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Rana

6/19/2014

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Writing by Rana from the first workshop
Picture
Rana 

What helps me write is depression, that feeling of being not able to answer the questions that you ask yourself.
Why the world is like that?
Why am I like that?
Why am I here?
And where am I going?
MY personal questions 
I started thinking about what I wrote…I stopped writing. 
I can't say more.
Who do I write for? 
Am I writing for myself or for the listeners? 
Do I write to impress or to reach the feeling of comfort?

***

I am from the trees
I am from the sound of water and wind 
I am from my parents and sister
I am from the corner where I smoke my cigarette so my parents won't smell the smoke while they're sleeping 
I am from the stage 
the wooded floor of the stage, the curtains the audience and the play 
I am every character that I played
I am every friend that passed by me or stayed until now 
I am from a land that you smell its history 
I am from the sea of that land, the mountains and the olive trees 
and above all, 
I am from the wind 
I want to  be THE wind. 
I'm not until now but I will be 
SOMETIME

***
My mom always says she named me after her best friend, but apparently this is not my own story. She named my sister after her other best friend also. I always felt jealous of my sister's name, Hiba, which means a gift. Above her being a gift for my parents and I am not, Kathem Al-Saher made a song for her.

Oh, the nights I spent crying after I heard that song.
 
My mom started collecting songs that have my name. 
She found only two. That didn’t satisfy me. 

Then the crisis of what my name means began. My mom says it means music. Well, that is not true. Rana is the past tense of the verb, Yarnow which means "looking." 

What? My name only means looking? That is not romantic. 
It doesn't mean anything spiritual. It's only looking.

But, don’t worry, whenever somebody asks me what my name means, I say "looking at the future." 
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