Makyda Al-Ma'na - Shorouq Al-Abdullah

In "The Trick of Meaning," Shorouq Al-Abdullah writes a poetic text that does not rely on the poem as a fleeting aesthetic moment, but as a long engagement with language, consciousness, and human betrayal. This is a book that does not ask: what do we say? but: how does meaning betray us when we trust it? From the first pages, the poetic voice takes shape as a tense whisper, oscillating between intuition and certainty, between what we know and what we doubt, as if the poetess is holding onto the edges of meaning before it slips away. The poems here move within a dense internal space: the night, memory, the body, solitude, loss, and the desire to survive without full certainty. The language is occupied with deconstructing itself; images that emerge from water and salt, from the desert and dew, from the tree and the window, from coffee and silence. No decorative metaphors, but images summoned because they carry both emotional and cognitive impact. Every text seems like an attempt to repair something broken: a heart, an idea, or a relationship with life. "The Trick of Meaning" does not present a direct poetic discourse, but writes through fragmentation, repetition, and a subtle rhythm. There is a sharp awareness that abundance is a test, that sadness is not an anomaly but part of the structure of living, and that language itself can be a trap when we over-trust it. In many passages, words turn into an act of resistance: resisting vulgarity, resisting repetition, resisting easy explanations of what we feel. This is a poetry collection about the human when he loses his simple tools: reassurance, clarity, certainty. But at the same time, it does not fall into nihilism; rather, it leaves an open window for reflection, patience, and a fragile form of hope. After reading "The Trick of Meaning," you will not come out with answers, but with more precise questions, and with the feeling that language—despite its cunning—remains one of the last possible places for salvation. So, is meaning something we possess… or a beautiful trap we keep falling into because we cannot bear silence?