War

I close my eyes,
my soul’s gaze carries me somewhere far from flesh.
I stand behind a closed door,

a faint melody drifts in from the other room; a voice, a song.
Songs of exile, buried deep in our weary hearts.
The ones my mother used to sing,
the ones my father played softly, like a fading lullaby.

In this place, my heart took root and never left.
In this place, to say “mother” is to say “home,” as if the words were born of one breath.

I take a few more steps,
the smell of blood fills the air.

Bombs are casting shadows over my childhood,
and building their future over my forgotten youth.
Even in exile, shrapnel rains from the sky.

Still, the nightingale sings,
even as we’re torn apart, piece by piece.

What once bloomed in us now withers in poison and smoke.
We burn,
on both sides of the ocean,
just the same.

Yet the jasmine still blooms.

June 21st 2025
Translated by Sanam Shantyaei