Arabic Poetry Mixtape: Prelude

I often find myself reciting lines of Arabic poetry in everyday conversations. Sometimes, it’s a verse that captures a fleeting emotion, a moment of reflection, or even a joke between friends. Other times, it’s a couplet that perfectly distills a lesson I’ve learned in business or life. For Arabs, poetry is like that—it lives with you, always ready to offer insight, comfort, humor. But for me, this wasn’t always the case.

I didn’t spend the first part of my life in the Arab world, swimming in a culture reciting classical poetry. I grew up in Bedford-Stuyvesant (Bed-Stuy) Brooklyn, a world far removed from the Arabic poets of old. But my childhood was still filled with poetry. 

In my neighborhood, hip-hop was the language of expression, and the streets were filled with the sounds of freestyling, cyphers, and the power of words. As a kid, I’d watch in awe and sometimes join, as groups of young men gathered in tight circles, trading bars back and forth, their words sharp and precise, their rhymes—sometimes effortless, leading to cheers, sometimes belabored leading to ridicule. Freestyling wasn’t just about rhyming—it was about craft, confidence, and the ability to not just create and communicate meaning, but strike with it. And on top of all of that, rhyme, perform with cadence, and keep rhythm. Emceeing is an unbelievably difficult and intricate lyrical craft that I think, only recently, the full scope of America has only just begun to acknowledge and appreciate. 

I remember watching Biggie’s funeral procession in Brooklyn, the way the streets were lined with people mourning an artist whose words had shaped their world. His lyrics, his storytelling, his ability to make people feel something—that was poetry. At the time, I didn’t think about it in those terms, but in hindsight, hip-hop was my first real exposure to poetry.

It wasn’t until years later, when I traveled to Yemen, that I realized just how much Arabic poetry and hip-hop had in common.

In Yemen, I discovered a world where poetry wasn’t just an art form—it was an essential part of life. People quoted poetry in arguments, recited it at weddings, used it in negotiations, composed poetry on the spot to honor guests, entertained one another with it during gatherings, it was woven into everything. Arabic, I learned, is a language built for eloquence and precision. And our poetry, the way words interconnect, the rhythm, the double, triple entendres, the wordplay, the humor, the tantalizing ornate descriptiveness—it was an ocean, and I was ready to dive in head first. 

That’s when I truly understood that poetry is more than just words on a page. It is the entire essence of what makes us human made manifest.

For the next few months, I want to take a deep dive into Arabic poetry—its history, its beauty, its complexity, and its relevance today. I want to explore the poets and verses that have shaped the Arab world for over a thousand years and, along the way, help those unfamiliar with Arabic poetry understand why it remains one of the most profound and celebrated literary traditions in the world.

But before we dive in, let's set the stage.

A Deeply Literary Society and Culture

In the Arab world, politicians compose poetry for their speeches, recite it during debates in parliament. This would obviously be quite bizarre in the West, but in the Arab world, it’s totally normal. Leaders are expected to be extremely eloquent, when they aren’t it can become a major problem for them. In the gatherings of rulers and influential men, a poet might arrive, stand before the host, and begin to recite. A good poem could result in a new car, a bag full of cash, college tuition, or even a lifelong monthly stipend.

At weddings, poetry is recited to celebrate the families. At funerals, to remember the dead. At gatherings, to entertain. A father giving advice to his son may do so through a verse passed down for generations, and a guest may honor his host with a poem composed on the spot.

One of the most popular television shows in the Arab world is called Prince of Poets. It’s literally just American Idol for poetry. Millions of people tune in to watch poets compete, delivering verses that are debated and scrutinized. This show, and this is a fact, has higher ratings and viewership than soccer in the Arab world. I actually love this show and frequently send clips to friends and family. Arab family WhatsApp groups have these floating around constantly.

Remarkably, a study conducted by Remitly between 2021 and 2022 sought to determine the most desired “dream job” in each country. While much of the world leaned toward professions like pilot, doctor, or entrepreneur, the Arabian Peninsula stood apart. In almost every single nation—Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Yemen, Oman and Bahrain—the top aspiration wasn’t a high-tech or corporate career, but poet. This finding speaks volumes. In a region where the mastery of words has historically been a direct route to status and success, poetry remains not just an art form, but a profession people still dream of pursuing.

The point is, this is a culture and a society built around the written and recited word—so much so that their majority religion places its defining miracle in what they believe to be inimitable language. In the first period of Islam, a large number of the initial converts did so simply upon hearing the Qur’an, moved by its beauty, rhythm, and unprecedented eloquence.

Lost in Translation

Poetry doesn’t translate. Not really. You can translate it, it’s allowed but the thing that makes a poem a poem is almost always lost.

