“Why didn't you write all this time?Did you not remember us in a song?A dance?In the skies littered with stars?Did you not get drunk?Why didn’t you write all this time?Did you not remember us in a film?A book?In idyllic dusks and dawns?Did you not get high?It is good that you didn't.For all is well. I am drunk and dazed.I have already forgotten youand your bewitching ways.”

writer, poet, and academic

Kamand Kojouri is a writer, poet, and academic, and a fellow of the Emirates Literature Foundation. She is known for her poetry and prose, and for two poetry collections, The Eternal Dance and God, Does Humanity Exist? Her poems and short stories have appeared in anthologies and been broadcast on BBC Radio 4. Her work has also been featured in El País, The Irish Times, and BBC Persian Television. Her poem “Let My Silence Grow” was later adapted into a chorale composition by Zachary J. Moore and performed internationally, including by the Luther College Nordic Choir.