles
Scattered around vacant parking lots
Dancing like ghosts
With honey on their tongues
A million longing words
Without ever uttering one
A sleeping city tells their tale
Of a longing moon and a loving sun

With a voice that fails me
I aim at the lines between your hope and my despair
With a needle, in an effort to achieve precision
To stitch our thoughts together
They’re so similar, so different
You think of October as a warm home
And I see it as a cold houseguest
And we co-exist in this oblivion
This circle of this or that
I admire your willingness to fill spaces
And you question my fear of being heard
You relish in the colours of fall
And I dread the looming winter
How is it that we left September
Hand-in-hand, wishing for rain...

Reckless, in a cloud of bloom
Ocean salt from seeping wounds
Eroded sands and mindless chats
Raised eyebrows, and an empty hand
My pulse, waves of emanating pain
In the troughs, is the space
You placed your absence within

Fortresses of shy encounters
Built around memories of happenstance
My cloudy speech and murmurs of nonsense
Infiltrate the speck of soil that still remains
Barren land, and you, a seedling of perseverance
Have found an impossible way
To grow
In my aching heart

Honey drops in to the Milky Way inside your tea cup
We sit chatting for old times sake
Friends of distance and enemies of uncertainty
I hope you’ve paved your road on those maps
That you pinned onto your walls
I hope the sun didn’t chase you away
I hope the foreign thunder stole your heart
And you found reflections of a beautiful past
I had written the night before
Inked into letters from the moon

From across the ocean, I waited for your postcards
Yet we sit here, with our thoughts
dancing in the silence between us
Your spoon makes ripples in your tea,
I dream to see the world you’ve seen,

You reminisce and I travel with your memories

We were a catastrophe
Just a small sense of letting us be
Broken and brittle
Loveless and little
But who knew that being mates
And late night dinner dates
Could lead to us,
A catastrophe?
One where ones like me
Found those like you
A shy little girl and the greatest book
The best pair by look
A story couldn't comprehend
The relationship we have
A bookworm and a good read
It's all I could ever need

I search for galaxies in your eyes
But all I find are the trembling stars
The ones the take you by the hand
Despite all the good and all the bad
And dance with you on the surface of the moon
Until your hand comes reaching out
And you pull me through space and time
Only to find that I’m lost at sea
Searching for your starry sky
But you’ve been here all along
The fire in my soul, the glitter in my lies  
You’re the universe I’m searching to find
And I’m the lost galaxy in your eyes

To be a woman, in today’s world,
that stretches into the writing of a tomorrow’s world,
a world that feels so absolute in its reckoning
feels like a mountain that cannot be climbed.
I pray that you find some sliver of beauty
in the moonlight that chases you,
and the stars that kiss your forehead
when you sleep with your big dreams.
I pray you don’t let those dreams flow off your palms
into a river stream when this world threatens you with its cold air
You hold onto them tightly
because even with their singular light
the shadow you leave behind,
so big and strong – a fearless fighter
you stretch into the writing of your world
and your light brings me to write of you
in awe.

Paper will always be a mirror,
Where words will be the reflection
of your thoughts and hopeless dreams.

Somewhere in a dream,
you soak your heart in a basin of damp earth
and from it comes seeping out, the colour of your skin
the voices of your loved ones
cover you in blankets of layered melancholy
deep within your veins
flows a network of love that drains into
that heart of yours now buried
under rich soil, fertilized with hope
and from it, a seedling of identity grows

You soak your sun-dried dreams in rose water
And bead them onto strings of premature promises
You once made to your naïve self,
Despite your love for dreaming
The summer moon’s quick departure
Leaves you stranded at train stations
And you make your way back through fields
Of distant memories
Looking for ways to fall asleep

Words were left behind
    on top of the soil
    where they buried
    yesterday's bones

2. suddenly, this cold chill
    that has befriended my spine
    is now a sense of comfort
    that I am still alive

3. Grief, it is love, it is every form of love
    From every story I have ever read
    it is hope and despair
    it is the shadow
    of this rain
    that follows me
    home

4. I hope you see
    that this running clock
    moves in circles
    just like we do
                             the beginning of your journey
                             is closer to the end
                             than you could ever imagine

5. If you are looking for me
    I am searching for that old shadow
    we left with the sun for safekeeping
    thinking about burying old love

You know that feeling?
When you remember a moment
Restructured to fit what your emotions desire
And then it’s born
Out of empty space
Nostalgia, a blue flower

And we sit on the porch steps
our bare feet rest on cold cement  
the space between memories and contentment
starts to occupy your lungs
we watch the distant rain, still too premature
yet you, in fear of the future
run inside.

