I did not write these poems. I survived them.
Some books whisper. This one burns.
FLAMES is what happens when ancient mysticism meets modern devastation. When the ecstasy of the old Persian poets collides with the silence of a 3 a.m. prayer no one answers. When grief stops asking to be healed and demands instead to be witnessed.
Hasan Kasem writes from inside the wound, not around it. These poems move through six chambers - Fracture, Longing, Annihilation, Memory, Endurance, and Sovereignty - tracing what remains when certainty, love, faith, family, and the self are tested by fire.
"What they called ruin, I called witness.
What they called scars, I read as script.
I did not return untouched.
I returned with light."
This book is for:
- The ones who carry everyone else and have no one to carry them
- The ones who have screamed at God and heard nothing come back
- The ones who were betrayed and chose not to become cruel
- The ones who discovered that surviving does not always look heroic
Drawing from Persianate mysticism, Sufi imagery, spiritual doubt, family memory, and lived experience, Kasem writes about the human beloved and the Divine, fathers and brothers, anxiety and loneliness, dignity and surrender.
FLAMES does not promise that suffering makes us wiser. Some pain teaches nothing. Some scars remain scars. What these poems offer instead is witness - to the breaking, the longing, the unanswered prayer, and the stubborn human voice that keeps speaking.
This is not poetry for those looking for easy consolation.
Not a healing manual.
A mirror.
A witness.
And perhaps, for some, a light.
