Across the Difficult with Rabia of Basra and Others <> published by Albion Andalus, Boulder, Colorado 2023

Available now on Amazon!

WON! An International Book Award 2024 also a prize as a Finalist ACROSS THE DIFFICULT

Tamam Kahn’s poetry carries bright exuberance, as well as empathy

 and sorrow. Her work is inspired by the mystical Middle East, and her 

time in Morocco and Syria. The poems are anchored with her research 

on women from early Islam to today…. The reader is introduced to 

the remarkable Rabia of Basra (Rabi’a al-Adawiyya) eighth century 

leader on the path of Unity of Being….Across the Difficult presents tales 

of other famous mothers such as Eve (known as Grandmother Eve in 

Arabia), Hagar, Sayyida Zaynab—granddaughter of Prophet Muhammad,

 her niece Ruqayya, and /Fatima al-Fihri, founder of the great Qarawiyyin 

University, who changed history with her life’s work. The brutal difficulties

of living this time in countries such as Afghanistan, Syria, Ukraine and other

countries, are included in the final poems. <> Poem on page 14:

NOTE PASSED TO RABIA

Just this morning I discovered

hidden in a landscape of words

your gifts of bravey—shajaea شَجاعة

I heard your whisper:

save the brave words, save bravery

from leaving the frightened world.

Trust me now, Rabia

to keep it going,

to raise the rough weight of it

here in this world

with all that I am.