Remember when we’d fly kites
And your hands bled from the wire
We used to talk about dreams
As you bandaged your cuts
Ready to fly them again

We drifted with each other's names
Still sewn into our hearts
I think back to those days
Praying that every dream I could never reach
Has found you instead
And that they walk with you every step
The distances I could not go
For you

It's the big cities that fascinate me
But then ruins are the sights to see
The dark lit corners
With broken shards of mourners
Loud car horns
Who bite at your feet with thorns
Bursting with their party voices
Made of rich history and choices
Small talk on the engines
Stories poking you like pins
Of running traffic lights
With power at the peak of heights
Something like a aurora borealis
They speak of this
A city of lights and wonders
Shaking from the roar of thunder
Twinkling like stars on the ground
The whispers can be heard from the ashes that lay around.

Underneath fractured rainfall
a shadow remains of the person you used to be
Your thoughts fly among the doves
having escaped steel cages of clouded silence
and comes gentle rain,
washing away the unforgiving cold

As your dreams pour out of your voice

If the world was a stage and I was a play-write:

The wind: It was a musician, the muse of a heartbeat and whistling was its charm.

The leaves: The companions of the wind, they were the strings of the guitar. Dancing towards oblivion.

The flowers: They were the painters. A vision was their purpose. They played with colours and mystery.

The sun: It was the stage light, as it glowed upon the sounds of music in the air, the surface of the leaves, and gave life to all the trees.

The stars: They were the show stoppers, dancing in the sky. Revelling in the attention from the eyes of the observer.

The moon: The shy wonder of the night, sometimes barely visible. As it timidly sets the stage for another afternoon.

And lastly,

You: With a thousand stories to tell you’re in thousands of places at once. Looking for mountains to climb and things to design. You’re curious and too quick, never on the stage but merely an observer, but secretly you’re the whole show.


There are a thousand stories to tell,
So I’ll tell you a secret to this mysterious show
The script is blank, the pages clear white
And every minute new words appear
For I am merely following sentimental alliances
Just an observer watching as the future becomes clear.

How does your desire to heal foreign wounds
translate into open skies
of flaming reds and solemn blues
ready to soak up all the rain
that drizzles on the frontlines
you’ve carved along the horizon
of pain still unspoken for

and you do everything to make it yours

“How do you feel?” I ask again. I, knowing the answer, poke my head into the lion's den. I feel the ghost of your frustrations floating about in the confined space. It haunts the room as our shadows strangle each other.

“What is the opposite of homesick?“ You ask.

“Homesick, ” I answer.

"I haven't laughed like this in forever."

"Me neither."

The laughter continued reverberating, threading itself into the wind and dispersing across the city glow. A moment of peace followed, and your company was a comfort, with each laugh we exchanged transforming into a life vest keeping me afloat.

You
see pain,
Feel pain,
Live pain,

I cannot give an explanation for this pain
But I will sit here in silence
Peeling away the darkness of your pain,
find the embers of hope in your pain
And use it to ignite the fire to keep your cold hands warm.

I'll paint my face with plaster
Forget the happy ever after
I'll build up all my walls all over again
I'll keep my lips quietly shut
And never come out to be beat again
I'll rip up all my stories
Break into all your glory
But I'll hide them once again,
I'm sorry I even spoke out
I'll disappear in the fall out
So maybe we can forget this one again

wide open
taking steps toward new seas
twirling this breeze between my fingers
horizons of possibility
what to wish for?
but to float
when all else sinks

You stand on one side of this
Mountain,
And I stand here,
Where fields of memorial Howers grow
Where colours blend into cobblestoned paths
To make hopscotch grids,
And carry children's laughs
Tell me where you go
When I try to reach out
For your cold hands
How easily you fade to memory
How easily It all fades to black
I find myself far from this mountain
Back into my restless eyes
Where I left reflections
Of you, my dear past.

