Fate’s Geography & Freedom Lives Inside Us

Two poems from a young poet and writer from Gaza: "And so I wear this coat sewn out of place and time, 
a silent pact, both prison and sublime."

Published at

5 September 2026

Featured on

Spotlight: MENA

Written by

Huda Helassa, Palestine

Poet and Writer

Original in English

Fate's Geography

Beneath the sky's indifferent gaze, 

soil remembers the footsteps that were never chosen,  

mapped lines are like scars drawn on ancient skin. 

I carry the weight of unseen borders- 

A river's bend that never asked where to flow. 

Stories are stitched into the rock's quiet pulse, 

and I, a leaf caught in the wind's decree, 

speak languages older than my own voice 

not by choice, but by inheritance. 

The land whispers in tongues I never learned, 

yet I must answer to those tongues, 

it is as if the land itself had written the tale, 

long before I took my first breath.  

Upon this ground where strangers cast their claims, 

My feet do not choose the path I walk;  

the hills, the winds, the old, unyielding frames, 

Compose a rhythm to my silent beat. 

A birthplace marked in hues I did not paint, 

its borders drawn with hands I cannot see, 

yet in its shadow, I inherit faint 

the lines that bind and shape what I can be. 

Though roots run deep in soil not my own, 

The land makes a decision shapes more than earth and stone 

it carves the soul, a quiet, stern command, 

a heritage I hold, yet don't demand. 

And so I wear this coat sewn out of place and time, 

a silent pact, both prison and sublime. 

Maps inked in silence, 

invisible chains beneath my skin. 

I am the sum of stolen geographies, 

a citizen of places made before my breath. 

I had no vote in the drawing of these lines, 

I had no say in the soil that claims my name. 

Yet here I stand 

a product of histories I did not script, 

tied in allegiance to a land's quiet command. 

The ground me beneath hums with old power, 

a subtle force that whispers, 

     “ I decide where you belong.” 

I reply: 

"But what if belonging is rebellion? 

What if the land that shapes us is also 

 the land we challenge? 

a mirror broken by destiny's hand." 

 Freedom Lives Inside Us

We're not running away from the sun, 

not trying to escape 

we're chasing a certainty 

that stretches far beyond endless seas 

With no shorelines to hold us back 

In the dark, our candle flickers , 

pressed by the wind 

But its light  stays true. 

    Its glow quietly shouting one thing 

“Freedom lives inside us.” 

     Life moves like water 

soft, unstoppable, 

turning night into dawn 

carving paths through silent stone. 

We don't fight the waves of fear; 

we learn to sail through them. 

Sometimes we drown 

in the maze of doubt, 

but a faint pulse of light 

always pulls us back 

from the deep dark. 

This journey isn't about surviving 

it's about carrying weight with grace, 

holding the loss inside your chest, the lightness of hope 

 in your soul. 

Freedom is not a horizon,a living space 

It's the courage 

to keep moving forward, 

to flow with life as it is, 

 to trust the song 

 the water keeps. 

ARABIC

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