tahsin sabah

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In about 3-4 days if everything goes according to plan! <3 thanks for your support babezzzz xoxox

(see bibliography at the end) Epigraph:  She said, “I’m tired of the war, I want the kind of work I had before, a wedding dress or something white to wear upon my swollen appetite.” – Joan of Arc, Songs of Love & Hate (1979) by Leonard Cohen This excerpt from Leonard Cohen’s Joan of Arc reflects the tension at the heart of Lana Del Rey’s “hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to…

This is an excerpt from my ongoing novella Lake District :

The green is deep and harsh under the silver sky. The wind is steady and constant. Birds sing on their own accord from distant branches. Mist rises from the ground like thoughts forming in the air. The hills roll down like poetry off a lover's tongue.

'Since all that beat about in Nature's range,' I quote from memory, into the gentle breeze clinging to the loose strands of my plaits. 'Or veer or vanish; why should'st thou remain the only constant in a world of change, o yearning thought! that liv'st but in the brain?'

The corners of my lips turn upwards, forming the image of a young girl recently kissed. It is almost as though I have always lived here, only blindfolded. I tie the knot of my tweed coat closer to my body. My boots traipse mud and leave behind a trail of my footprint. I wonder if I am walking over the same spots where Dorothy Wordsworth had once walked. The coil of the path leading to the lake is rocky and not unlike broken glass bottles. Through the black trees, I see it, an iridescent slate holding a mirror to the morning sky fearlessly, like a dare. I dare you to show me the sun, it's saying. The lake. The wide body of water is like a sheet of smooth iron, a katana blade or a fairy-tale looking glass.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore— While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. “’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door— Only this and nothing more.”

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December; And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor. Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore— For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore— Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before; So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating “’Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door— Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;— This it is and nothing more.”

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,

“Sir,” said I, “or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore; But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping, And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door, That I scarce was sure I heard you”—here I opened wide the door;— Darkness there and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before; But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore?” This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, “Lenore!”— Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,

Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before. “Surely,” said I, “surely that is something at my window lattice; Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore— Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;— ’Tis the wind and nothing more!”

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,

In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore; Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he; But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door— Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door— Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore, “Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven, Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore— Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!” Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,

Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore; For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door— Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door, With such name as “Nevermore.”

But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only

That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour. Nothing farther then he uttered—not a feather then he fluttered— Till I scarcely more than muttered “Other friends have flown before— On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before.” Then the bird said “Nevermore.”

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,

“Doubtless,” said I, “what it utters is its only stock and store Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore— Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore Of ‘Never—nevermore’.”

But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling,

Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and door; Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore— What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore Meant in croaking “Nevermore.”

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing

To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom’s core; This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining On the cushion’s velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o’er, But whose velvet-violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o’er, She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer

Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor. “Wretch,” I cried, “thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore; Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!” Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—

Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore, Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted— On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore— Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!” Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!

By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore— Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore— Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore.” Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

“Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!” I shrieked, upstarting—

“Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore! Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!” Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting

My novella 'The Nightman' is now complete and ready to read for free on Wattpad!

"In the dark heart of London’s East End, an old Tudor house hides secrets that refuse to rest. Dr. Kareem, a rational man of science, thinks he understands the living—until he meets Blessing, a ghostly figure bound by rage and grief, and the Widow, whose veil hides a tragedy centuries old.

From haunted privies to blood-soaked corridors, from the shadowed docks to the flickering lights of a forgotten clinic, the past claws its way into the present. Whispers of love, betrayal, and fire linger where lives were lost too soon.

In 'The Nightman', the dead walk, the living tremble, and the line between this world and the next is thinner than a candle’s flame. Some doors, once opened, can never be closed."

When people speak of Marilyn Monroe, they don’t just recall her beauty – they remember how she felt in a room. There was a visceral reaction to her, a quiet electricity that lingered long after she had walked by. While Hollywood wants you to believe that was the work of lighting, makeup, or clever costuming, the truth is more empowering: it was Marilyn herself. Her glow came from the inside out –…