Between Your Ribs: Love Poems

I love you, darling.
The word love, try to replace it . . .
eventually you will discover love remains the same . . .
It is a word with a wonderful mixture of all the beautiful
meanings, to be at the end “I love you.” It is playing the
sweetest melodies, rhythms, and the underbelly of their range.

Somewhere between stormy passion and haunting despair lies a powerful feeling like no other. Love is a complicated emotion, one that all of us struggle to understand at one time or another.

In her first compilation of poetry in English, Palestinian poet Amany Al-Hallaq shares moving, lyrical verse that reveals all the passionate emotions that accompany falling in love. With an honest, relatable style, Al-Hallaq relies on vivid imagery as she takes an unforgettable journey through love, comparing the powerful emotion to a sweet mango, with its seductive taste, smooth skin, and magnificent fragrance.

Al-Hallaq’s poetry eloquently speaks of love through deviant lust, a luminous smile, and a gentle whisper while positing that through every challenge, true love stands strong and able to withstand any storm—proving that no matter what, it really is sweeter than a mango.