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Best Poems Written by Maya Kaabour

Below are the all-time best Maya Kaabour poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Let Me Write You Something.

Let me write you a poem.
A poem so great Bukowski would give me a hats off-
And hand me a beer.
A poem so well-written, John Mayer would play me a 
Tribute song with his guitar.
Let me bring Shakespeare to shame-
Let me write you sonnets one and two,
Three, Four and maybe 
Five hundred. 
Let the only alliteration be that of our laughter,
As we exchange puns and stories.
Let the words “I love you” be an understatement.
Let us be the Paradox – and let the popcorn munching crowd watch us with awe.
Let the touching of our lips write Concrete poems.
Let your embraces warm me with Haikus.
Chase me through Couplets where we are the only couple.
Let the only Dramatic Monologue be that within my palpitating heart.
Wrap me with imagery- 
Shower me with smiles and similes. 
Be the Free Verse,
Be the Epic poem,
Be the Ghazal poetry drunkards wrote to their loved ones…
Be the hero in my Heroic couplets,
Be the one.
Just let me write you a poem-
Where your name is the only repeated term.
Where the only irony is the twist of fate that brought us together.
Where the only onomatopoeia is the ROAR of your rusty car’s engine.
Where we stand like Oxymorons- contradictory but side by side.
Just let me write you a poem.
Or a novel
Or a play
Or a song-
Let me write you something.

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Spring Clean

You wiped me out
The day
I was exhaled by that indigo storm.-
You stared at me with
Disapproval,
A frown sown to your forehead
As I lay on your fingertips.
Like dust in a dark old attic,
You disposed of me
To spring clean your life.

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Amid the Purple Phlox

I am losing you again

White, oh your skin, whiter than pearls…
I sit here, trying not to stare,
Serene you are, as you lie in your bed,
How awful could agony become?

I am losing you again

Chapped and faded your divinely drawn lips…
Opaque, the spark in your eyes, it no longer exists,
Uttering out the words, "you had my heart from the start,"
Lament, your words are, as your lips part,
Does God really need another angel by His side?

Exasperating, your paralysis, suffocates me…
Abashed I awake, from a nightmare,  
Throbbing, I almost submerged your sheets with gasoline,

Yelping,
Oh poor baby, you are so soggy from the chemo,
Undying, everlasting we are, hang on my love,
Rusting your skin, your sickness is so ruthless, to kill you,

Could I really break the wall my pride has built?
Angst haunted me as I listened to the mournful,
Notes of the saddest symphony existing…
Could I please place a red rose on your mahogany sepulcher?
Endless our love is, as a paroxysm of pain,
Rushed through my blood,

Amid the purple phlox, and the emerald elms,
Waves of distress, overwhelm,
As I realise how your anguish was so true,
Yesterday, I wished I had died instead of you…

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Gone With the Sin

Giving up on all I believe in,
Opaque is the road that I walk on,
Not even the brightness of a hundred stars, is capable of
Erasing, all the wrong I've done.

Wandering the streets of wrong-doing,
I'd watch people pass me by, life is much more complicated
Than I thought it would be, it's just so mystifying, 
How everything wrong feels so right, everything is a 

Trap, in the web of life. 
How everything that gives delight, in fact, has
Existed to reveal the true meaning of remorse, yet until this day, a 

Sinner I am, carrying a bundle of sins
In my hands, 
Not knowing what road to take.

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Mr.Playwright

Dulcet electrical-guitars playing as I draw graffiti on the sky-line.

There’s more to me than converse shoes and
These lonely brown eyes. 

This force within me is,
Shaking-
Aching.
I am waiting to be written. 

I’ll be your masterpiece, and you can be my Playwright-
Dress me up in 
dramatic irony.
You can knock me out from 
setting to setting-
Be the cause for my complications-
And just when I think I’ve had enough,
You can hose me down with a 
happy-ending.

I’ll run-on from scene to scene,
And for a protagonist, 
(I can sometimes be pretty obscene.)
Cut me off with periods and full stops.
Re-arrange the fragments of my being. 

Feed me catchy infinitive phrases-
“I don’t know
What it’s like
TO FEEL
Anymore.”
You know how cheesy words cut me to the core.

You can shoot me with idioms.
After all, you are 
All bark and no bite.
I’ll be your break through; I’ll make you famous-
Mr. Playwright.

Hold me hostage in your possessive forms.
I’ll be Yours,
And maybe you could be Mine. 

Do not under-estimate my logical
Parallel structure though-
If you want me "to stay,"
Then you’ve got "to give me a reason."

Mr. Playwright, I am not a big fan of Treason,
Indirect metaphors,
And open-endings.

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Life of the Party

Beirut.
You’ve always been the life of the party.

I’ve seen the sun smile at you,
on Saturday mornings.
As your women
hung over and wrecked
with Jesus crosses on their necks
waltz through streets
trying to find a ride back home.

Your green wooden window panes,
always left open.
Always left waiting.
A sign of hope.
As if something holy
or someone with a red cape on
would come
and save you.

I see it
I feel it
The pain
The terror
I see the bullets 
That have pierced through your walls
Left you with nothing

Your anarchists
Your extremists 
Your people
Your children
Are all fighting
Over a hit 
of the fix you gave them.
Oh Beirut,
what have they done?