To be empowered is to be proud
To be proud is to be hopeful
And to be hopeful you must fear
Because to fear is to be human
And be human you must withdraw
And to withdraw you must have a soul
And to have a soul you must be alive
And to be alive you must have a heart
And to have a heart you must let them go
And to let go is to be empowered

The best of your days,
spent in vast fields of memorabilia.
Golden drops of sunset rain,
wash over your haste,
and you reach out for the hidden starlight,  
to rewrite the melodies of your broken heart.

Shades of burnt orange and saffron
in clusters between the clouds,
the coolness of the atmosphere
brought ease to my swollen eyes
the bitterness on my tongue washed away
as if caramel was poured into the sky,
sweetness inhabited my lungs
and I uttered...

سُبْحَانَ الله

Healing wounds
leave behind threaded words
as written declarations  
of all that you have survived
and I leave them here
for you

I sit here listening,
to words, you have yet to speak
knowing that for you,
I would lose everything to the sea

fireflies glow, with memories
sewn into my bones
remembering the way we spoke
to the wind  

promises fade; lost in translation

You anxiously anticipate evening restlessness
feeling the pain of resilience deep in your bones
but dying fires from the sunset sky cool your eyes
and a horizon line is sewn into your heart
where blazing sunset colours go to rest
after evening blues wash the sky
and leave behind droplets of stars
you fall asleep - dreaming of hope

The hands of time
intertwined with mine
we walk down this street
through puddles of years
in the rain
where minutes fall
onto our heads
soaking our laughter
until it dissolves
and flows down the drain
to the stormwater pond
where the past awaits

but we keep walking
ignoring the ache
to retreat our steps
to what is now a lake

and we journey until we've left behind an ocean

Where the atmosphere meets blooming water
and boats of paper mache dock
You carry your dreams in a garbage bag  
waiting for an eclipse
to sew back together
your words of reconciliation that you sold
in exchange for hopeless daydreams
when you were too afraid of the aftermath
of healing

It has thorns like roses
and solemn hues
the pinpricks from picking
these flowers have left maps on my hands
that I read when I am lost in the woods
by my childhood dreams

The winter mornings are unlike others
When casting shadows of dark dreams have retired,
And all that's given is glory and fire
Fuelling the sparks of the sun on a new day,

But summer evenings are just as magical
The night of warmth with no sign of being tired
The dreams that are coming are already floating in space
and the stars are shining with grace

Yet spring afternoons are always enchanting,
With droplets of rain that are always dancing
There is nothing like the gleam of light shining through foggy haze,

And even then nothing compares to a midnight in fall
When winds are whistling
And trees stand tall
Colours changing with every closing eye,
There is nothing like the seasons at all

Your heartbeat is caught in a thunderstorm,
You run with a broken umbrella away from winds
That chase you with the hopes to carry you home,
And every time lightening strikes, you realize,
the darkness is only a disguise


The light is closer than it seems

From the echoes of the future
What would you like to hear?
I hear sea breeze and glittering leaves
Rustling in a wind that has travelled from yesterday
Touched your palms and took you dancing on the moon
Then bid it's farewell to meet you once again someday

If this is all we've left behind
Of fractured conversations broken up by laughs and cries
I hope that somewhere under this broken starlight
You find the strength to dream and feel
And when you sleep, all your prayers reverberate through the atmosphere

We shall meet someday, in a moment of realization
Or in someone's loving daze
We shall watch the sunset and wave our last goodbyes

From: the past
To: the future

Little signs
Waiting at the airport
Watching planes fly
You and I
And this dying sunlight
I’ve been looking for trees
Forests, green
You have been chasing seas
Everything blue and never seen
So, what are we to do,
With this continental divide?
Your arrival
Is my departure time
Your goodbye
Is sunrise
On the other side
Of the world
That lays asleep
Between
You and I

The birds speak of a kindred soul
One that basks in the afterglow
of a solemn moon lingering in the daylight

and you watch as nights go on
the way it changes phases
falling in love with the idea
of embracing the volatility of life

The winds from where you grew up
Strike conversations at midnight
Your thoughts, now paper planes
Take off into memory lanes
And your feet, aching soles
Search for branches, and petals
That remind you of home
The taste of sweet dates still dancing on your tongue
Sweet syrup stretches its limbs
Through your nose
Sensations of a past soaked in white noise
When did you leave it behind?
And you think back to the time
When you walked with your naïve self
Too young to comprehend
Back onto a boat
In those dreams that never escape you
Called memories

