Poetry: Ashraf AboArafe
Beneath Cairo’s golden lamps, two flags swayed as one —
The crescent of Anatolia kissed the Nile’s eternal sun.
In the courtyard of brotherhood, prayers rose like light,
And the scent of compassion perfumed the quiet night.
From Ankara’s heart to the banks of the Nile,
Came whispers of mercy, tender and fragile.
Türkiye and Egypt — two rivers entwined,
Flowing toward Palestine, one soul, one mind.
Ambassador Şen spoke with a steady flame,
Of homes torn apart, yet hearts that remain.
He called upon nations — on kin, on the just,
To cradle the wounded, to rebuild with trust.
Tarek recited verses the heavens once heard,
Each syllable trembling, each pause a word.
While Mostafa Kamar sang softly, his notes took flight,
Carrying Gaza’s sorrow into the Cairo night.
And there — between the echoes and sighs,
Between faith’s tears and hope’s reprise —
Stood mothers of Gaza, fathers, and sons,
Bathed in the warmth of united ones.
O night of Cairo, remember this grace,
When two nations embraced one face.
When family meant not blood nor land,
But hearts that reached out, hand in hand.
And lo — the wind drifts softly from Gaza,
carrying both promise and pain,
bearing the keys of lost homes,
and the fragrance of jasmine in the rain.
It whispers:
“I shall return… though the dawn be delayed,
for the peace of Cairo and Ankara
has lit the lanterns of longing.”
Children walk barefoot upon the ashes of war,
yet in their eyes a homeland blooms once more.
Mothers lift their hands toward the sky,
and heaven rains tranquility — not tears — but sighs.
Then the doors of home open to a new dawn’s gleam,
where absence no longer parts the martyr and the dream.
And there, upon the sacred soil of Palestine,
the hearts that once cried out softly proclaim:
“The home is the light divine.”
