Conversation

Listen to the open, unabashed desire of I’timad Arrumaikiyya, an 11thC Arab poet: "I urge you to come faster than the wind to mount my breast and firmly dig and plough my body, and don’t let go until you’ve flushed me thrice." Arab & Muslim female poets speaking desires! 👇🏽
The cover of Classical Poems by Arab Women. On a white background is an abstract illustration drawn in black.
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And here is Hafsa bint al-Hajj Arrakuniyya, a twelfth century poet who was considered one of the best Andalusian poets, free with her desire:
Text: If I keep you in my eyes until the world blows up I’d still want you more
. . .
I know too well those marvellous lips.
By Allah, I’m not lying if I say I love sipping their finerthanwine
delicious dew . . .
When you break at noon you’ll need a drink and you’ll find my mouth
a bubbling spring and my hair a refugeshade.
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Who among us is raised to desire freely? When desire is surrounded by silence & taboo, the most vulnerable who are hurt-esp girls & LGBTQ folks. To desire & to be desired is political. How we fuck & who we fuck is political. Always the goal: to be free.
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Will definitely look this one up. I know The Perfumed Garden, which begins "I praise God for the cock and the cunt" or something like that! Sheikh Nafzawi!
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And it opens with one of my all times favorite openings: Praise be to God, Who has so disposed matters that pleasant literary anecdotes may serve as an instrument for the polishing of wits and the cleansing of rust from our hearts. Ahmad al-Tifashi, The Delights of Hearts
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