Love Poems & Proverbs from the Middle East
but that never stops a poet from trying. Arabs and Middle Easterners have been writing about the matters of the heart for centuries, looking for a way to effectively share and understand this strong emotion. As love comes in all shapes and sizes—be it gratitude, longing or impeccable admiration—here are a few moving love poems by beloved Middle Eastern poets:
The day I met you
I tore up all my maps
all my prophecies
like an Arab stallion
I smelled the rain of you
Before it wet me
heard the pulse of your voice
before you spoke
undid your hair with my hands
before you had braided it
When you go away and I can’t
follow you up with a letter,
it is because the distance
between you and me
is shorter than the sound of
Oh, because the words are
smaller than the distance of my
longing.
You departed from my sight
and entered my thoughts,
travelled from my eyes
to my heart.
Between what is said and not
meant And what is meant and
not said Most of love is lost.
The minute I heard
my first love story,
I started looking for you,
not knowing
how blind that was.
Lovers don’t finally meet
somewhere.
They’re in each other
all along.
Even after all this time,
the sun never says to the earth
“You owe me.” Look what
happens with a love like that. It
lights up the whole sky.
When less is more, and the word ‘love’ holds immense vitality in the spectrum of emotions, proverbs offer a way to express the indescribable. With only a handful of words, proverbs offer simple but effective ways to express the emotions of love.
A love out of sight is a love away from the heart.
When you are away from those you love, you miss them and feel more affection for them, realizing what you have with them is special.
The heart is a stubborn organ. No matter what the truth is, we believe what we believe and want what we want.
No matter how much knowledge a wise man possesses or how little a fool has, both are in love’s great exposure when they fall in love—no logic or wisdom could save them from what they feel.
Two people are closely connected to each other in their hearts; they think of one another and connect on a deeper level.