This is why some forms of poetry translate better than others. Religious and philosophical poetry—like the works of Rumi, Hafez, Dante, or the Tao Te Ching—often carry over well because they are built around meaning and linear storytelling. They don’t rely as much on wordplay, so what makes them powerful survives the transition from one language to another. 

Arabic poetry, in particular, resists translation in ways that make even the most skilled translators hesitate. There’s the wordplay, the internal rhyme, the subtle shifts in meaning that depend on a deep understanding of both the language and the culture. There’s the fact that a single word in Arabic can carry multiple meanings at once, something English for the most part doesn’t allow. A clever poet can embed double and triple entendres into just a few words, layering meaning in ways that make a verse work on different levels all at the same time. Strip that away, and all you’re left with is a rough approximation—something that communicates the idea, but not the art. But, I think, if you really take the time to break it down, poetry can be appreciated by those who don’t speak the language. 

Take, for example, this short poem:

فتى

فتن

في

فتاة

فتاه

A boy

Was entranced

By

A girl

And became lost

Five words. Five variations on the same root: fata. In Arabic, it flows effortlessly. It plays with sound, rhythm, and meaning in a way that makes it immediately memorable. The words fold into one another, like a riddle unraveling in real time.

If we break it down word by word:

Fatā (فتى) – A boy, a young man.

Fatan (فتن) – Was entranced, became fascinated, fell into temptation.

Fī (في) – In, within.

Fatātin (فتاة) – A girl, a young woman.

Fatāh (فتاه) – Became lost, disappeared, faded away.

In Arabic, this works because the root letters (ف - ت - ى) are being manipulated to create a series of interconnected meanings. The first and last words mirror each other (fatā / fatāh), creating a circular effect—the boy is transformed, almost dissolving into the girl, entranced by her to the point of losing himself. The internal rhythm, the way the sounds roll into each other, and the compactness of meaning are what make it work. See? When I break it down like this, it’s cool.

So, that’s the challenge with translating poetry. You can’t just read a translated verse and expect to feel what a native speaker feels. To truly appreciate it, you have to break it down, to step inside the language and understand how it’s working. You have to unpack the layers, examine the choices, see how the poet is playing with structure and sound. Then you’ll get close.

Ready to Join me on this Adventure?

Over the next few months, we’ll be taking a deep dive into Arabic poetry—its history, its evolution, and the forces that shaped it. This series will be structured around four key eras of Arabic poetry, each representing a different stage in its development.

1. Pre-Islamic Poetry (Jāhiliyyah Era) – The foundation of Arabic poetry, where poets were warriors, lovers, historians, and spokespeople for their tribes. We’ll explore the Mu‘allaqāt—the legendary odes of the desert—and how poetry was used to immortalize honor, love, and war.

2. Umayyad & Abbasid Poetry – The golden age of Arabic poetry, when it became more refined and sophisticated. This is the era of court poets, satire, and philosophical poetry. We’ll look at the famous feud between Al-Akhtal, Al-Farazdaq and Jarir as well as how poets like Al-Mutanabbi and Abu Nuwas shaped the Arabic literary tradition.

3. Andalusian & Post-Classical Poetry – A period of poetic innovation, possibly the height of Arabic poetry, where poetry was deeply tied to beauty, longing, and exile. We’ll explore the lyrical poetry of Wallada bint al-Mustakfi and her lover Ibn Zaydun, Ibn Quzman and Ibn al Khatib, the eulogy of ar-Rundi and the rise of new poetic forms like the Muwashshah, a sophisticated strophic form that blended classical Arabic with vernacular influences, and how Arabic poetry flourished in Al-Andalus.

4. Modern Arabic Poetry – The breaking of classical forms, the rise of free verse, and poetry as resistance. This is the era of, Ahmed Shawqi, Nizar Qabbani, Abdullah al-Baradouni, nationalism, and poetry that speaks to contemporary struggles.

In each of these parts, we won’t just be discussing history—we’ll be breaking down actual poems, looking at their language, rhythm, and the deeper meanings embedded within them. The goal is to not just explain Arabic poetry, but to help you experience it, to appreciate its beauty even if you don’t speak Arabic.

In an era where, tragically, so many cultures are becoming less literate—not in the basic sense of reading and writing, but in the deeper sense of knowing, preserving, and engaging with their own literary heritage—the Arab world remains an exception. Poetry is still memorized, recited, and celebrated. It is woven into daily life in ways that feel both ancient and immediate. That, to me, is something worth exploring, something worth admiring. And my hope is that through this journey, others will be inspired to look within their own families and communities, and to rekindle an appreciation for the literary traditions that shape who we are, regardless of language or culture. I believe if you want to understand the psyche of a people, their hopes, fears, desires, there’s no better place to look than their poetry.