“Danish spring eats my whole soul with sunny days and cherry blossoms Flirting with the longing of hot summer nights where everybody is in love where we forget all the bad politics, It is the season where you bathe your hair in oils, turmeric face masks, And cumin in salads, The season where Ramadan is A love poem Danish Ramadan heals my soul With spring rain and full moons Where sacrificing the body is the least One can do for the afterworld's beauty For the Most Merciful Creator Riding on the bike through Copenhagen Like a local Like I am more than an immigrant with eyes on my mouth, they will ask me if I need saving But do they not know that we will never be thankful until our Palestine is returned to us Until we can break the fast with a Palestinian date without feeling the pain in its sweetness Until my Afghans can fall asleep in silk, And eat Kabuli Pulao in Kabul without dreaming of Europe Until we can pronounce the name of these countries Without agony? Danish Ramadan in the spring, at the local bazaar looking for the fruitful watermelon, Looking for my mother’s eyes, Asking for the red lentils, Wondering how did I became a woman? When I am not even the half of my mother’s sacrifices I would never sell my hunger for this city, but sometimes I wonder what would feel like to take everything without asking Without considering my heritage, Without considering their values? What about my values? Danish Ramadan, I fall in love with the man of my dreams, Holding hands in the moonlight, Driving all over Nørrebro, at night it feels like we are in our homeland, like a palm tree might grow out of peace here Where the night is the most you get out of your day Where the old uncles are drinking Turkish tea, and asking you to recite your favorite prayer And you will always recite the most love-full prayer, the one where The Creator is introduced as Ar-Rahmanul Rahim Danish spring with moody weather, Like women who are exempted from fasting, eating cake in the brightness of the day That put more salt in their men’s food out of love, out of mercy Breaking the fast at sunset while your wife’s eyes shine brighter than the sunrise And we meet again at Fajr, where we slow-dance in our Abayas and you ask me if I will be this gentle for the rest of our lives? There is so much fever in the world, but this Holy Month reminds us of my Lord’s promises and I promise my husband that indeed I will be gentle for the rest of our lives”

�� Danish Ramadan from The Immigrations Series by Royla Asghar 

��� are you a romantic, my love? ”

bathing in romance by royla asghar

writer-of-madness

“Dear grandfather, your features are falling on our faces like velvet curtains; elegant eyes of an Afghan representing a tribe of a proud nation. We inherited that. And in my dreams you know me better than anyone. You call on me in Pashto, or maybe Dari, or even Farsi, you could speak all of the languages. There was so little of you but so much of you in us. Some tragedies leave so much love behind, and I know my father loves you more than you could imagine. And he made all of his success with the lessons you left behind. Grandfather, your family calls me ‘jan’ and it is bittersweet, like the seeds of a pomegranate, cause I wish I had all of my uncles and aunts, and all of their children here with us. You taught my father how to migrate, how to build a home in a country where it wants to send you back where you came from. But you were a cartographer, you knew that borders are just drawing lines, it means nothing if you have the the charm of an Afghan. My grandfather, we are educated, with bachelor degrees, masters even, talents and passion. Like you. We never learnt our father’s language, but lately, your language is yearning to be pronounced. Every word is a poem. Every sentence is a proverb. And all the lyrical letters are crying in silence. You would still be proud, your son re-learn it all like an old childhood song. We still call Afghanistan on the phone, we still send photographs, and my father’s old sibling are scolding him that he should be speaking Persian better. After all, he is not a European. Dear grandfather, would you read my poetry when I meet you in heaven? Would you pronounce my name the right way? Would you know I have searched for you? Would you know my father never stopped mentioning you? Would you know we never forgot you? Generations later, we were still lion kings.”

�� The Lion King from The Immigration Series by Royla Asghar  (via poems-of-madness)

“She had eyes full of dead dreams and the heart of a wild horse. She had summers dying on her, and her skin was unforgivable. Addictable. You loved her, and she would leave you for a plane ticket. Caramel hair, vanilla smell and she laughed like a child, and her accent was delicious, you could taste it every time she kissed you. You fall in love with her while walking on the beach, you asked about her tattooes while taking off her red dress in the ocean. She took all your money, calling her mamacita, knowing she would leave you broke with a broken heart. You had visions of her moving her body, every men tried to take her away from you. They offered her cigarettes and dreams. They would leave their wives for her, and she’d pray for them when they cried for her. You last saw her on the Columbian beaches, in all her youth, in that dress, with all her beauty. You named her Rosalina, when she left you. You called her Rosie, when you thought she loved you.”

�� Rosalina “Rosie” by Royla Asghar 

godinourhands

A fragment after Augustine’s Confessions. 

Yelena Moskovich, A Door Behind a Door (2021)

Portrait of Fryderyk in Shifting Light, Richard Siken

[text ID: Lovers / do the looking while the strangers look away. It isn’t / fair, the depth of my looking, / the threat of my / looking.]

Every time I’m in an airport, I think I should drastically change my life: Kill the kid stuff, start to act my numbers, set fire to the clutter and creep below the radar like an escaped canine sneaking along the fence line. I’d be cable-knitted to the hilt, beautiful beyond buying, believe in the maker and fix my problems with prayer and property. Then, I think of you, home with the dog, the field full of purple pop-ups — we’re small and flawed, but I want to be who I am, going where I’m going, all over again.

— The Problem with Travel, Ada Limón

I wish your heart knew what my heart stores for you

Claire C. Holland, from I Am Not Your Final Girl: Poems; “Jess”

[Text ID: “I can’t exist in a way that comforts you.”]

All night I feel their absence and I burn.

Carol Ann Duffy, ���Warming Her Pearls���, Selling Manhattan (via noorshirazie)

From a series of interviews with bugs 

Claire C. Holland, from I Am Not Your Final Girl: Poems; “Ginger”

[Text ID: “I got cursed, in every way a / woman can. / You kill yourself, over and over, / to be different.”]

poems-of-madness

I am upgrading

Dear followers Poems of Madness is still very much alive! I just moved to roylaasgharpoetry.tumblr.com 

see you there. 

"In my culture, we know death intimately. In Arabic, the highest expression of love is the phrase "ya'aburnee" Translated "you bury me" . It means "I love you so much, I'd sooner die than bury you". It was used by mothers in our lineage who were so used to losing their young in war. In my culture, we cannot talk about love without speaking death's name"

-George Abraham, "Untitled," Published In Black Napkin Press

“September days have the warmth of summer in their briefer hours, but in their lengthening evenings a prophetic breath of autumn.” 

�� Rowland E. Robinson

flowerytale

Margaret Atwood, from “Late Poems”, Dearly

typewriter-worries

[ Text ID: These are the late poems. / Most poems are late / of course: too late, / like a letter sent by a sailor / that arrives after he’s drowned. ] 

Dele Olanubi