Tag: women

Disclaimer

This poem was written in 2006, when I was a teenager. It reflects a personal perspective shaped by that time and by my own struggles with identity, relationships, and the social pressures surrounding ideas of freedom and self-expression.

The poem is not a judgment of women or men, nor a commentary on how anyone should dress or present themselves. A woman’s body is her own medium—whether veiled or exposed, entirely by her own choice. Likewise, this text is not a call to change behavior, but a record of how certain social norms appeared to me at that age.

What the poem questions is the gap I perceived, as a young person, between outward displays of “liberty” and lived experiences that still felt restrictive, manipulative, or unfree. It is a critique of appearances and assumptions—not of bodies, genders, or individual choices.

This work is shared as a historical diary piece, not as a contemporary position or universal claim.

Adapted from my Arabic diary (5 December 2006) with the help of AI.
The original poem appears below.

Image by Pixabay

Damascus —

Undress as you please—
ignite the streets in flame,
extinguish evening’s stars, erase their name.
Claim all you want of progress and revolt,
of skies deemed backward, heaven’s fault.
Proclaim yourself an icon, raised on high,
the sovereign of women, crowned to fly.
Lay claim to wisdom, prophecy, and grace—
invent whatever suits you, any face.