I see the clouds of smoke rising
I see your people left bare
with secrets to strip off
and hang on the laundry ropes
that fill your skies

The writings on your walls say it all.
You’ve lost your soul
You’ve lost your spark

Corruption
Destruction
You made the rules 
and then asked us to break them.
I’m not sure who to blame.
Them,
Or you.

You left me high and dry-
Lost in the alleys of your dark streets

I didn’t know who to blame.
So I asked around, Beirut.

I asked the men on motorcycles
who snatch purses from old women.
I asked your nine year old
gypsy beggars.
I asked your officers 
and the teenagers in cellars,
who in another world could’ve been heroes or poets.
I asked your university students,
but they were too stoned to comprehend my questions.
High on a drug of complacency
High on a drug of nonchalance
High on a drug of compromise.
So 
Numb
Numb
Numb


I asked your gods.
Your middle-men.
The pictures on the walls
of your many leaders.

I asked your fathers
Your rapists
Your artists
Your lawyers 
Your educators

I even asked the old man pushing a cart of oranges in Hamra.

But nothing was to be found…

Not even a tad of sanity…
Not even a sense of security
You couldn’t give me that, could you?

Oh Beirut.
You’ve always been the life of the party. 
But I’ve seen them frown at you,
when dawn breaks and you walk out on them
hung over and wrecked 
with a cross around your neck
walking over shattered beer bottles…
trying to find a ride back home.

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Welcome To the Fake World

Welcome,
To the fake world,

Enjoy,
The breath - taking nature,

Rubber trees,
With fragrance - free leaves,

All kinds of immortal flowers,
Dipped in all colors of paint, and eternal shine,

Here, grab a magical brush,
Draw on a fake smile,

Walk around, with the fake crowd,
A crowd as fake as you,

Look around...

Fake plastic lovers,
With hearts cut out of red gift wrappings,

Arms of gorgeous mannequins,
That reach out to hold you, 
Embrace you,
And chill you to the bone,

Look around...

Fake gleaming mirrors,
That only show the reflection of,
Outer beauty,

Have a drink,
Cheap champagne or cancerous cocktail?
Watch them, crown the fake queen,
With a glittery tiara made of artificial jewels,

Watch her, praise her, that polystyrene Goddess,
Shining this night's sky, even brighter,
Than these yellow stars above us, 
Lit by the unbelievable power of,
Batteries...

Have another Botox injection,
In your forged, yet lovely features,
My dear! Have you forgotten you should take one every six months?
A sting of beauty won't hurt!

You fool! It is not what is in your mind that counts,
It is what is under your thousand dollar shirt,
Have you forgotten?!
Have you forgotten?!

Be shallow,
Or else,
You'll never be good enough for the fake world.
You'll never be good enough for the fake world.

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Almond Eyes

Grandma with the almond eyes
Needed a seat on the metro
On a warm Wednesday
Afternoon-
I stood up and guided 
Her to mine
As she smiled at me
With whatever was left
Of her eighty-eight
Year old teeth
And although I am
Usually the last one in line
When it comes to
Doing what’s right-
I still felt like
I owed her a lot.
This grandma could be
The cute little
Baby girl whose 
Two toothed smile
And big brown eyes
Caused my
Great grand parents to
Decide they wanted 
To have a child.
She could be 
The woman who
Made the vase 
That was set on
A table in a cafe
And triggered a conversation
Between my parents
On their first
Date.
Or her husband could be
The man who left that
Banana peel on 
The floor somewhere
In Rainy Beirut 
During the 1970’s
Hence causing my
Dad to slip into
Mother’s arms. 
She could be
The person who
Sold my father the 
Rose he gave mother
On Valentine’s Day.
She could be
The uttermost reason
For my existence.
Or she could be some
Random old lady-
I still gave her my seat anyway.

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

Monsoon

Monsoon so azure— 
Turning misery into crystal,
Gemmed, bits of ice..

Details | Maya Kaabour Poem

To Beethoven

Beethoven,
I love you.

But you play your
Moonlight Sonata
On a bleak night and
I am left-
In my coffin
Bones devouring
Flesh-
Eyes drowning in chasms
Left wide open-
Wearing a black dress
With a white collar
Sweeping dust and talking
To myself

All the delicate Ballerinas 
Of the world
Softly dance with those
Grotesque girls
Who were told they were
Too fat to perform
When they were alive

And the Cavaliers watch from afar- 
As they write poetry drained
With Disdain towards
The Love
They never had and never lost

The Emersons and the Twains
Watch quietly--
The Einsteins, Newtons, and Hookes- 
Scribble formulas on napkins
As they try to calculate
The changing notes your Piano Plays---

The kings quarrel and start a war.

Scared for the life I have already lost I-
Clench to the hand of the
Man next to me
Who died of cancer because he
Swore and drank too much

All our thoughts collide
The piano plays on
Newspapers rot
And it all flashes before me-
The Pharaohs
The Kings
The Wars in the name of God
The poems
The symphonies
Centuries filled with Nothing
People
People
People 

It all flashes before me-
As we die again 
And again

The process repeats itself at least twice-

Until I wake up in my bed,
Shudder,
Take off my earphones
And stare at the 
Empty room around me.