Drifting deeper into this September dust
It’s been a thousand nights of wide open eyes
Waking up to sounds of December dreams
Your hands shaking in this frail wind
As you try to steady your heart beat
To match the stagnancy of these cold encounters
But the little things hurt too much
And the little thoughts dissolve into your atmosphere
Faster then the rain on your skin
Drifting deep into these November nights
A thousand days of rehearsing the right words to say
When all the words you knew too well are too big to house in these hours you dwell in
So you sink into this mud made of spring
Running from a winter that craves your honesty
Your reflections sit here in this fractured mirror
Waiting for you to break this inner silence

Oh beautiful wonder, how terribly i’ll miss you,
You taught me to love in the colour blue,
With your endless brush-stroked seas,
And skies blended with azure hues.
I’ve fallen in love with your scent that trails  along sculpted roads
Even your dark corners, that I’d never dare to tread
You’ve latched on to my heart by every last thread

Oh beautiful people, how terribly I’ll miss you
You with your melodic voices, and hands of gold
Your language flowing through the wind,
pulling my heartstrings with every word.
And your welcoming faces, laced with a stunning smile.

Oh beautiful city how terribly I’ll miss you,
You with your crowded streets and busy nights.
Your nocturnal nature alive with your city lights,
bright lights that steal my every gaze,
And your laughter that will forever ring in my ear.  

Oh beautiful wonder, only for you
I’ll have to leave my love here
For it is all yours, and one day when I fall in love with another place
My heart will pull me back to you
For it it still says your name.

Your emotions, cataclysmic sentiments,
build foundations from crumpled pieces of paper
creating ideas born out of despair
and you sit amongst yourself
feeling like a candle flame
with piles of unsaid things
as your fuel, waiting to ignite,  
a wicked smile held in place
right where it belongs
at the centre of a concept map
unsteady, unpredictable
the blueprint of catastrophe
laughter without reason

Broken words line these open seams
A bleeding heart rests in the palm of hope
You struggle to keep your hold on the ground
All your stitches are open doors
Ready to take in a lonely soul
At the expense of everything that was yours

Growing pains,
It hurts when your bones break the tethers
And you float above oblivion
only to see yesterday smiling back at you
holding out bandages
to wrap your open wounds,
and send you off to tomorrow,
toward a monument of obstacles
you forgot you had already crossed

In wakefulness,
Your heartbeat stutters in its attempts to make peace with the impulsive evening rain.
But when you soak in the fog and embrace the coolness of winter's breath,
you will find that it will quietly sew itself into the scars that line your heart, and illuminate through your wounds in the shape of a dying ember, radiating warmth.

It's the grey of the sky
That takes my breath away
It's the blue of the day
That's stolen by the rain

it's the thirsty lake that is replenished with every drop
The smile of the clouds that darken their gaze
Or the misty aura that wraps up your skin
It's the way you're lost in the haze

And once it has drizzled it starts to pour
The winds came up and brushed us with hail
But then the ice softens when it touches the ground
The world might be strong but it's already frail

its the people.
The people who hold their hands high as the drought drowns in their prayers
For finally we've been blessed with rain
It's the children who watch in awe as they're wrapped up in layers

It's the way the world watches as the sky cries
It's the way the way everyone's umbrellas are furled
No matter how busy anyone could be
We all can say what a wonderful world

From the beginning till the end
I’ll watch through shattered windows
Admire your changing colours
And revel in your foreign fractured skies

I’ll watch as time takes your blues
Changes a day into a minutes worth
And steals the colours of the wind.
Watch as the night is born again.

I’ll remember your changing skies
As I fly towards your diamond stars
Forever you’ll be a distant sunrise
And a closer memory somewhere far

First I nurse the realization
That this pain will echo
And in all my attempts to grasp it
And keep it close to my lungs
It weaves itself into my breath
And spills out into the open
Seeping into the damp earth
Whistling between the fog
Sinking among the morning dew
And slowly creeping it’s way close to you
My hands are far too unstable
To offer you some peace
I’d give you my bones and everything
That I thought I could be
I would wrap it in the flowers
That we wished for our garden
But this pain it’s too unpredictable
It leaps away from me
It touches anyone who dares
To give me a moment of their time
and when they tell me they are sorry
We both begin our decline
This grief, she sits at the table
It’s never just you and I
This pain it always echoes
Bouncing between your words
And mine