Sparks of Phoenix

by Najwa Zebian

  I stopped longing

  to be understood

  when the ones I thought

  understood me

  in my darkness

  turned out to have knives

  hidden under their tongues.

  To all of the lights

  who chose to dim

  when I was in the darkness,

  thank you for teaching me

  that my own light

  is all I need.

  It feels like I have to

  believe myself

  and

  teach people how to

  believe me.

  It feels like I have to

  heal myself

  and

  teach people how to

  help me heal.

  Don’t tell me how

  or when

  to heal

  if you didn’t live through my pain,

  if your heart did not stop

  and struggle

  to be with mine

  when I was burning

  and turning to ashes.

  Lose as many people as you need to

  in order to not lose yourself.

  No one worth keeping

  in your life

  is worth you

  losing yourself.

  When a hero is rising,

  many will choose

  to focus on the ashes at their feet.

  Keep rising.

  You are about

  to start soaring.

  I am so proud

  of the warrior

  I’ve created

  from the ashes

  that were meant

  to bury me.

  You are a soaring reminder of what they

  cannot

  have.

  Look down

  at your pain

  all the way from the sky.

  Look how small it is.

  Look at how big

  the world is.

  Look at all of the streets

  you can take.

  Look at all of the mountains

  you can climb

  and soar above.

  I have poems

  and books

  inside of me

  waiting to be written

  from the pain of humans

  whose names history

  will not remember

  or miss.

  When his voice

  asks me now:

  Who do you think you are?

  the hero I’ve become

  answers:

  I am Najwa Zebian.

  I am a hero.

  I am a survivor.

  A woman asks me:

  “How could a man

  like him

  not want

  a woman like you?”

  The younger, more innocent me would say:

  “Try sitting in my seat.

  Try to understand

  this

  while being me.”

  The older, wiser me says:

  “He wants me,

  but not in the way that

  I want to be wanted.

  He wants my untouched body

  to be his heaven for one night

  so he can leave it empty,

  like his hollow soul.”

  Don’t mistake his

  lust for love.

  I know that my kindness

  hurts me,

  but I will continue to choose it,

  not because I’m naive

  but because my actions define me.

  Remind your heart that kindness

  is always the answer.

  If your pain doesn’t make

  your soul softer and kinder

  with everyone around you,

  then you are not using your pain

  in the right way.

  You can be angry

  that you’re in pain.

  You can be upset

  that you don’t deserve

  to be in pain.

  Or you can be humble enough to say:

  Pain is part of life.

  And my ability to feel it

  proves that I am human.

  My wounds teach me

  not to hurt others.

  My scars have become

  my friends.

  They remind me

  of how brave I was

  to overcome

  the pain of my wounds.

  There is a part of me

  that craves

  not needing safety.

  I no longer want safety.

  I am a free bird

  soaring.

  To be kind

  in a world that could be

  so cruel

  to kind souls

  like you

  must be the greatest

  act of courage.

  I heard

  you’re hurting

  because of what I said about you.

  I heard you’re hurting

  because of how I made

  you look in the eyes of others.

  I think you’re hurting

  because you know that you

  made a mistake

  by hurting me.

  I think you’re hurting

  because of who I became,

  because of who I am becoming.

  And because you no longer

  have the honor of being the one I love.

  You are no longer someone I love.

  You are someone I once loved.

  Why should I feel bad

  for you?

  Why should I feel guilty

  for not wondering

  how you are dealing

  with your truth being exposed?

  When you were torturing me,

  did you

  for one moment

  wonder how I was dealing

  with what you

  were putting me through?

  I will never be okay

  with what you did to me.

  You have to be okay with that.

  Regret without an apology is

  cowardice.

  It was not you

  who I loved.

  It was the person

  I thought you were.

  It was the person

  you made me believe you were.

  Not you.

  I am free,

  not because

  you let me go.

  I am free because

  I let you go.

  And set myself free.

  I will not thank you for this pain.

  I will not thank you for this destruction.

  But I thank you for this lesson:

  My demolition might not be in my hands,

  but my reconstruction is.

  Now that I have built my own home,

  in every place

  or person that I try to make my home,

  my soul feels rejected.

  My own home

  feels like I am abandoning it.

  The most painful rejection

  is rejection of the self.

  The soul’s denial of itself.

  The heart’s refusal to love

  itself before it’s loved

  by someone else.

  If you hate me because of

  what happened to me,

  I don’t hate you,

  but

  I also will not a
llow your hatred

  of me to make me doubt myself.

  I don’t want to be liked

  by someone whose love is

  conditional on shame.

  If I lost your respect because

  of what I went through,

  keep your respect.

  I don’t want it.

  You don’t have to be okay

  with me

  or with what I did with

  what happened to me

  for me to be okay

  with myself.

  It will be a glorious moment

  when you realize

  that it is the world,

  not humans,

  that will give to you

  from its heart

  based on your intentions.

  You can be a fighter

  and have pain inside of you.

  You can be a hero

  and live with trauma.

  You can be brave

  and still need a break.

  Give love from your soul

  because you want to.

  Because it feels right.

  Not because you have to.

  Take love

  because you want to,

  not because you’re afraid

  of saying no.

