I HAVE NO POWER

Sen başkalarını sevgiyle karşılıyorsun

ama

özleyen olan benim.

I saw her alone,

emaciated, heavy-eyed, really tired,

I asked her "who do you love ?"

Who wounded your heart and torn it?

Who melted your eyes in the nights and made you restless?

She said: Do not blame him.

He doesn't know that my heart adores him,

I've secretly loved him for months,

My heart has died of yearning.

One day

We’ll meet again You’ll look at me And while i look at you I won't feel a thing I'll walk past you With a smile on my face And inside you'll be dying because it took you too long to realize It was me

| Unknown

Don't love deeply, till you make sure that the other person loves you with the same depth, because the depth of your love today, is the depth of your wound tomorrow.

Art by : Julia Soboleva

I can't promise to be calm,

dignified, and indifferent.

like a rock by the sea...

If my heart's going to break,

let it break from anger, grief, or joy.

― Nâzım Hikmet

🌌 PART I: The Arab Astrologers—Names You Must Know

📝Abū Maʿshar al-Balkhī-known in Latin as Albumasar

Born in Balkh (modern Afghanistan) in 787, a former hadith scholar who turned to the stars in midlife.

His Kitāb al-Madkhal al-Kabīr (The Great Introduction) became the bedrock of European astrology when translated into Latin.

He systematized planetary natures, zodiac signs, houses, aspects, and the elements.

His “conjunction theory” argued that history moves in great cycles, marked by rare celestial alignments—especially Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions, which he claimed heralded the rise of prophets and empires.

"All change under heaven is written first in the sky."

📜 Al-Kindi – The Philosopher of the Arabs

A polymath in the Abbasid court, blending Greek philosophy with Islamic theology and celestial theory.

In De Radiis Stellarum (On the Stellar Rays), he proposed a theory of stellar influence—not superstition, but a natural force, like light or magnetism.

He laid early groundwork for what would become natural philosophy (proto-science), suggesting stars transmit influence through rays affecting Earthly matter and human temperament.

🌍 Al-Biruni – The Observer from Khwarezm

Though more astronomer than astrologer, he cataloged astrology in full without ever endorsing its claims outright.

His Kitāb al-Tafhīm contains precise definitions of astrological terms, planetary motions, and how horoscopes are calculated.

A master of cultural synthesis: he compared Greek, Indian, and Persian systems, noting their commonalities and contradictions.

🕊 Abū al-Rayḥān al-Sijzī & Al-Zarqālī – Instruments of the Sky

Developed the astrolabe, armillary spheres, and zij tables—astronomical charts used by astrologers to pinpoint planetary positions with astonishing accuracy.

🪐 PART II: What the Arabs Contributed to Astrology

🧠 1. A Philosophical Foundation

Arabs didn’t just practice astrology—they thought about it. They debated whether the stars compel or merely incline.

Al-Farabi and later Avicenna argued the stars could only affect the body, not the soul—a blend of Neoplatonism and Islamic ethics.

The stars whisper, they do not command.

📊 2. Horoscopic Techniques Refined

Arabs inherited and enhanced horoscopic astrology from the Greeks:

Twelve Houses (Bayūt): Places in the chart signifying career, love, health, death.

Lots (Arabic Parts): Points calculated from planetary positions, like the Lot of Fortune and Lot of Spirit, used to fine-tune predictions.

Triplicities and Dignities: Systems to assess planetary strength.

Interrogations (Horary Astrology): Divining answers to specific questions, such as “Will I marry?” or “Will the king win this war?”

⚔️ 3. Political and Historical Astrology

Astrologers like Abū Maʿshar claimed that world events—plagues, conquests, religious shifts—were written in planetary cycles.

Used to time coronations, launch battles, found cities.

Caliphs would sometimes delay decisions until the astrologers said the heavens were "favorable."

🏥 4. Medical Astrology

Used zodiac signs to diagnose and treat illness—Aries rules the head, Pisces the feet, and so on.

Ibn Sina (Avicenna) himself, though skeptical of predictive astrology, used astrological charts for medical diagnoses, especially in fevers and crisis periods.

🌠 PART III: Astrology in Islamic Society

🌗 Religious Debate

The Qur’an warns against claims to know the unseen:

"Say: None in the heavens or on the earth knows the unseen except Allah." (Qur’an 27:65)

So Islamic scholars:

Allowed astronomy (for timekeeping, Qibla direction).

Permitted astrology only if used to understand natural rhythms—not fate.

Condemned fortune-telling or attributing independent power to stars.

Yet astrology persisted—not as dogma, but as courtly art, folk belief, and scientific curiosity.

🕯 PART IV: The Transmission to Europe

Translations of Arabic astrological texts into Latin via Toledo and Sicily reawakened Europe’s interest in the stars.

Terms like zenith, nadir, azimuth, almanac, and even algorithm come from Arabic.

Albumasar, Albohali, Messahala—all Arabic astrologers Latinized into the canon of European learning.

The Renaissance astrologers (like Ficino and Agrippa) drank deeply from Arab wells.

🌌 In Closing: A Legacy Like the Night Sky

The Arabs did not merely gaze at the stars—they listened to them, charted them, debated them, and passed on their wisdom in tomes that still echo today. Astrology, as they practiced it, was never just fortune-telling—it was philosophy, poetry, medicine, and mathematics entwined in a cosmic dance.

We were both silent,

as if there was a secret agreement between us,

but if you whisper a single letter,

I will scream and cry.

Have you ever had a crush? Have you ever felt a rush? Makes my heart stop, she didn't even blush And I got a crush Oh man I got a crush Got a psychedelic dagger in my heart, tell the paramedics to rush

I hate crushes, I cover bruises with paintbrushes Pour it all in the music now that my bank's ruptured

She never texts me, she never texts me, she never texts me Never texts me, she never texts me, forgot to text me

Well I guess we accept the ones that neglect us And my moms say that we disrespect the ones that perfect us And try to protect us

I really hope that you get this My thoughts are weighin' me down My neck can't handle the necklace Your father says that I'm reckless, I didn't cause all that wreckage

had to give you this message I wrote it straight from the soul and it didn't make sense to text it So I snuck up in your room, put it on your shoulder and in return You sent me back a restraining order.

Jaden - let it breath

Lets agree on me loving you from a distance, And you being closer to my heart than my veins. And me being a stranger to whom you tell your troubles, And you being to my heart, the sweetest and dearest lover.

| Nizar Qabbani

Kabil

Kabil şimdi şistten yapılmış bir kuşla atıyor Yeryüzüne iner ve onu muazzam ateş yağmurlarıyla yağdırır. Onun ıssızlığından önce kuleler ve evler çöküyor Ölüler toprağın kucağından yukarılara kaçar Cain şimdi tankında dolaşıyor Koyunlar dehşete kapıldı Kabil ahırının duvarını yıkıyor Köyde gece sabaha döndüğü için ahırı uyumaya uygun değil Aşağıya inen ışığın yaydığı Bir ejderhanın dili gibi Kasırga dünyanın yüzünü harap etti