i'm performing at ronnie scotts jazz club

-

click on image to read details!!

warmth,
warsan.

whilst waiting for fajr...

-


i'm listening and smiling and smiling and smiling.

-

on recognizing my love.

-

it is the winter of my twenty first year and by his mercy i have stripped down my life and my loves down to the most pure, most loving, most honest, most sincere.

the women in my life- my real friends and family,my aunts, sisters, friends, mothers and grandmothers - who have proven, after many years and many heart breaks, through puberty and poverty, death and new borns,sickness and marriage that they are and will always be the only women who will want the best for me, love me. these are the same women who have grounded me, made me aware of my god, my skin, my culture, my rights.

these women hide my shame and keep my secrets hidden under their tongues, god fearing women who i share my life with,who i love and honour.

the man in my life, my beloved, who guards my modesty, my integrity, supports me, respects my body and mind, who calms and teaches me. who loves me through all faults with dedication, who nurtures me, heals me.

the only man who could make me love wholly, fully, holy, staggering. a old love, of a time before divorce and displacement and mistrust. the kind that makes you want to forgive your demons and ghosts. a selfless love.

life can be such an ugly place when you are sharing it with people who wish you the worst, friends with envy on their breath, family who spite you when you turn, lovers who take from you sexually and spiritually, who disrespect you, men who you have to build into men, who are boys who do not know how to love a woman. men that you are with because they are good looking, men that you are with because you do not know how to be alone, or because you think you have spent too much time to walk away now, or because you honestly think that this is your only chance at love.

we can control nothing else in this life, only who we share this life with and i will kneel down every day in dedication to the almighty for blessing me with love, blessing me for recognising my love, finally. for blessing me with the courage it took to remove those that were waiting for my fall.


"And of His Signs is that He created mates for you from yourselves that you might find peace of mind in them, and He put between you love and compassion"
Chapter 30, verse 21 of The Holy Qur'an


"it is He Who created from a single person, and made his mate of like nature in order that he might dwell with her – in love"
Chapter 7, verse 189 of The Holy Qur'an

beloved, this one is for you.

memoir poem one.

-

freewrite


The song of old lovers

My father will always love my mother,
above all, that is one thing we all know
and she will always compare all the men
she will ever love, to him.

Some songs will always be his,
he will always be the first man to have
honoured her body, the first who had taught her
the sweet heat of matrimony,
he will always be the reason why she
is so sure of her beauty.

I am a selfish daughter,
tugging at my mother’s heart
all her old honeymoon pictures are
blue tacked to my bedroom walls,
a shrine she no longer worships at
I rub wine on her lips waiting for
the churchyard to signal the fire.

In a car driving through Amsterdam one winter
my mother tells me what song she wants played
at her funeral, I am a child, I cry.
Now as an adult I am looking for that song.

In a West London hospital
my father’s a sheet of bones under dusty skin,
his body a hospital bed
his eyes large, desperate,
I don’t know how to touch him,
even with my small hands
he looks like something I would break.

My mother jokes all the way back home,
on the phone to a friends she says,
“oh you wouldn’t even recognize him
if you saw him now, he’s so frail,
no longer the big burly man walking like a bully
who just won the school yard fight.”

I’ve found the song,
played it to my father in his flat
on his dark green cassette player
he took off his glasses and looked at the small
window of spooling black tape for a long time,
then came back, sober, younger
“this is the song I played for your mother on
our wedding night, where did you find it?.”

My mother will always love my father,
and above all things,
we should always remember that.

i dont believe that anybody feels the way i do about you now.

---

current obsession.

dedicated to my beloved,

memoir poetry.

-


project.

ten poems, ten lines each. in ten days about ten true to life things.

trouble is, i'm not sure when i will begin,
but tonight is a good night and god is kind god.

love,
me.

how many heroes died in the summer?

-



the beautiful split screne scene song.
me and him were like-
"oh, wow this is so well done."
then i cried a little.

goldilocks and the three bears at st pauls cathedral.

only by way of god, did i find you. i am so thankful, god i am so grateful.

throw back.

i'd want to live inside there with you.

mirror girls.

depression-
a mental state characterized by a pessimistic sense of inadequacy and a despondent lack of activity .


my depression is my most narcissistic trait.

tell me what led you on, i'd love to know.

anyone who knows me, should know that i am completely obsessed with little dragon.
heres a dubstep remix to their masterpiece "twice". months ago i posted the original on here. can't explain how it makes me feel. something like magic on speed inside a gold coloured rainbow of sad good times.

shima's heroes.

be my friend.

midas is the king

so sorry,

arrghhh.

i've missed you all. how could i be away for so long and not even send a flower, a note, a midnight phone call. nothing.

but we will get through it because, ofcourse- we just have to.

anyway so much has been going on, i haven't been blogging any poetry lately because i'm working on the final draft of the book., don't want to spoil it now.

i'm also working on a performance at the soho theatre on the 23rd of this month, working with apples and snakes. it's gonna be beautiful, will be posting more info on it, so any of you in london do come down.

i have to be more forthcomming about where and when i perform, i need to work on my commitment issues so that our relationship can work, so that we can raise the kids together and be happy.

what else, what else- im reading alot of terrance hayes, shown to me by the lovely jacob sam la rose.

also, i am a knitting addict.

insha allah, the few months that are comming are so exciting, god is good. he allows me to live what i love and do it honestly. so many doors opening up. alhamdulilah.

and tomorrow i wana go see emiliana torrini live, cannot wait!!

much love, (ramadan kareem)
warsan.

=]

you got to be wise.

this song has always made me cry- with happiness. she has a really strong effect on me, the way she sings it, her face, the way she is moving. it's like she's singing it all for me. this song raised me, i would hear it and be like "yes mum".

me and my kids will dance to this together insha allah, in the kitchen with white socks on. god willing.

love.

july is before august.

tomorrow im going to the zoo with beloved. with or without the children.

bang bang

Jindřich Štreit

a diabetics love

motherhood.

birthday girl.

