How brave a soul must be to love through poverty,
in a country where the flag frays a little more each season,
stitched by hope yet torn by hungry hands and restless histories.
Streets remember promises louder than prayers,
and still the heart dares to choose love over survival.
My soul refuses sleep unless it witnesses spring arriving softly,
blossoms opening like wounds learning forgiveness,
unless it walks through the storm-swollen nights of July
where thunder writes grief across a dusky sky
and rain falls like unfinished confessions.
What is love here, if not endurance?
What is devotion, if not staying when leaving would be easier?
Through winter’s pale and trembling daze
I remain, a poor man with pockets full of longing—
learning that love is not abundance but persistence,
not warmth alone but the courage to shiver beside another soul.
So I must love through emptiness, through broken seasons,
through a homeland that forgets how gently hearts can live,
because only by loving without certainty, without wealth, without shelter,
do I begin, slowly and painfully,
to understand you.
Nubisha Rabya Topote, a poet currently working on her debut poetry collection. Find her at @nubishawrites.