If there is one language common to the world, it is the language of affection. Attractions swells, sex sells, motherhood tears the body apart, nostalgia seeps into the soul, heartbreak reverberates in the thrum of our blood as humans continue to love and lose. I’ve been trying to encapsulate those affections that different languages across the world express, through a myriad of stunning words. Sensations of love, lust and loss are fleeting through the course of our lives and yet forever, as we grow into the people we are meant to be. Eternal. So here it is – a series of poetry that captures affection in every syllable and word.

Dictionary of Affections is The Zoya Project language, common to the world…

MAGOA

‘a heartbreaking feeling that leaves long lasting visible traces in gestures and facial expressions’

I always wished,
For those things that
I didn’t know, couldn’t exist
That sat in the darkest crevices of my soul
Being etched under the surface of my skin
With my blood.
I would paint pictures
With my wishes,
Dreams,
Desires
That were, but a disillusionment
Existing in my eyelids
Which when broken
Watered the cracks between the keys
Of my typewriter,
From which blossomed
Wildflowers
Undulating pinks, purples and ivories
That mirrored
My puffy eyes
Which bloomed with salty tears
That burned
The cuts and scratches on my heart.
And words which were meant to be stories,
Turned into this,
Poetry
Flowering in my eyes
Watered by my tears
And lit by the smile that stretches across my lips still
In a lyrical despair
That writers will find
Beautiful.