-


god, im sorry i've been away, you have to believe me.

so, august 1st was a birthday of mine, i also found out that i was born on a monday.
so that makes me, mondays child fair of face.
but- i think, wednesdays child is full of woe, is more fitting, for a man of my calibre.



in these past few weeks, ive aged a year.
im twenty one years old and it shows on my face.


i'm nearly thirty, time to get everything rolling.


alhamdulilah, i am happy, ramadan is comming, i can't wait.
june and july were interesting months and august was just beautiful.

i have much in store!!

i'm reading for the ninth time -




it's effin beautiful.

harbour front cleaning.

for the now, i'm working on a collection of stories.
also i'm in toronto right now feeling maternal, and i miss my special person.

i'm gonna go do some laundry right now,
living out of suitcases always makes me feel dirty even if i'm clean.
i want to listen to some morcheeba before i sleep and drink some cinnamon tea.

and read a book my beloved bought me, i'll come back and do the review.

day dont want to live.

look at this.

see how she has her mothers hands now, busy cleaning.
see her 3 am loud banging of plates and cups that she
as a child,teen,adult, could not sleep through.

watch her, how her face is eaten up by that scorn
how quickly her eyes tear up over the sink,
how she steadies herself with a broom.

she danced at last nights party,
saw his face in the stars, spoke about the moon
and how it was chipped at one side.

now she is carrying a strange weight
something is hanging from her limbs
she is a sad woman
a sad girl
look how she knows this all too well
watch her body move homeward
how she scrubs surfaces with bleach,
no gloves.

did you see how she became her mother
in that kitchen

she herself wouldn't have believed it,
if it weren't true.

before the morning after.

i've lived in homes brimming
with threats.

threats spilling out of windows
out of mouths
threats bloody smeared across chins

do you know what it does to me,
when they come in your voice?

it's a train ripping through a childs bedroom
an uncle creeping into a childs bedroom
a hand ripping knickers off a sleeping body

its steals my breath
and numbs me.

day three. on the eve of breasts.

on the bed we don't have
you gave me your back.

we slept
in a room i wasn't in.

your slumber
deep and regretful
made leaving possible.

i'm going to new york.

but i miss you and i want you to come with me.

time takes too much time.

one from the past- i've loved them since i was a kid.

watch the video, dont know how to explain it. the whole thing, the men sitting with the guitars, everyones face, how slow it is. her face. her voice. the colour. the greys. the music. makes the hair raise up.

roisin, i would marry you.

a novel about my wife.

that book i blogged about-

novel about my wife. i finished it. it was good. could've been a film. like the way it described london. confusing at times, honestly don't think i understood the plot exactly- but god were some parts uncomfortable. it made me sweat at times, i felt anxious even. no doubt the writer is gifted. there were love scenes that were bare and almost there, enough to make you question whether you just have a filthy mind or if the writer is actually saying what she's saying.

don't ask me what kinda book review this is, it isnt a book review. im just telling you in everyday conversational english that it was a good book. i bought it because of the title and cover. yes im that kind of reader. also i read first lines of books. the stranger the better. and i loved this books first line, first chapter.

took me awhile to read, started a few months ago. don't know if this had any reflection on the book or if im just a lazy mammoth.

i'd give this book another read in five years time.
i wanted to be pregnant the whole time i was reading it.

i also fell in love with the wife a little, and i also cried a little.
good book, the author would be absolutely incredible if she had the look of someone who had suffered some trauma.

buy it. or atleast come into my bedroom whilst im away and steal it.

=]

ricki lake. lie detector tests.

-

the man in the tv didn't steal the earrings.

his girlfriend kisses him on the mouth
full and wet
the audience applauds
he cries a little into her neck.

she remembers
him on his knees three months ago
in their bedroom
where he said
"bay i never took 'em"
and kissed her knees
and thighs,
that night she kicked
him in the
mouth.

day two. block 12

have you heard my laugh
at the market yet?

have you pressed your thumb
into ripe mangoes
and felt my name in your throat?

describe the fruits
you have suckled,
juices running down
your elbows,
wishing i were there
to catch the drops with my
tongue.

day one. telephone.

"im looking at the sky and there ain't one star
there's just dust over this city"
-10.52 pm my time, 12.52 pm your time



you sit with your legs spread apart
on an old bed
on a balcony as wide as your back,
fireflies dancing around your beard
with your home in their
stomachs.

on descending from the sky
you couldn't see the lights of khartoum,
fajr was thirty six degrees warm,
i wanted to be the kohl eyed woman
greeting you at the airport
with skin
sticky and sweet.

i bought calling cards
with some change,
took the bus home,
sat on my bed with my knees together,
unwrapped my hair,
held my breath to hear your hello,
wanted to remind you
of the sandstorm you left in london.

poem for a renewal of things.

-

two weeks ago
the blood had risen to your skin
you both laughed,
she had wanted to bruise you.

last night she pinched herself
drawing blood,
grinding the scabs on her knee
into her matress.

a month ago she sucked blood
from your thumb in a coffee shop,
neither of you
brought that up again.

tonight her mouth is a hurricane
wanting to suck the blood
from your bone.

tomorrow her hands
will search behind your ears
for coins,
magic to make you smile
but she will reappear with stigmata palms,
hands a bloody mess.

for years to come
her body will renew itself,
passing blood where woman
would pass child.

until one day a daughter
with a name
thick in mouth like blood
comes and dizzies the breath
out of you both.

poem about the temporal loss of lover.

-

tonight you showed your teeth
the city whimpered
i held on to your shirt collar,
anything to hold us steady.

the sky turned the colour of rum,
the clouds moved into clots of curdled milk,
the children laid down on the battlefield.

in the midst of shooting,
you remembered the statue of a woman
that you had begged to move.

poem to self. and other insecure women.

