Beyond the Border
Perhaps freedom
is not always
quite so much
like breaking down walls—
walls like those
of the Bastille
and Berlin;
sometimes
freedom means
that even in a closed room,
or even
in solitary confinement,
you can still
keep a window open
in your heart,
a window opening onto
your own truth,
your own ideal,
your own feelings.
We
did not break every border,
we did not open every door,
and some roads,
before we ever reached them,
had either
already come to an end
or
were lost
among other roads.
But love—
I could not
drive you
out of me.
Love
remained somewhere
between
breath and silence,
not as a wound
that must be forgotten,
but as a light
that found
another way
to live.
What we could not
touch
in the world
sometimes
turns, within us,
into poetry
and passion;
into beauty,
into knowing ourselves,
into an awareness
of the world within us
and the world around us;
into a quiet gaze
that one day,
in the mirror,
no longer
runs away
from itself,
but instead
embraces
the elusive self
that once
kept trying to escape.
Perhaps love
is not always born
to remain
beside someone;
sometimes it comes
to awaken something
within us
that has been asleep
for years.
And you,
who could not
find freedom
in leaving,
may perhaps one day
find it
in the honesty
of remaining true
to yourself.
A day when you understand
that to love,
you do not need to possess;
to let go,
you do not need to forget;
and to be free,
you do not need
all the borders of the world
and all the towering walls
of prejudice and domination
to come crashing down.
It is enough
not to surrender
your heart
to captivity
amidst all these walls.
Then
love,
which once
could not fully
taste life
in this world,
slowly,
within you,
turns into poetry;
and poetry
into beauty,
and beauty
into understanding,
and understanding
into a freedom
that arrives late,
but when it comes,
it is no longer
a hat,
nor a shawl,
nor a robe
that someone
can take away from you.
The story of freedom and love
is not about
being or not being.
Nor is it about
being or possessing.
Then what is it?
Perhaps
becoming,
living,
continuing to unfold
within yourself.
آن سوی مرزها
شاید آزادی
آنقدرها هم
شبیه شکستنِ دیوارها
مثل دیوارهای
باستیل و برلین
نباشد؛
گاهی
آزادی یعنی
در اتاقی بسته
یا حتی
در سلولی انفرادی
هنوز بتوانی
پنجرهای
رو به
حقیقتِ خویش
آرمانِ خویش
احساس خویش
در قلبت باز نگه داری
ما
،همۀ مرزها را نشکستیم
،همۀ درها را نگشودیم
و بعضی راهها
پیش از رسیدنِ ما
یا
به پایان رسیدند
یا
در راههای دیگر
گم شدند
اما عشق، تو را
نتوانستم
از خودم
بیرون کنم؛
عشق
جایی میانِ
نفس و سکوت
،ماند
نه چون زخمی
،که باید فراموش شود
بلکه چون نوری
که راهِ دیگری
برای زیستن
پیدا کرد
آنچه نتوانستیم
در جهان
،لمس کنیم
گاهی
در درون ما
به شعر و شور
بدل میشود؛
،به زیبایی
،به شناختنِ خویش
به آگاهی از
دنیای درون خویش
و دنیای پیرامون خویش
به نگاهی آرام
که یک روز
در آینه
دیگر
نه تنها
از خودش نمیگریزد
بلکه
خویش گریزپا را
در آغوش میگیرد
شاید عشق
همیشه برای ماندن
در کنار کسی
به دنیا نمیآید؛
گاهی میآید
تا چیزی را
در ما بیدار کند
که سالها
در خواب بوده است
و تو
که نتوانستی
آزادی را
در رفتن
،پیدا کنی
شاید روزی
در ماندنِ صادقانۀ خویش
آن را بیابی
روزی که بفهمی
دیگر برای دوست داشتن
،نیازی به داشتن نیست
برای رها شدن
،نیازی به فراموش کردن نیست
و برای آزاد بودن
لازم نیست
تمام مرزهای جهان
و دیوارهای بلند تعصب و تحکم
فرو بریزند
کافیست
قلبت را
در میانِ این همه دیوار
به اسارت ندهی
آنگاه
،عشق
که روزی
نتوانست در جهان
به تمامی
،طعم زندگی را بچشد
در تو
آهستهآهسته
به شعر تبدیل میشود؛
و شعر
،به زیبایی
و زیبایی
،به شناخت
و شناخت
به آزادیای
،که دیر میرسد
اما وقتی میرسد
دیگر
نه کلاهی است
نه شالی
و نه ردایی
که کسی بتواند
آن را از تو بگیرد
قصۀ آزادی و عشق
بودن یا نبودن نیست
بودن یا داشتن هم نیست
پس چیست؟
شاید
شدن
زیستن
در خود ادامه یافتن
سهیل خداپرستی
-
Author:
soheil khodaparasti (
Offline) - Published: September 2nd, 2026 22:26
- Comment from author about the poem: This poem is dedicated to those who remain true to themselves—to the ones who hold on to their identity even when the world pressures them to change. It honors those who choose authenticity over approval, who stay faithful to their values despite criticism, rejection, uncertainty, scars, and suffering. It is for those who have endured pain, carried wounds both seen and unseen, and still have the courage to be themselves, even when doing so means standing alone. It is for those who refuse to let their suffering define or diminish who they are, who carry every scar as a testament to what they have survived, and who continue forward without losing the person within. Above all, it celebrates the quiet strength of living honestly, embracing who you are, and refusing to lose yourself simply to fit in.
- Category: Unclassified
- Views: 9
- Users favorite of this poem: Kaz, A.N.
Offline)
Comments5
Love this, very wise and very beautiful
Thank you so much.
Your welcome
A poem of growth and the poetry in it. I particularly was struck by the passage:
"that to love,
you do not need to possess;
to let go,
you do not need to forget;
and to be free,
you do not need
all the borders of the world
and all the towering walls
of prejudice and domination
to come crashing down."
Love is accepting differences not always embracing them. Very nicely written Soheil
Thank you so much for your thoughtful words. I am truly touched that those lines resonated with you. I believe you captured their essence beautifully: love can embrace difference without needing to erase it. Your kind appreciation means a great deal to me.
Always most welcome my friend
A poetic reflection on the depth of one who is awake in the midst of the turbulence of life and living souls.
Thank you for such a profound reflection. True awakening, perhaps, is finding stillness and compassion amid life’s turbulence.
There’s a damn profound meditation here on freedom, where the walls gradually shift from physical barriers like the Bastille and Berlin to the invisible walls we carry inside ourselves. The final movement from love to poetry to beauty to understanding to “becoming” is what gives the poem its real power—it suggests that sometimes the freedom we spend our lives searching for outside us is the slow, painful freedom of finally becoming fully ourselves.
Thank you, my friend, for such a perceptive reading of the poem. You have touched on something very close to what I was trying to explore—the way freedom can begin as a struggle against the walls imposed upon us, only to reveal, gradually, the more difficult walls we have built within ourselves. I especially appreciate what you noticed about the movement from love to poetry, beauty, understanding, and finally becoming. Perhaps freedom is ultimately less about escaping every wall than about discovering who we are beyond them and finding the courage to become fully ourselves. Thank you for seeing that dimension in the poem.
When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
Thank you for sharing this beautiful reflection. I agree that maturity asks us to leave behind the limitations of childhood and grow into a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world. Perhaps that is also what I was reaching for in the poem: not simply putting away childish things, but continuing to become—to transform love, loss, and experience into understanding, beauty, and an inner freedom that cannot easily be taken away.
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