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…

QUAINAAT

‘Universe’

The lines on your palm
Aligned with mine
As if a cartographer
Had scaled and drawn them
To write a love story
That wouldn’t fit on maps.
The ridges between your fingers
Made to size
To intertwine with mine.
I saw the stars in your eyes
The moon in your face
The sun in your smile
And in my mind
Painted the world on your body
And hoped
Ardently
To be folded within it.
My compass
Changed its ‘north’
To wherever you stood
And for the longest time I convinced myself,
It was attracted to the iron in your blood
Before I realised
I had charted your coordinates
In rough lines
Upon my heart
And carved promises
That formed a cygnus
Across my chest
खून से खींची हुई लकीरें
दिल के ऊपर तुम्हारी तस्वीर बना चुकी थी
जैसे सितारों का झुरमुट आसमान में चमकता है
तुम मेरी साँसों और दिल की धड़कनों में
बस चुकी थी
और उस ही जिस्म में
मेरी क़ायनात मिल चुकी थी