-

look at you
you're so beautiful when you laugh
at night i swear you look like you could swallow the stars
or atleast swallow the scars
and stories of the women who came before you.

see how your hair torments the sky
thick curls that blot out the sun
eclipsing the city into the hue
of your grandfathers
midnight skin.

your father wanted to name you
after a wet season
he wanted to explain
why the rain falls;
just so that it can taste your skin
dip into your collar bone
drip down your shoulder blades
and on the rare occasions when no one is looking
and your head is tilted back,
rush into your open mouth.

for women like you
death comes in the body of a lustful man,
and the earth can't wait to bury itself
inside you.

look at you,
cloaked in god's skin.
only in his name could you exist so bright.

at the bare nakedness of things.

i'm still that little
girl
who made the moon follow her
home.

समाधि

-

yoga.

you make me feel so good.

samadhi.
समाधि

pontiac.

-


clean girl with dirty mouth
plays with the hem of her skirt
lusting after boy
with no facial hair
praying-
"dont be anything like my father please"
fiddling with the saints
on the dash board
hands begging
for something to
undress.

charming boy with cousins car
leaves the radio low
pulls girl by her hair
into his lap
pushes thumbs
into her navel
tells her to
hold her breath.

pretty girl with her initials
hanging between breasts
sweats shame
between contractions
eyes darting between
doctor and doorway
looking for
him and his promises.

tired mother
cradling bible in lap
shakes head at daughter
waiting for baby
to come into the world
and be crossed
in the name of
absent fathers.

scared boy sits in borrowed car
in hospital parking lot
counting the windows
of the building
guessing which one
is glowing
with his mistake.

people and small things

-

a fondled child grows into an adult
who won't hang mirrors in their home.

a beaten mother shows her children
her bruises, on purpose.

an alcoholic father dies
and can only be remembered for his nose bleeds.

a miscarriage feels like
the hard seating of waiting rooms.

i search for lumps in my breasts whilst
standing at the kitchen sink.

my father sleeps with the radio on,
his bed smells of apathy.

my brother listens
to grown men moaning into prison walls.

my mother marries
the same mistake.

and inside the television
there is a war going on.

it's been

one month.

of orange moons and vinyls.

alhamduliah.

you are making the biggest mistake of your life.

i've been writing to this.

home truths. (freewrite).

how does a
daughter show herself
to a father
who forgets
he held
her first
born
before the second
son came and stole
all of his blood
and name

and how do i tell
an old man
that every poem
i've ever written
has been an attempt
to steal his heart

had i gone
the dark route
for a fathers love
searched the laps of men
for his voice
laughed into empty bottles
fell into strange needles

i still would be who i am now
a girl with stanzas between her teeth
begging for his love

no one taught me
how to be soft
how to let shoulders sag
how to be okay
with your hand
on the small of my back

even love
sometimes feels
like treason,
a tribe of parents
sitting in my stomach
my mothers trembling hands
my father chewing his knuckles
a home full of lonely people
so cold and stubborn

but still,
all of that just
makes me want to open up my chest
wide and pull you in
promise you i'll
never
be anything like them

and i want you
to hold out your arms
and swear that
our children won't
grow into
poets writing poems
about their mothers split lip.

near railings.

ofcourse,
she could describe it
the way every body else does.

"the earth moved"

"i'm weak at the knees"

"it's dizzying"

"you stole my breath"

"my heart skipped a beat"

but, really it's just
her soul trying
to leave her body,
thinking heaven is close
when ever you are near.

star trek

last night i was as happy as a moon face.


"i married your mother, because i loved her".

girl made of wood sets herself on fire and survives.

final semester goodbye. you dog faced dragon dinosaur.


summer...insha allah.

- laugh.
- sleep.
- love.
- fly.
- read.
- write.
- touch.
- brown.


i'm reading this-




i will let you know when i finish.

pantry.

he took this photograph for me.
- saffron and cinnamon in mason jars.

how did he know it would make me feel the way it did?

of poems and living.

* i was commisioned to write this piece for the muslim writers awards.
- a poem about poetry.

my mother breast fed me poetry
haikus my father kissed into her mouth
sonnets he wrote across her back and thighs

men chewed tobacco
and spit of out songs
women threw hymns
into the water
and begged the tide to
bring back the bodies it stole

and theres a man whose lost his mind
walks around north london,
says he saw the way the war started
how the first word was thrown
and fell near the feet of the women
at the market,
how the city hushed
itself into a strange shade of red.

i come from the cracked stomachs
of women who hold poetry in their breath
and would never
kiss the hollow of throat
or the back of neck
lest their stories would
leak out onto the skin of others

a place where poems strain your knees
like prayermats
where a song will have you doubled over
in the street
holding your face in your hands
calling for god

say walahi you never knew that
men married women
with a mouthful of poetry
or that we buried our
men in graves
hollow with words
gave birth to children
over grandmothers
gabay

poetry can heal
wounds people
forgot they had

one song
can surrender a thousand
chests
soften the hardened skin of feet
tell mama to sit for awhile
the sky is the shade of good memories
and i can't promise happiness but
i think i have a poem
she would like to hear.

then and now, here and there.

In the corner of a room
A man sings hollow
In Arabic,
Repeating the same line-
Something about the wetness of eyes.

Last night we sat on soho
Back steps
Hidden in back roads
Watching sad people
And
I am jealous of
The way the cigarette
Lays between your lips
The way you breathe it in
The way it sits inside you
Easy.

Now there is a man singing
About a fire in
His body that won’t show mercy

Now you are a schoolboy
Seated behind uncle
Singing songs on the car ride home,
Look how an old Sudan serenades you.

