Declamare

More familiar than any familiar face
I had never seen you
in my past—
not in old photographs,
not in lost dreams.

But when you arrived,
I didn’t feel like I didn’t know you.
I felt like you had returned.
Your smile wasn’t strange at all.
Your voice felt known.
Even your silence
was familiar
to the ear of my heart.

Like a melody
that had lived within me for a lifetime
without ever being played.
You were not familiar—
You were more than familiar.
Like prayers, we don’t know
when we first learned them.
Like poems we have memorized
before ever hearing them.

In your gaze,
There was no question,
no doubt—
only that nameless feeling
that calms the heart
without offering a reason.

And I remained,
among a thousand familiar faces,
with someone who had no past with me,
yet was
more familiar than all of them.

Maryam Azadmard

From the island of “me” to the shore of “you”

I stand on the heights of my own island,
where I am rooted
in my own soil.

With trees grown from experience
and a sky made of selfhood.
I was not lost,
nor was I alone.
I was myself—
whole, aware, flowing.

Then the sound of a wave arrived,
not to rescue me,
but to speak.
It was you—
a shore, not a shelter,
not a destination,
but a fellow path.

With full awareness,
with a calm heart,
I set my boat in motion
from the island of me
to the shore of you—
not to be,
but to be together.

Maryam Azadmard

From the island of “me” to the shore of “you.”

I stand on the heights of my own island,
where I am rooted
in my own soil.

With trees grown from experience
and a sky made of selfhood.
I was not lost,
nor was I alone.
I was myself—
whole, aware, flowing.

Then the sound of a wave arrived,
not to rescue me,
but to speak.
It was you—
a shore, not a shelter,
not a destination,
but a fellow path.

With full awareness,
with a calm heart,
I set my boat in motion
from the island of me
to the shore of you—
not to be,
but to be together.

Maryam Azadmard

Chronic Longing

Longing doesn’t always smell like memory.
Sometimes it feels like a home
without knowing where it is.

There is always an empty space
inside many of us—
one that is not filled by someone’s arrival,
nor made emptier by someone’s departure.

This is not a void;
it is an absent presence.
A feeling like an unfinished song
whispering in your ear for a lifetime.
You know its melody,
but not its words.
You know it has been there,
but you don’t know where.

Sometimes, this vague feeling
slips through the cracks of silence
and shines into my room
like a faint light—
not to reveal the darkness,
but to find a missing point
within us.

Then it disappears again,
and we are left
with the lingering ache
of that light.

I call this feeling chronic longing:
longing for someone we have never seen,
a home we have never visited,
and a story we have never heard—
longing for ourselves,
Somewhere in the past,
that may have never existed at all.

Maryam Azadmard

So Much Distance

So much distance
has fallen between words and the heart,
between truth and sincerity,
between honesty and compassion.
No one gives their heart
for sincerity anymore.
Lies have made a home
between reason and feeling.

No one lights a lamp
for kindness.
No one stands firmly
beside dignity.
How bitter is the story of humankind—
having lost love
in this vast arena.

Where is the hand of friendship
that asks for nothing in return?
Where is the love
that still lives in chests and hearts?
Amid all this doubt,
eyes have grown cold,
and the absence of humanity
still aches.

Where is the hand of a companion,
free of pretense?
Where is the love
that plants loyalty in the heart?
Among all this doubt,
a truth was lost,
and the footprints of humanity
were left behind in the night.

And in the end—
Pride is the bitter tale
of breaking hearts,
and love
is a mirror
covered in the dust of regrets.

Maryam Azadmard

The Vastness of the World in the Embrace of Love

Close your eyes,
and the world is still the same world…
the same streets, the same people,
the same days and nights.
But when love begins to flow within your heart,
this very world
takes on a different color.

Trees
are no longer just pieces of wood and leaves;
they become arms
embracing the sky.
The sea
is no longer just water,
but the reflection
of your heart’s boundlessness.
And people…
are no longer passing shadows,
but fragments of yourself,
passing by in different forms.

Mysticism is seeing this beauty—
understanding that the world
has never been narrow or dark;
it is our hearts
that sometimes grow tight.

And love…
is the key
that unlocks this lock.
With love,
The world becomes wider,
calmer, deeper,
and you are no longer afraid of anything—
because you know that in this vastness,
wherever you are,
Love is holding you
in its embrace.

Maryam Azadmard