In the Footsteps of Enayat Al-Zayyat – Book Review

Iman Mersal’s In the Footsteps of Enayat Al-Zayyat takes the reader on a quest to unearth the reasons behind a young author’s suicide. Mersal is captivated by the author’s only novel, Love and Silence, which she comes across by chance in Sour Al-Azbakiya. She was drawn to the author’s surname, which resembles that of the award-winning novelist Latifa Al-Zayyat. Mersal assumed a relation between the two, but later learned there was none.

Love and Silence was an obscure semi-autobiographical narrative of grieving woman in the 1950s. Inspired by Al-Zayyat’s own grievances, the book illustrates a young woman’s search for a way out of her despair and into a hopeful future. While Al-Zayyat’s depression consumed her and took her life before the age of thirty, she afforded her protagonist a happier ending. Upon learning of the tragic fate of the author, Mersal made it her mission to track down her story.

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Enveloped by Darkness

Enveloped by darkness day after day

Surrounded by friends ready to play

Alone in a crowd cheerful and smiling

Drowning inside dying and crying

Isolated as usual with limited choices

Invisible among them, but no one notices

Critical sometimes they are of my ways

Silent or furious are my moods without delays

Hearing their voices but not listening to their words

Because often they slay me like sharpened swords

Not great company I am I know

But where else am I supposed to go

Trapped inside myself away from reality

Despising its expectations and meaningless futility

Away when among them, away when alone

Haunted by demons that were birthed at home

Monsterous

Locked in an internal box

Living in a monsterous world

Devoid of life

Broken extremities

Hanging off of a robotic skeleton

Skull cracked

Lonely beings

Putting on a theatrical performance

Methodical actors

Soulless the experience

Lying behind meticulous masks

Hopes shattered

Bloody streets

Contaminating the senses

Meaningless

Cut through the noise

Stitching the mouth shut

Wordless

Burning

In response to the Sometimes Stellar Storyteller Six Word Story Challenge

His stubborn pride ignited her wrath.

Grey Sheet

A grey translucent sheet is cast in front of my eyes
Distorting my view and signaling my demise
I see the world often so bleak
A crippling feeling that hinders my ability to speak

Past regrets and pains swimming in my mind
Rendering me virtually blind
Absent I am from the events of the present
But I try and often fail to seem almost pleasant

Regretable choices not truly chosen
By a heart once beating and now sits frozen
Trying to please eveyone but myself
I commit to decisions made by eveyone else

Fears take charge of a boggled mind
Detaching it from reality and forcing it to hide
Creating a world so it can try to survive
The tortured self has not yet been revived

Excuses

In response to the Sometimes Stellar Storyteller Six Word Story Challenge

It’s too difficult, I really couldn’t.

Ashes

The fire has died

And all I’m left with are the ashes

The grey remains of what once was

A silver powder, which will disappear with the slightest breeze

 

The earth is spinning

And I’m standing still not moving

The shadow of the person I used to be

A distant image is the life I had once desired for myself

 

The future is uncertain

And I have no remedy

The days seem bleaker with every passing month

A tragedy of loneliness too dark to describe too real to endure

 

Let’s Hope

Let’s hope for peace across the land

Let’s hope the monsters would never band

Let’s hope their fury we avoid

Let’s hope our hopes don’t become void

Let’s hope for calm water, when we sail

Let’s hope our loved ones would not bail

Let’s hope for forgiveness in every corner

Let’s hope for love beyond our borders

My Heart Isn’t In It

My heart isn’t in it, this life of mine

So I wish to remain on my own for a while

Too much unfounded hurt by people so close

Disappointed I am of the choices I chose

Disrespected for no reason but caring

Humiliated regularly, my anger is flaring

Stabbed in the back by a friend turned foe

Blamed and accused with blows too low

Thus my heart isn’t in it anymore

For my spirit has been broken by the burdens I bore

B’S POETRY CHALLENGE #40

Rules:

1. One word will serve as an inspiration for a poem.
2. This poem can be of any form and any length.
3. You can choose to use the actual word in your poem or a synonym or simply convey its meaning, that’s up to you.
4. You can post your poem in the comment section below OR copy the URL of your post  OR Pin Back (for WordPress users).