Morning feels like your breath,
Your ashes lay heavy across the shell of
Pistachio nuts
Peeled with a thumb
or bottom set of teeth

Did you know
That you lick your lips
When you mention the nile?

There are no orchestras in this room
You talk of countries
That lay beside each other
Barely touching
This summer
When you leave me
I will forget how to breathe.

Do you know how jarring it is
To dream about the
Person laying beside you?

You make me want to
Go to my father
And gather stories
And secrets
From between his toes
Curse him for being so quite
You make me want to go home
And love it.

What are all these things
You are teaching me
Things I should’ve known
Like how songs heal
People
And homes
And countries,
How some songs
Weld me to your rib.

6th/7th/8th may.

He said one more I love you with yesterdays breath
His baritone still beating between my breasts
Yesterday was jealous of today
And left it self
Stained on sheets
And yesterday fell against
The back of my throat.

Yesterday felt like tomorrow in my mouth
Wednesday’s fingers touched places
That the day before yesterday wanted to claim
And today is dizzy with remembrance.

He says one more I love you
In a borrowed room
On borrowed time
Waiting for a borrowed moon
To nestle itself between jealous
Stars
And promise the city
A second coming.

-

to love you, is the most frightening, most brave thing i have ever done.
to want you to love me back, empties me of any pride or arrogance i have ever owned.

am i not getting closer to the one, by way of you?

the most unusual high.

shukran ya zol.
x

graduation day.

he done it.

=]

O2

"we should sleep now"

i thought my heart
was made of tougher things.

central line is red, circle line is yellow.

i cant compete with your home.

i cannot become sky and soil, hot tarmac and airport taxis.
i cannot hug you like your uncle, burly embraces filled with baritone arabic.

i don't know your alphabet, i can't remember the words you teach me,
i can only listen to your stories.
write about your memories.
sometimes cry for silly, stupid, british reasons.

but i can't compete with your home.

i am not mountains nor am i back roads.
i am not the singing woman with the sugar voice who knows all of your alleyways.
i can't say i know how you feel, i dont know my country like that.
dont know its hot air in my face, havent felt it under my feet.

im jealous that i can't be homesick.

and it hurts that i know
that me and my london can never be enough for you.

underground.

my god,
all the little deaths you have given me.

how london looked so different
beside you.

.

i'm a poet.

has it not occured to you that, maybe i need this sorrow, this despair.
and also your hands, and mouth and unwavering attention.
that with me, love cannot be calm, nor can it be partial.

to be like this.

anxiety-

An unpleasant state of mental uneasiness or concern about some uncertain event; An uneasy or distressing desire (for something); A state of restlessness and agitation, often accompanied by a distressing sense of oppression or tightness in the stomach.


ever since i can remember i've suffered from this. it comes fast, sickeningly so.
if im holding someones hand i have to let it go.
if im near a door i have to walk through it.

tonight is no different.

& i wish you understood how it makes no sense.

london and he

tastes like a monday night.

east london.

just got back from a reading at brick lane.
made me remember how reading a poem should really feel like.

i need to get back to myself.

so sorry so sorry

i just came back from bristol and manchester,
for a couple of readings.


i promise never to abandon you again. maybe.


but anyway, thirty days? thirty whole days.
wow.

god is good.
alhamdulilah.


=]

day thirty.

your aunt gave birth
to still cities
hiroshima a cyst in her stomach
mogadishu a lump in her breast
everyone in your family
told her to
stop
loving
so hard
you won't find a man who wants
to kiss an atlas
dont map out stars on your back
like that
where you gonna find
a man who wants to join
your constellations with his tongue
push out falestine from under your
tongue xayati
let damascus drip from your neck
and wash out the havana of
your ribs
your dreams are too large
too big
stifiling
they make everyone around you
hold their breath
what man wants a woman
covered in continents
teeth small colonies
stomach an island
what man wants to
watch the world
from his bedroom
face a small riot
hands a civil war
arms freckled
with an immigrants story home
behind your ears
a refugee camp
a body littered entirely
with ugly things

but god,
doesn't she wear the world well.

twenty nine.

do they kiss like this back home

where you are from
is bottom lip sucked into mouth,
does the woman forget where she is

are there couples dying on every street corner
bodies connected at the wound
pressing dead weight into each other

what is to be said
of people who only come alive
when touched by another,
surely it is a serious matter
if i am dead whenever we come apart.

twenty eight

your tobacco reminds me
of my fathers silence,
i need you to keep talking.

day twenty seven.

tell the woman on the roof
that it won't be like flying

tell the man on the bridge
that the water will be like fire

tell the woman with the keys
to wait outside for 3 minutes

tell the boy with the gun
that his father is proud

tell the girl at the hospital
that you'll never see beauty like that again

tell your wife without the breasts
that they still feel the same in your hands

tell the baby that was in my stomach
that i wanted it real bad

tell your angry boyfriend
that you'll kill him next time

tell the husband that's about to leave
that this day won't leave his skin

tell the man on the train
that he isn't god

tell yourself to remember all the
other ways you can make a person gasp.

day twenty six.

i look at old photographs,
see how easy my fathers arm
hung from your shoulders,
he looks like a man who knows
how to hold a woman.

mama, do you miss him
sometimes,
with your entire body,
do you wish you
could cook for him,
shout at him,
look at him,
beg him to stay
one more time
for the old countries sake.

day twenty five.

we will struggle
not the way people do
and you will hurt me
but not the way everyone else can
and you will love me
harder than anything i've ever known
and i will need you
it will be strong and terrifying
and i will listen
even if it's the saddest thing i've ever heard
and you will question
and i'll tell you to remember god
and i will remind you
of the way my heart wants to jump out of my chest
and i will cry
fast tears that don't break your heart
and you will speak
words that make too much sense
and i will be silent
knowing i don't ever want to be anywhere else.

day twentyfour.

