Delafil

New writings added once in a while. | humble soul | Instagram : @delafilPoetry

[delafilpoetry]

Laid my hopes in you

like they used to lay children into the Euphrates.

Most times they drowned

and got lost before they were even close to their destination.

How will I ever mourn and move on?

When I will always be uncertain

about them reaching the riverside.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

This is a tormenting farewell.

I am leaving you in the care of god.

You are not to be mine.

Our names crossed each other’s pages but we didn’t remain on all of them.

You‘ll forever be my most painful but also my favourite chapter.

The only way we’ll see each other again is when you dare to cross my mind.

You might be my naseeb in another life.

But in this one we don’t belong to each other.

I am letting you go.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

My mother braids my thick brown hair, as if she is holding on to a part of her identity in this foreign country. And she tells me tales of her childhood and how she used to collect hazelnuts in the colour of my curls.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

My desire to write overwhelms me

Every inch of my being

Craves to fulfil the duty

I do not call myself a poet

Because I do not own the language

Poetry owns me and I am the language's slave.

How many torn pages

Prove my loyalty

The poem carries me

Alive I become

As the pages skip

One by one.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

I stood up, opened my eyes

And erased your memories

Which were lingering upon the edges

Of my eyelashes.

And I took the ferry,

Sat beside the window

And erased your name.

Your name which was echoing through my thoughts

Like the waves of the sea.

And even the sun rays noticed my grief,

Trying to find a beam of happiness-

Caressing my face with their warmth.

But they cannot give me back what you took.

And just like Rudy Francisco said,

I only ever write when I’m falling in love

Or falling apart.

I did not have the time to fall.

All I have is your absence

And the bitter cold of an April morning.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

From the bottom of

My heart rises an echo.

A voice I’ve muted ages ago.

But the heart is louder than any sense.

And it sings a song

only your heart could hear,

If it would listen.

But your heart is sitting beneath a river,

weeping

For all that it has lost.

Not able to see all it could gain.

If only your heart would be as obsessed as your eyes.

Eyes in which so many have drowned.

And I vowed to never drown again.

But with you I can see my future,

Inevitably I too, will lose myself in you.

And it will be the greatest loss in history.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

Do not go,

Do not leave the leaves crumbled upon the streets of my soul.

I beg him,

Do not go,

Do not go after planting the most beautiful flower in the gardens of my heart.

Do not go,

I beg him a last time.

The seeds of hope grew way too fast,

And you want to pass too early.

Do not go,

I whisper as I slowly get up above his grave.

A grave he dug for himself and lays himself into with every word he speaks.

More is it the words he didn’t speak.

Talking about change,

The future,

Our future.

When you came to this station with no intention of staying.

My pride is broken,

My ego buried with him.

He went by like a storm

shattering the windows of my soul.

[delafilpoetry]

I open the book of myths and force the pages to hand me the words.

My medicine is hidden below the pages of the paragraphs. Telling ancient stories.

About how Layla left Majnun and Romeo who died for Juliet.

But what happens if love visits you on a winter night and leaves you nothing but sorrow and memories

Memories.

Dark brown eyes.

Rusty voice.

Height as tall as a tree.

Loving never healed me,

Pain opened my heart.

Poetry became the meaning.

Feelings were deceiving.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

I wrote a poem,

With it I shared a part of my soul.

But my poem was cold,

So nobody ever dared to read it.

So many words,

Lost in translation.

Because the language of my heart is foreign.

Foreign

is what I am without you in this world.

Will you read my poem?

Will you touch it, like you’ve touched my soul. And left me burning.

Pathetic.

Thinking love would find its way

into my life.

But love never changes lanes.

Headed directly onto my pages.

Love calls me vain.

Expecting from me not to crave it.

When it dances right under my eyes.

Had I known it’s fragrance;

Would I ever deny the existence of it?

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

I wish I could take away the pain.

And all the worries inflicted by a man that swore to take care of you.

