August 2018
Dubai Poetics on Facebook – Dubai Poetics on Instagram
Photo credit: Tarek Roumie
Pregunta, Señor Juez
¿Y si un minuto después
De haber accionado la palanca,
Se confirma su sospecha
Que el hombre que yace
Reventado y humeante,
En la silla eléctrica,
Era inocente?
Photo credit: Steve Parfitt
Go With The Flow
Crying under a shower of rain
makes you think the whole world is weeping with you.
Standing under an Autumn tree
makes you think the whole world is falling with you.
A big crowd by the station
makes you think something grand is approaching.
When one finds love,
makes you think it’s your turn
Waiting in line for so long, she left and said:
“Only dead fish go with the flow”
Photo credit: Peter John Maridable
Cherish Red
By Jumana Radi
there’s no white
without black
and no red
without white and black
so
live
pure
white
dancing flakes of snow
embrace
hardships
black
idle piles of coal
and cherish
your passion
red
glimmering sparks of fire
cherish red
Photo credit: Martino Pietropoli
The Ebb and Flow
By Haya Venna 2
The silver around my neck is rusted,
murky orange-red lathered over purity.
My mother had given it to me in the spring
and I made a vow, to protect it forever, to never sin.
Followed through was all I did,
so why is the yellowing my fault?
My rusting, depreciating silver got taken away,
society left my neck looking bare.
I hardly go out now;
The world is a calamity, broken in my vision.
Because of me, my family lives in dread.
Oh stranger, didn’t know you could be such a threat.
Was it really due to my violation of a dress code?
Or was it thee who followed thy heart?
Because, my glittered face shone brighter than my dignity
and your attention was elsewhere.
Sometimes I wonder what life would be like
if I never had ever left the house.
So tell me something, society;
With a few stacks of finance,
you roam around trying to get to the grocers
and just as your figure reaches the double doors,
a stranger’s silhouette turns you around and steals.
Would you blame yourself for carrying all that cash?
So tell me something, society;
On a cloudy winter night,
when her tears glimmer like the stars,
his hooded orbs burn holes into her
and his heinous grin widens as if he’d stole,
would you blame her for simply existing?
Photo credit: David Taffet
Hard-Headed Death
By Johnny Chbat
Nobody dares to say: “Die”
and I advance to myself all sorts of preexisting pretexts like:
“I can’t die now for there are lots of things of which I still have to take care of”
“Die?” Damn I clown a lot to defeat death!
Defeating death
gentlemen
is not heroic
An enlivening rush? perhaps
for when you faint
you become that guy who tears his clothes and turns green
what’s his name?!
Hulk, yes big Hulk who feels
electrical pain
a sickening strength
and is driven to such
an amputated end
that longs for a sequel
Photo credit: Alex Perez
Two Little Slits
Two little slits on a
face
windows to the soul
envelope of intentions
Never do they change
but strip all your
emotions
to nakedness
At your ecstasy
they shine brighter than
the sun
at your love
they are euphoric with
passion
at your life
they scream the truth
at your anger
they burn with hatred
Little slits,
holding a universe inside
of them.
Photo credit: Hakim El Haj
On Love
Mediocre love never settled with her.
She needed soul.
She needed mad.
She needed untamed passion.
The kind of love that touched
every fibre of her body and
jolted it.
The kind of love that made noise and
fire.
The kind of love that changed
the order of things.
Photo credit: Maxim Lugina
Fleeting Affair of the Heart
The world is a small place
the scurrying people on the bustling streets
time passes as fast as the blowing wintery wind
whispering the failures we have been
The rattrap of life we’re caught in
its vicious cycle of the never-ending demands
too many to fulfill
ending the life we never lived
I may never meet you again
but those few minutes we’ve spent
those fleeting moments in our little bubble
filled with warmth and love
had only this fluttering heart flown away
with the memories etched on its tiny fraction of flesh.
I’d sleep my night away
without crawling into the corner
gazing at the night sky with its embedded stars
like the beads sewn perfectly on my favorite dress
finding little peace acknowledging that
at least, we’re under the same beautiful moonlit sky
Finally on one beautiful day,
I won’t be caged by this constricting feeling
with each breath uttering your name
with each eye searching for your face
I’ll breathe freely again
for all I can, I’ll not look at your changing profile picture
imagining myself with you in every moment
I’ll find courage before clicking the delete button
from my contact
and from my future
I’ll bury this book filled with love, hurt and longing
I’ll write a new book again
Photo credit: Mohamed Nohassi
What You Aren’t
By Yaman Nimer
You are not the embedded roots,
why every time the winds blew strong I had to search for you on the other side of the pond.
You are not my day and night,
after so many years and I still can’t figure out when the fuck it is that you’d come and go.
You are not the sun kissing my skin,
my skin is pale and I reek of the smell of lighter fluid and scorched senses from every time you erupt.
You are not the light touch that I miss,
all I feel is the weight of the rubble you’ve buried me under.
You are not my home,
cause home is where the heart is and it seems you’ve done away with mine and let yours turn black.
Photo credit: Jacqueline Day
Purple Couch
He sat there
on his leather chair
and asked me
to have a seat
in front of him
on the soft
Purple Couch
He then took
out his book
and his shining blue pen
Next, he started writing
my casual details of
the present day
His hazel green
and focused eyes
met my brown sorrowful
and confused eyes
searching for the answers
he wanted from me today
He checked my
body language
and nodded in disapproval
he questioned me
if I had done
something awful
and wanted to share
with him
I shook my head
round and round
and denied
to give him the
Answer he already knew
So he placed
a paper on the table
in front of me
and set a few
Purple colored pencils
crayons, and sketches
beside the paper
After a while
into coloring
the thoughts from my mind
slipped away from
my mouth
and crawled straight
into his book
Once again he
got his desired
Answer from my
stubborn mouth
His gaze shifted
towards his wrist
on the Golden watch
and the Ancient clock
above my head
to let me know
that the session
for today was successful
and over.
Photo credit: Tarek Roumie
Thyme
A natural spot is but wrought
The wind is a delight
If only the spot was not caught
In a miserly demise
In Thyme is there reason
And in reason is there Time
But no time is there reason
Or spot is there Thyme
Thank you to every writer for the thought infusing poems contributed and
thank you to every passerby for reading the art of our talented poets.
If you would like to have your poem or image published for the next
Dubai Poetics edition
send your poem or request to be a “visual artist” to poetry@dubaipoetics.com
Join us again in our Poetryhood!!
Enjoy more poems from our earlier editions in 2018:
Edition XXV
Edition XXVI
Edition XXVII
Edition XXVIII
Edition XXIX
Edition XXX
Edition XXXI