remember morecambe bay,
the first time you ever
saw the ocean
the tide came in quick like
a slap and stole all of the breath
from your body
it stunned your legs
forced your mouth so full with water
and you did not know
how anything not alive
could be so cruel.


the ocean laid you down,
still small bodies dotted
across the shore,
and for a few seconds on the news
you looked like lazy
immigrants who just
wanted to rest for a few minutes.

day twenty three.

your grandfathers hands were brown,
your grandmother kissed each knuckle
like they were separate mountains
then circled an island into his palm
and told him what parts they would
share and what part they would leave alone,
she wet a finger to draw where
the ocean would be on his wrist
kissed him there, named the ocean after herself.

your grandfathers hands were slow but urgent,
your grandmother dreamt about his hands,
a clockwork of fingers finding places to own on body-

under the tongue
collarbone,
bottom lip,
arch of foot.

your grandmother names his fingers after seasons,
the index finger a wave of heat
the middle finger rain fall
and some nights his thumb is the moon
nestled just under her rib.

your grandparents often found
themselves in dark rooms
mapping out eachothers bodies,
claiming whole countries
with their mouths.

forgive me.

love,


i've been away, i've been dealing with intense laptop abandoment issues.
but i'm back..and thats all that matters right?


=]

god is good, god is so so so good..

day twenty two.

im afraid
of what i will write
if you
mend me
if i start believing
all the nice things
your mouth empties on
to my skin

what poems
will spill out
of a body
filled to the breath
with you

how can i
remember anything
about wars
or women
when moments with you
are full
and ripe
hours entirely
swallowed watching your
mouth move

even this poem
is about
your voice
and the cities it leaves
trembling inside my stomach

what will be of poetry
if now,
watching you sleep
is the closest i
ever come
to dying.

day twenty one.

My mother’s bedroom smelt of frankincense and emptiness.
Her palms were soft and even when we shared her bed, she still reached beyond our small bodies to find something that was never there.

Sad people have the gift of time, while the world dizzies everyone else; they remain stagnant, their bodies refusing to follow pace with the universe.

With these kind of people everything aches for too long, everything moves without rush, wounds are always wet.

I was 6 years old when our father left; my mother wore red nail polish and refused to cry.

I remember my aunt coaxing my mother out of the bathroom -
"Leila, Leila please stop scrubbing the bathtub".

My mother owns the scent of forgotten things.
It clings to her hair and arch of back.
Even the way she speaks is doused in absence.

In passport photos sadness hangs off of her face.
These days I look so much like her.

day twenty.

gloomy sundays
your teeth are brittle stars
she wants to touch
and swallow,
instead she feeds you strange fruit
with bare hands,
you catch the juice from her elbows
with your tongue,
she giggles.

you said
she had unearthed you,
your head
a small black burial between her legs,
she smells of rainy evenings
tastes like an easy tuesday morning.

you count your subxnallahs
by running fingers across her ribs
or by each ridge of back bone,
when you swear she cups your mouth
her eyes urgent
her mouth a small O,
she wants you in the next life.

when she is pregnant
you will warm almond oil between palms
and make her stretch marks glow,
you will rub jasmine into her scalp
whisper surahs into her stomach
& thelonious monk into her spine.

when she presses the soles
of her feet into your chest
feeling the thump of your heart under her toes
you'll say
"you're walking all over my heart habibti"
and she'll throw her head back
and laugh loud like her mother,
slip her toes into your hair,
her legs the colour of old
photographs.

day nineteen.

last night
you said you hoped
that the angels
were telling god
how we were talking about him.

you said that sometimes
they sit around
and listen when people talk about him,
i imagined them with hands under chins
huddled close,
each knee a forest.

you said that they then go
up to the heavens
and tell god our names,
that god repeats it.

god,
how i shuddered at the thought,
each syllable of your name
the size of a city,
the breath of it
carried upon the backs of angels,
the horizons filled with its pronounciation
the s in your name causing rain fall.

walahi,
never had anything inside my head
seemed more beautiful.

day eighteen.

when i heard you
mumble nina simone
soft into my ear,
"oh lord, please don't let me be misunderstood"
i wanted to ask you
what you knew about dying.


my heart
an old record player moaning,
billie holiday's voice drying your
knuckles a nairobi winter
and all i want to do
is search your mouth
for ghosts,
and i swear i would
if it didn't mean
having to count the suicides
on your breath.

day seventeen

you are in love.

gandato
sleeps with you outside,
a matress of fireflies
burning wings into your back
as angels drag dawn to
your country.
your mouth bleeds miswak sometimes,
and you spit out a pink colour
over rocks wet with your wounds.

sabalooka
is old,
the oldest place in your heart,
a wet dusk
sweeter than
any musk you've rubbed
into your beard
sweeter than any woman you've ever held.

merowe
is your face and body,
when you are a map of scars
that she would like to connect
with her mouth,
a constellation of mistakes
god needed you to make.

jabal marra
tells you to come here,
it's voice a prayer call
raising the hair on your arms
and back of neck,
you've been there before,
just not as you.

but dongola
speaks rotana
a language you want to mean something
you imagine your skin nuba,
a deep brown.
sometimes your country becomes the
colour of old blood on
new sheets.

no one has ever loved home the way you do,
with so much hate
and so much love and so much love.

day sixteen

somewhere, there is a loyal man
lowering his gaze from the sea,
the waters wetness
reminding him of how
his wife
says his name over and over again
pulling him in like the tide,
swallowing him whole.


somewhere, there is a quiet wife,
quickening herself homeward,
praying that she'll reach the door
as the sky turns the colour of sucked skin,
hoping that he'll look up and drop everything he's carrying,
and hold her.

day fifteen.

haiku.

she told you that she
was broken but still you tried
to force her to heal.

day fourteen.

jannah is written for your heart,
but you do not accept it.