I beg the lord to open the doors of heaven a little earlier for you.

So that you may find Rest.

There is no love like yours on this world. And you were the one that had to live deprived of it for so many years.

How could the man of your dreams not be a man of his words?

He wrapped you into ivory

And your chains were made of feathers.

But when he turned his back on you, you saw his true reflection.

A slave of his desires.

So many words coming out of his mouth,

but they lack meaning.

His severity was never absent compared to his provision;

Always deceiving.

A man of god,

A man so highly regarded.

A man that couldn’t fulfil his promise.

Because he gave it away,

One too many times.

Leaving you broken hearted.

—Delafil, father figure.

[delafilpoetry]

I spoke of love as if I ever had the pleasure of its taste.

Like a drunk man searching for a wineyard in the dessert.

My soul was yearning for its thirst to be quenched.

So I took way to many sips of what they had offered.

Not knowing it was poison, which I devoured.

So I took a last sip.

Satisfaction on my lips,

but the reflection of pain on my face.

My last breath, your name.

One thing the devil could never replace.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

The words are strangling me.

Burdening me.

Heavy weighs hanging from my neck.

Such strength.

How can something so beautiful,

Be so physically demanding.

And you will not carry my burden,

Never will you experience what I go through.

When the words pull on my fingertips.

And my mind becomes a gathering place,

for all the poems I’ve ever read.

But my burden is also my medicine.

I cannot see myself without the boldness of poetry.

Without the expression of what I feel,

when I refuse to talk.

My teardrops carry names.

But my poems never will.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

Tell the pigeons to take away my words,

And me,

with my language.

Tell the judges to chain me up.

For all I have sinned,

-was for love.

I cannot cross waters to reach my prior self.

It’s sitting on the other riverside,

yearning to be united with my body.

But I cannot reach the past.

No ship is strong enough to bring me back

To what has once been me.

And I sit on this side of the river

Weeping for all that I’ve lost.

With the loss of my mindset.

Why do we define “different”

as trouble.

Who gave them the right

to deem the sunrise more important

Than the sunset.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

When we go through some hardships, we feel as if the world is falling apart.

As if happiness will never visit us again and if winter will never end.

But we will feel the warmth of sunshine again.

We will trust and love again.

Happiness is like a bus.

Sometimes when we miss one we get mad and think we’re stuck.

But another bus will arrive.

So will your happiness.

Trust in god and his timing.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

Softness was a language, my lovers were never fluent in.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

I dreamt I saw an olive tree

Its leaves told me ancient stories

Stories about the children playing in the sand.

And I saw Jerusalem from another perspective

As if a bird took my sight

And flew to the holy city

Not even the smell of Damascus was sweeter.

I dreamt I saw an olive tree.

And the sound of peace was louder than the sound of guns.

People were throwing roses to welcome each visitor.

Ana falastini, my grandfather said when the visitors arrived

I am Palestinian

I dreamt I saw an olive tree.

In its shade my mother,

My brother and my sisters.

A calming breeze from the east

And a white horse.

I dreamt I saw an olive tree.

And I woke up,

drenched in sweat

Realising it was only just a dream.

The war goes on,

so does the occupation

And they do not only hold our ancestors hostage

But also the olive trees.

—Delafil

[delafilpoetry]

I beg you,

Take away the words,

And with them the meaning.

Take away the rhythm

And all that’s deceiving.

Had I found a place

to call my peace of mind.

Wouldn’t every night be filled

With words I try to find.

Not even an umbrella

Would shield me from the rain,

Had I not vowed to become a writer,

Endure and write down all the pain.

It is not only mine

That I carry with me

A burden much bigger

Than any nationality.

A burden much deeper,

Than the separating sea.

And I reassure myself

God’s promise is true.

Had I not believed and trusted.

Would I have ever met you?

And the rhythm shackles me,

I would never dare to run away.

From a suffering so beautiful.

That my mind turns into a place of fray.

—Delafil