Love
Love is a beautiful emotion that develops between two individuals. It encompasses feelings of attraction, admiration, and a deep inclination towards someone. On the other hand, infatuation refers to an intense attachment to something. Key indicators of love include caring for the other person, a desire to share their hobbies and interests, and exchanging sincere words of affection that are not bound by time or purpose.
Love Teaches Me Not to Love
Mourid Barghouti is one of the standout Palestinian and Arab poets. Born in 1941 in the village of al-Birwa in Palestine, he passed away in the United States on Saturday, August 9, 2008. He authored numerous poems and collections dedicated to the theme of love, including:
Love teaches me not to love and to open the window
On the edge of the road, can you step out from the call of the mint
And divide me into two, you and what remains of the song
And love is love in every love, I see love as death for a past death
And a breeze that pushes horses back to their mother, the wind between the clouds and valleys
Can you not escape the buzzing of my blood to calm this yearning
And draw the bee from the petals of the wilting rose
And love asks me how the wine returned to its mother and burned
And how sweet love is when it torments when it destroys the narcissus of songs
Love teaches me not to love and leaves me in the currents of the paper
Love and What Was in Youth is Ignorance
Gibran Khalil Gibran was a Lebanese Arab poet, writer, and painter, recognized as one of the most significant figures among the émigré literati. He was born in Bsharri, North Lebanon, and died in New York on April 10, 1931, at the age of 48 due to tuberculosis and liver cirrhosis. His works on love stand out, including his poem:
Love and what was in youth is ignorance
A maiden calls, yet you do not say to pause
Who in love answers its call
And whoever defies love has no place in passion
Does a blessing please a person if they see it not
Does glory seek the depths of those
Who do not have the eye to encourage
O descendant of Jacob, let your ambition
See a favor on high
Your father was the swiftest man in a land
Where his place remains the highest
And you are what you are in the sanctuary of lineage
And you are from what you are with brilliance
Your health is restored, understanding within you
Heals the ailing conscience
If you begin matters, you conclude them, and if
Only concern is spared from those who depart
And do not see fear if you suspect it
Except as comfort, and don’t see stinginess
Generously, not frowning nor angered
With good will, it multiplies the gifts
How lovely is noble aid from
A handsome face that has graced us without arrogance
Rafeef is the adornment of youth; enough for you that
You have achieved what no youth achieved before
So be, O Rafeef, a bright dawn
In which loyalty may flourish
And extend your pure ancestry
Honoring a branch that surpasses the root
Today you embrace your joys
With fresh flowers adorning your door
A door of blossoms, enter it to
The paradise of this life and settle
It gifted to him the gardens their lily
And roses and jasmine and fields
And poetry within it adorned
With beauty of every measure it displayed
With every petal casting its connections
In every emerald necklace
And every word, sweet and new
Like the spirit in a body of bliss
A door for the bold and glorious, and about
Your right, I feel it whispered
O delightful marriage, the eyes watch it
Who has not seen a precedent
It made in purity with passionate desire
The ways of modesty and noble inquiry
You entertained by nature’s art
Fine in creation and with perfect wisdom
Impeccable in art and radiance, so fine
It calls you to a life most sweet
Today you bask in your lords of joy
I Love You, I Love You, and the Rest Comes Later
Nizar Qabbani, a contemporary Syrian diplomat and poet, illustrated love through his words to his beloved, capturing a range of positive emotions and feelings in this poem:
Your voice is a Persian rug
And your eyes are two Damascene birds
That flutter between wall and wall
And my heart travels like a dove over the waters of your hands
And takes a nap beneath the bracelet’s shade
And I love you
But I fear getting entangled with you
I fear losing myself in you
I fear becoming you
For experience has taught me to avoid loving women
And waves of the seas
I do not debate your love; it is my day
And I do not debate the sun of the day
I do not debate your love
For it decides which day it will arrive and on which it will depart
And it dictates the time of dialogue and its form
Let me pour you some tea
You are enchantingly beautiful this morning
Your voice is a beautiful inscription on a Moroccan dress
Your necklace dances like a child beneath the mirrors
And sips water from the edge of a vase
Let me pour you some tea, did I say I love you?
Did I express my happiness for your arrival
And that your presence is as delightful as that of a poem
And the arrival of boats and distant memories
Let me translate some of the seats’ words as they welcome you
Let me express what is on the minds of the cups
As they ponder over your lips
Along with the spoons and sugar
Let me add you as a new letter
To the alphabet’s letters
Let me contradict myself a little
And gather, in love, between civilization and barbarism
Did you like the tea?
Do you desire a bit of milk?
Will you suffice, as you always did, with a piece of sugar?
As for me, I prefer your face without sugar
I repeat for the thousandth time that I love you
How do you want me to explain the inexplicable?
And how do you want me to measure my sadness?
And my sorrow is a child growing more beautiful with each passing day
Let me declare it in all the languages you know and those you do not
I love you
Let me search for words
That fit the size of my longing for you
And for words that cover your breasts’ expanse
With water, grass, and jasmine
Let me think of you
And yearn for you
And cry and laugh for you
And eliminate the distance between fantasy and reality
Let me call you with all the letters of allure
In the hope that, when I whisper your name from my lips, you may be born
Let me establish a state of love
Where you will be the queen
And where I am the greatest of lovers
Let me lead a coup
Establishing the sovereignty of your eyes among the people
Let me change love’s visage of civilization
You are civilization, you are the heritage that forms within the earth
For thousands of years
I love you
How do you want me to prove that your presence in this world
Is like the presence of water
And the presence of trees
And that you are the flower of a sunflower
And a coconut grove
And a song that sailed from a string
Let me tell you in silence
When words fail to convey my suffering
And when the words become a conspiracy I find myself tangled in
And poetry becomes a vessel of stone
Let me
Tell you the unspoken between me and myself
And what lies between the lashes of my eyes and yours
Let me
Speak to you in symbols if you distrust the moonlight
Let me speak to you in thunder
Or raindrops
Let me present to the sea the title of your eyes
If you accept my invitation to travel
Why do I love you?
For a ship in the sea does not remember how it was surrounded by water
It does not remember how it was overcome by dizziness
Why do I love you?
For a bullet in flesh does not question where it came from
And offers no apology
Why do I love you? Do not ask me
For I have no choice, and neither do you