it felt good,
the night
you pushed albadya into my mouth,
i understood what part of your blood
was warm
and what part
understood the sea.
why are you so good at drowning?

you were dizzy with miles davis
when you asked me if i thought your lips were dark,
i told you no,
but since then they have reminded me
of old vinyls
meccan soil
sammy davis's funeral
my mothers black dress,
yes, your lips are a sudanese night.

habibi,
how long have you been drowning?
and how could you have not noticed the
heaven you hold inside you,
the way god shines
from your skin,
every time you choose not to drown.

day thrirteen.

craiglist #2


i found a slow wail
the height of small war
knotted into cysts
covering the receiver
of a phone box
just off of stanley avenue

it was trying to dial your number
had skin a sad colour
i asked it where it lives
and it pointed to my mouth

is it yours?

day twelve.

baby,
this was before you were born

before the women
came home
with hair soaked in blood

before your father understood
that the weight of your mothers thigh
reminded him of an ak 47

before the bald headed women
of manakobia
fled the asylums

before someone let the prisoners free
and the virgins came back with bleeding skirts

before half brothers shot eachother
in the face

and new widows set fire to
themselves

and the mosques smelt of rape

and batteries were pushed into women
and children were pulled out

before the streets lost their names
and tribe became god

before we carried machetes in our mouths
and surnames in our pockets

baby, would you believe me
if i told you that home was beautiful?

day eleven.

to make my husband love me again
we sacrificed a prostitute
in mama te's kitchen,
her wrists smellt like firewood.

we filled her torso with
hair and nails,
pushed her down the tar river,
i wanted to say sorry to god.

i danced,
my mouth a swarm of breath,
until my hair
caught into my teeth
bled my lips a raw yellow.

at night i wash my feet
and face in urine,
leave pieces of gold
inbetween doors.

my husband loves me now,
never looks at another woman,
but next month
when the moon is full
and swollen,
i will be asked to
bring my first borns
eyes.

day ten.

what you miss the most
is the way he kissed you,
leaving branched bruises on your throat,
mouth a greedy open thing.

how later he would lay you down
and name your broken capillaries after cities
sarajevo
freetown
havana
damascus.

your cousin whispers
apologies into your ear
as she ties a black cloth
around your head like soot
her breath reminds you of
his bullet tongue
sapping at your skin.

the other widows
are statues
with silent children spilling from hips
but you are different
your back is an arc,
there is something urgent
under your skin.

the holy man reads from a tired book,
you are the only one trembling
your uncle holds you up
by your arm,
his touch is dizzying.

later you will tell
anyone that will listen
the reason you fainted
at the funeral,
how it rushed in waves
from your stomach,
how all you could feel
was his beard grazing
your inner thigh.

day nine.

and what of those women
who came home with the bleeding hands

those who held down the thighs
of their daughters

those who cleaned the rusted
blade with warm spit

who lit coal beneath
binded legs

who lit fires and drank
tea leaves under tin skies

who danced when a man came
to try to make a woman out of that wound

who paraded when the sheets came back
a siren red

what of them now?

at night does a henna tipped forefinger
remind them of all the flesh cut away
by mother
and mothers mother
and mothers mothers mother

and do they the remember their daughters
and cry?

day eight.

i refused to turn my head
to see him holding you by your throat,
spit falling from your mouth
like meteors.

you haven't forgiven me for that,
have you?

you have three daughters
the one with skin
the colour of curdling milk
didn't come back the same
from the house party you took her to.

inside a dark bathroom,
she is taught everything a seven year old body
could feel against its will,
she remembers the sound of your red lipped laugh
how it travelled from
the strangers living room
and into her skin.

remember that summer
when you jumped borders?
i gave birth to myself
in that kilburn flat,
back mottled with abandonment,
her belt buckle
kissing a london night
into my skin,
i forgot your name
in her bedroom.

tell me
how you forgot
the ways i made your stomach crack
how i pushed your belly button outward
or did you not like the way
i came to be,
my fathers dry awkward kisses
and clumsy hands.

you are not the kind of woman
who knows how
to kiss a child,
your lips are better suited
for the hollow
of neck
or the base of spine.

mother,
your laugh
always feels like
a dark bathroom
and an adults tongue
counting my ribs
two by two.

day seven.

hope lives in the soiled
palms of prositutes that
make love to men
who look like their fathers
biting blood into tongues
moaning like
their mothers would
when saltwater
licks fresh welts
women who fold money
into ruptured english
waiting for a man
who doesn't arrive
by way of broken dirty things
waiting for a man who won't
come and collapse
in sterling.

day six.

a poem about the question he asked me in the advertisement break of a radio interview.


"what happened to your nose?"

i wanted to hold your large hand in mine
and press your fingers there
let you feel out the places
where bone had become a stranger
a crescendo of pain
spreading out from the centre of face

how almonds remind me of his knuckles
that i still flinch when men move too quick
that i can't trust boys with hard bodies
and blood is a brown colour

i rubbed the coal foam of microphone
against my lips
stifling what i really wanted to
say

how it was my mothers scream
that left my mouth

"yeah, i broke it time ago".

day five.

craiglist.

i found woman writhing
the other side of her bed on fire
rosary beads burning half moons into her throat
stomach a chalky cathedral of ribs

is she yours?

day four.

cancer

it's in the things left unsaid
you want to kiss her where her breasts used to be
run fingers across that place where they stitched nothing together
she wants to hear it, tell her

you want to kiss her where her breasts used to be
remind her that even children began as clots of blood
she wants to hear it, tell her
how now, her heart has space to swell

remind her that even children began as clots of blood
something moist between woman and man, a shy touch
how now, her heart has space to swell
but she misses the empty fullness of chest

something moist between woman and man, a shy touch
run fingers across that place where they stitched nothing together
but she misses the empty fullness of chest
it's in the things left unsaid

day three.

old spice.