  Not because you’re afraid

  of being alone.

  Look how far you’ve come.

  You rose above

  what was meant to break you.

  You are soaring.

  You are a hero

  reborn.

  I have been soaring

  for a while now,

  and I am afraid

  of burning again.

  He said to me:

  “I know you’re broken.

  I know your soul has been shattered.

  But you are beautiful

  in a way that I cannot explain.

  And I think that

  being in love with you

  would be

  the beginning and end

  of all beauty.”

  He told me:

  “Smile for once.”

  Silly boy, my heart’s been smiling

  since the moment you said:

  “You can trust me.”

  Since the moment you took my pen

  and wrote

  “Trust me”

  on the pages of the journal

  of my heart.

  I’m afraid to allow love in

  again

  because I don’t know

  what love is anymore.

  For a while now,

  love has been pain.

  I want to shield myself from pain

  again,

  so I tell you

  that I don’t want you to love me

  because

  you feel bad for me.

  You tell me that

  you can force people to do anything

  except love.

  You cannot force people to love you.

  He says:

  “You cannot,

  did not,

  and will not

  force me to love you.

  I just do.

  I choose to love you.

  And there is nothing

  you can do to force yourself

  out of my heart.”

  Why do you want to love me?

  I will traumatize you.

  I hear your words

  through my wounds.

  I see your face

  through my wounds.

  I talk to you

  through my wounds.

  And I will love you

  through my wounds,

  just like your love will enter me

  through my wounds.

  “Look at me.”

  Three words that cause

  an earthquake in my bones.

  I want to tell you

  that I am falling for you,

  but fear of this moment

  stops me.

  My heart reminds me:

  Don’t allow room

  for shame.

  Tell the people you love

  that you love them.

  He tells me:

  “I wanted to get you

  one rose,

  but I thought about you

  twelve times today,

  so twelve roses

  are what I got for

  the sun standing in front of me.”

  My heart says:

  One rose is enough.

  He reminds me:

  “Not for you.”

  I’ve never wanted roses

  to resist wilting

  more than I do now.

  That’s how I know

  that I want this love

  to last.

  I tell you

  there are things about me

  you should know.

  I’m afraid

  they’ll make you leave,

  but I tell myself

  that I will not hide

  parts of who I am

  because of the person

  that I want you to see.

  He tells me:

  “Your history is written

  in your eyes.

  In the way that you

  look down

  and to the side,

  anywhere but into my eyes.”

  He tells me:

  “There is a truth that’s hidden

  in your eyes.

  You’re falling in love

  or trying not to fall again.

  And if you think

  I don’t know

  what you’ve been through,

  you must think

  I’m foolish at

  love.”

  I knew that our souls

  were connected

  when you told me:

  “The sight of you

  and the sound of your voice

  stimulate my brain

  more than

  the touch of

  all the women whose bodies

  I have explored.”

  How do I tell you

  not to compare me

  to other women?

  Not to love me more

  because you love them less?

  Because you love her less?

  Love me

  for who I am,

  not who I’m not.

  Love me because

  you love

  me.

  You stayed a short while,

  but

  you made me want to write

  about love,

  not heartbreak,

  again.

  Thank you.

  AN INVITATION

  If this book has moved you, then move. Lift up your pen and start writing your own story, however you’d like to write it. Don’t keep it inside of you if it needs to leave you. Don’t settle in the ashes of your pain. Let the sparks lift you up. Rise from the ashes as I rose. And soar.

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you

  to every person who

  loved me as I was burning

  and turning to ashes,

  not just as I was rising

  and soaring.

  Thank you

  for loving me

  when it was difficult.

  About the Author

  Najwa Zebian is a Lebanese-Canadian author, speaker, and educator. Her passion for langu
age was evident from a young age, as she delved into Arabic poetry and novels. The search for a home—what Najwa describes as a place where the soul and heart feel at peace—was central to her early years. When she arrived in Canada at the age of sixteen, she felt unstable and adrift in an unfamiliar place. Nevertheless, she completed her education and went on to become a teacher as well as a doctoral candidate in educational leadership. Her first students, a group of young refugees, led her back to her original passion: writing. She began to heal her sixteen-year-old self by writing to heal her students.

  Since self-publishing her first collection of poetry and prose in 2016, Najwa has become an inspiration to millions of people worldwide. Drawing on her own experiences of displacement, discrimination, and abuse, Najwa uses her words to encourage others to build a home within themselves; to live, love, and create fearlessly.

  Sparks of Phoenix copyright © 2019 by Najwa Zebian. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews.

  Andrews McMeel Publishing

  a division of Andrews McMeel Universal

  1130 Walnut Street, Kansas City, Missouri 64106

  www.andrewsmcmeel.com

  ISBN: 978-1-5248-5272-6

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2018945556

  Editor: Melissa Rhodes

  Art Director: Holly Swayne

  Production Editor: Elizabeth A. Garcia

  Production Manager: Cliff Koehler

  Digital Production: Kristen Minter

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  Andrews McMeel books are available at quantity discounts with bulk purchase for educational, business, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail the Andrews McMeel Publishing Special Sales Department: specialsales@amuniversal.com.

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