Sunday afternoon he dresses in his old uniform
Tells stories of the men he shot
The women he saved
No one believes him.

Hold his grandchildren against sunken
Chest
And hums anthems
Forgotten.

Smoothes old spice into coat lapels
Cries whilst listening to
Suulfe and dhuule
Believes circumcised women are pure
And beautiful.

Greets framed photograph of the old president
Every morning.
Sleeps in a separate bed from wife
Every night.

This summer he wants to go back,
No one knows how to tell him
That it won’t be the way he left it.

day two.

new orleans


saw that creole boy i kissed
bloated held up by strange water
skin a blunt blue
smelling like
nothing i had ever tried to love before
eyes filled with moon colour
mouth ajar like he wanted to say something
to god.

day one.

"i swear i won't be anything
like your father".

it's a weighty promise
littered with baby teeth
mottled with rice scars

one i didn't know
he knew
to make.

april.

30 days 30 poems.

but i have to make up for the three days i missed and create three right now.
lets see what happens.

let's

i would be with you if i could.

i am alone in the back of a cab night time kind of lonely.

back when.

jamel shabazz

with him.

all it took was february & the nape of his neck.

a pleading letter to riazuddin.

dear hana,

please dont steal my baby name.

it means more to me than anyone will ever understand.

we must know our daughters names.

and i'll help you find yours, i promise.

lady asleep

raul gutierrez

sunday afternoon.

had a beautiful day. brick lane, soweto kinch. beautiful. beautiful. beautiful.

poem for soweto kinch.

freewrite #7


tenors
still pulling at chests
conjuring legends
between legs

this man must not know
how he leaves gigs
with hearts trailing behind him
fleshy against side walk

he doesnt like the blood
the gore of love
the guilt.

says he's single
doesnt want to be responsible for other
peoples hearts

maybe he understands how you break
yourself
in breaking others.

sleep

freewrite #6

perhaps i have forgotten how to be okay with this
you,asphalt away
miles between each licked lip
fajr creeping up trembling legs
a goodnight
me, wishing i could remember the way your mouth moved
you, drifting into dreams
no, i am not okay with this
there is something urgent under my skin
the way morning is bruising itself into a night time sky
i become lead
and granite
heavy things
impatient things
sinking into coil of bed
whilst you drfit
joining the metropolis of
souls midflight
the phone weightless against my ear
no, tonight, i am not content with just
hearing you.

edomex.

Raul Gutierrez.

to bed.

two years ago i found this. i was already in love with cody chessnut at the time, but at the end of this beautiful short film i found a woman incredible. her name is asha ali, a sweden based somali singer who i've never been able to forget ever since.
it's in two parts.

makeba

everything a woman should be.

esperar

freewrite #5

hope lives in the taste
of whiskey soaked tongues
serenading
wide eyed
women with rollers in hair
smelling of fried cassava and yuca
later
biting into
shoulders of
lovers who sneak bodegas
leaving milk
inside women they'll never call back
forgetting curly haired juniors
they'll never father.

perhaps a stranger she could love.

everything is illuminated.

how important our history is, the names of our fathers lovers. the could be parents, secrets, languages our mouths missed out on, recipes we stole, surnames that were too heavy to trail onto first. the true colour of mothers hair. grandmothers cancer. at what age did they all stop loving. who are you most like? my fathers golden eyes and if my children will have them. what about his cold heart, will they inherit that too? perhaps it's a chill we all contain within our chests, strange how many stories, legacies..how much history held within endless cavities; our hearts, our minds.

surely that is what makes us human, the ability to remember, to commit to memory or to erase, to forget, to remove from existence something that once lived.

i need you to need me.

i don't know how to love in genres.

forever.

freewrite #4



when sky scrapers pierce stars
angels will weep armageddon.

balance.

today my heel is aching, this does not feel good but alhamdulilah.
but also, today i found this and it was beautiful and it did feel good alhamdulilah.

poets & their pimps.

poets become puppets become prostitutes.

sad, how something you put your everything into becomes just a business venture to another.

i don't know how many pimps i've had.

i could use somebody, someone like you.

she's re-sung a song i already loved and made me re-breathe a breath i had already breathed.

karima francis.

elhillo

freewrite #3


her brass skin wants to be held.

she wants him to blow onto her neck with sore lips
wants to be his saxophone
wants to be coltranes naima.


she recites poetry across dc
breathing in tenors
swearing she thought
she saw coltrane in the audience.


she asks you
where you were
when she was counting
khartoum across cities
wants to know if
before she was born you held saxophones
dreaming other women
brass curves between
arms
shirt rolled up
forehead sweating train
maps.


she said she heard coltrane in your breath
told you that even though that aint her name
could you please call her
naima.

snow cake

only a film this tender can create tears furious.
it was perfection, a stunning ache.

requiem for a dream

every saturday afternoon i watch this. you call me, ask me whats wrong with my voice. i say nothing. then later i admit that i've been crying for an hour and a half. you curse this film, ask me why i depress myself. i say because it feels good. you laugh. i dont want you to judge me so i laugh too, but really im still crying.
i like to think that you're kind of crying too.

saluuglay

Omar Dhuule

i beg Allah to have mecry upon his soul. ameen.

freewrite

hope lives in the crevices
of women who laugh too loud
skin sticky
nights warm between legs
forcing halos to form
from cigarette smoke held between red tipped fingers
breaking cheap heels across
dizzy floors stained rum & malta
lips kissed swollen
steadying themselves against the arms of men
who want to carry them up harlem fire escapes
and make them claw at horizons.

what is that little death behind your face?

define: migraine- a severe recurring vascular headache; occurs more frequently in women than men.

sometimes it makes me want to stab myself in the face.

pure

if i am destined to love my own children more than i love these two little girls,
i dont know if my heart will be able to take it.

samawada left, 7 years old
suban right, 5 years old

Sulaimans.

the blue man was beautiful.

i feel good.
alhamdulilah.
solitude has become like second skin.

tomorrow i want to wake up mid afternoon.
i hope i do wake up. insha allah

i watched watchmen today. kept getting chills everytime the comedian said "mother forgive me".

so i fell in love with john, thats doctor manhattan to you.
people complained about it being a really long film, i could've stayed infront of that screen forever.

raising victor vargas

bare shoulders are beautiful.

ma and pa.

black love. africa 86' mogadishu.
no love. europe 93' london.

i've only started grieving it.
time lapse.

sigur ros

to be able to exist beyond translation.
my skin understands this.

2.46 am

Fe says: I never made the connection!!
Fe says: you will be the greatest writer of all time
Fe says: I want to exploit you
trembling. your name does not fit, says: what connection?trembling. your name does not fit, says: effi wat are u talking about?
Fe says: photos poetry writing
Fe says: all together
Fe says: is film
Fe says: music
Fe says: argh
Fe says: u said u wrote something?
Fe says: I wanna read

the science of sleep

it made me feel so much, so hard.
it dizzied me.

mikaal sulaiman.

comes from real beautiful genes.


www.myspace.com/quantumpalindrome

space between lips

for a few years i've been in love with his photography.

steeve cute
www.steeve-cute.com

effios

ive had the pleasure of connecting with beautiful people in the twenty years that i have lived. but he is so talented and so sincerely humble, at times completely unaware of how he affects people. he makes music, makes art, makes photos, makes amazing stories about cats in dumpsters. he's my village dog.

effi ibok.

www.myspace.com/simplibrown

a phone call i wish i could have.

me- hello
him- hey
me- oh hi
him- i just wanted to say
me- yeah?
him- that i get it
me- do you?
him- so much.
me- i've been waiting for someone to say that
him- i know
me- ok
him- bye
me- bye

with so many lovers singing songs.

i've fallen in love with this. with all of it.
this is as close to unconditional as i can get right now.
i don't think the way i feel is strange.
i tend to music gently. i expect nothing,
then moved to tears when the hairs on the back
of my neck stand up. one by one.
that is the purest love.

judgement

we are all one bad decision, one ill fated moment away from being a junkie,a prostitute, a drug dealer, a criminal.

Photography by Robert Yager

no one belongs here more than you.

i am in love with her, urgently. and everything she has ever written or created.

Miranda July

why so ugly?

i write because if i did not i wouldn't know what else to do with my hands.

but if i really think about it, i write because the human condition is not simple, and sometimes it is not beautiful. and most times we do not want to look at it.
but if we do, we'll see ourselves somewhere in there.

its like falling in love with a heroin addict, you realize how beautiful you are in the midst of it. then you hate yourself for being so selfish. then you accept that human beings are human beings.

also, i've never found beauty beautiful, i like to search for it. and i understand that not everyone is like me, not everyone will like what i write.

and im ok with that.

and you are who?

so i do feel like i'm giving away too much, but what am i measuring "too much" by?

i want to make sure that i never forget that there are many people in the world, i need to choose whose opinions matter, then drown out the rest.

you are not healing.

i've found r erica doyle.
the way she writes speaks to me, let me quote her.

"the edge of the tub, the arm of the sofa, your brother's rocking horse, fruit, vegetables, tongues fists, nipples, fingers, toes, toothbrushes, bottles, candles, handles, plastic, porcelain, silicone, glass
you are not injured. you are not healing.
you are taking it lying down"

- palimpsest

i don't know, i had to get up from bed and copy it from the book.

it's filthy, honest, sad and beautiful in a very human way.

emotion.

"Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishings."
— Anaïs Nin

emotion

edwidge danticat, she does beautiful,slow and easy

night time in my room.

freewrite.

forever ago

i'm listening to alot of bon iver. he makes train rides nostalgic. sometimes midsong i remember heartbreaks i have yet to experience.

"Would you really rush out for me now?

Taught line... down to the shoreline
The end of a blood line... the moon is a cold light."

blindsided, bon iver. from the album. for emma, forever ago.

Blue

Leyla Jeyte

lady face & i, equate to the greatest love story ever told



http://www.flickr.com/photos/blueepocha/
http://wordvase.blogspot.com/

home

i'm craving a somali sunset

trane

“I never even thought about whether or not they understand what I'm doing . . . the emotional reaction is all that matters as long as there's some feeling of communication, it isn't necessary that it be understood.”

nostalgia

this picture makes me want to touch someone.

noir is the colour of my true loves skin

i want to watch these films with him.

darko

london can't deal with the snow, doubt i'm gonna be able to get to my lectures tomorrow.
tonight me and frank are gonna spend some time together,
like old times.


Warsan: Why do you wear that stupid bunny suit?
Frank: Why are you wearing that stupid somali girl suit?

bruise

girlfriend's train, nikkey finney.

"how you do that, write like you've never been hit before"

i found this poem, after reading the line above on a friends facebook status.
it stifles breath and speech.

manipulations

by tebe a Russian artist from Moscow.
incredible

magicians shrooms

omar rodriguez lopez.

just feels too good.

reynholm industries.

Roy: [at Denholm's funeral] I hate funerals, I never know what to say.
Jen: Just say, 'I'm sorry for your loss', and move on.
Roy: [to Denholm's wife] I'm sorry for your loss. Move on.


Moss: I'm sorry for your loss.
Mrs. Reynholm: Thank you.
Moss: It's not like you've lost a pen, is it? It's so much worse. Would you like a pen? I have a spare one.
Mrs. Reynholm: No thank you.
Moss: Please take it.
Mrs. Reynholm: Why are you giving it to me?
Moss: I don't know. [Hands her the pen] Swings and roundabouts.