What do you think?
Rate this book
Oceans 7: Poems by Ismet Diab
Have you ever felt homeless in your own body?
Have you ever wanted to cry a river into your emotional desert?
Have you ever been deafened by the silence of a bleeding heart?
Inspired by the changing weathers of her mind’s journey, Ismet Diab invites you to explore the depths of your soul's ocean. Like wildflowers yearning for sunshine and rain, the author’s poems wait for the reader to select the ones they need for their personalized bouquet.
Oceans 7 is a Sindbad like adventure, delivering tales from mysterious seas with messages in a bottle that found its way to your shore.
Have you ever wanted to cry a river into your emotional desert?
Have you ever been deafened by the silence of a bleeding heart?
Inspired by the changing weathers of her mind’s journey, Ismet Diab invites you to explore the depths of your soul's ocean. Like wildflowers yearning for sunshine and rain, the author’s poems wait for the reader to select the ones they need for their personalized bouquet.
Oceans 7 is a Sindbad like adventure, delivering tales from mysterious seas with messages in a bottle that found its way to your shore.
216 pages, Paperback
Published September 13, 2023
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 4, 2024
Ismet Diab is a warrior of the rain and storms. Her writing is elemental, soft and cold, ruthless and fiery. Her voice is a scream from the lungs of the deepest sea. There is a most distinct anguish in the way she uses her own grief to hold you tightly versus the way she slices through the taxidermy of her voyages to bring in the light of all she lost but knows is being found in the fire of her truth, in the stories of her being and in the flames of her phoenix mission. Her romantic verses are like seaweed letters that can only be understood if she lets you into her world. Every word is carefully elected to reveal and at the same to conceal the secrets of her soul that can’t help but whisper their truth.
Oceans 7 mirrors the wild character of the ocean itself in the form of a mysterious woman who knows herself and at the same time, does not. It is like as if the voice of the author’s poetry cuts the silhouette free from the depths of the seven seas. Her storytelling has a fighting rawness with blades from corals’ tales with a softness of eloquence that she allows to arise in between her sentences, almost like as if she doesn’t want anyone to see it and yet, she does. Her poetry is exactly like the waves that move in an unhurried dance to fulfill the purpose of the currents borne from the scars of the Moon. Sometimes, her waters are calm and other times, they are as powerful as tsunamis. Her tears for justice are measured in the little and big waves she makes to pursue the angle of repetition to leave a longer mark upon the shores of humanity. There are gentle lullabies slipped into the poems like loving songs of comfort to herself and her readers because she understands the agony of unveiling the heart for a greater love to reside. Her lines weave an ancient wonder in the simple beauty of nature and fantasy as she makes the sole journey to find her way back home. Her vivid imagery in the awakening arousal of the innocence of the soul in its finest hour are some of the most touching feelings I took away after reading her book. Her determined energy in moving forward, the dark battles in overcoming being stomped over in her inner healing journey is astoundingly expressed and the way she describes how love enters and calms the storms with subtle grace and enchantment, evokes the stunning crescendo of something magical beginning.
Her pieces flow like the seven seas and over the rainbow of hope. Her poems are never titled and when you read her work, you will understand why. It just wouldn’t make sense to name her pieces because they flow into each other, like a story ballad of all the periods you feel like you somehow lived in once long ago. I suppose this holds true for most of us, especially if you are a reader who photographs scenes, imagines how it all could have been like and stores them in your memories of time. Well, Ismet’s writings are like the waterways for canals to slip into the boats of time traveling. Reading Oceans 7 is literally like following a mermaid as she takes your ship into the stories of the seas in a heart that knows how the balance of time, healing and growth leads to transformation.
Some of my favorite quotes from each part of her book are:
Roaming through this life and between the thousands of lives I’ve lived before, I feel homeless in my body.
I feel like a caged lion that is ravenous for the wild except that the cage is not locked… I am only trapped inside my mind.
I am a gypsy who knows how to dance on quicksand. I make you dream to tango with me to the music of the falling rain.
-Black Sea Of Darkness
Is there a way out of grief? Sometimes, I smile. Sometimes, I fall apart.
My heart is fractured beyond repair. You died once but I am dying every day.
All the love you cannot reveal echoes in your blood stream turning you into a poet, an artist.
-Blue Sea Of Tears
I believe we should celebrate the beauty they brought into our lives because happy smiles shared must never turn into tears.
He treats her the way the waves treat the shore. He doesn’t want to lose her but he doesn’t let her in.
I should have known that YOU were the ocean but I didn’t.
-Orange Sea Of Farewells
I try to teach my wayward heart to rhyme with your majestic silence. How do I quiet my mind?
You were leading the dance but all along, I was conducting the music.
What devours you more, I wonder, your solitude or the love you hold back?
-Amber Sea Of Fire
You splash the wind and the rain with the colors of your soul. Oh, I have never seen a brighter rainbow.
To the wild side of the unknown, I carry you in my heart like my North Star, like an anthem, like a prayer.
I am falling hostage to your light. You capture my heart.
-Viridian Sea Of Hope
I was the ocean all along your journey and here I am, still waiting silently for the rivers inside your veins to flow towards me.
It takes a moment to fall in love; a lifetime to forget.
Of all the words you spoke, it was your silence that tore my heart open into loving you.
-Scarlett Sea Of Love
I belong to the moon and just like her, I go through phases to become whole.
I change my heart but my soul remains wild and free through every shade of me.
As you wear you inner truth, like a crown over your head, I am in awe of you.
-White Sea Of Light
I will quiver your stillness and walk you to the wild side of your heart.
You hold the flames of my blood and I carry your blues down my spine.
Sure, you are the ocean—wild, moody and so mysteriously deep but darling, I know just how to swim.
-Somewhere Over The Rainbow
Oceans 7 mirrors the wild character of the ocean itself in the form of a mysterious woman who knows herself and at the same time, does not. It is like as if the voice of the author’s poetry cuts the silhouette free from the depths of the seven seas. Her storytelling has a fighting rawness with blades from corals’ tales with a softness of eloquence that she allows to arise in between her sentences, almost like as if she doesn’t want anyone to see it and yet, she does. Her poetry is exactly like the waves that move in an unhurried dance to fulfill the purpose of the currents borne from the scars of the Moon. Sometimes, her waters are calm and other times, they are as powerful as tsunamis. Her tears for justice are measured in the little and big waves she makes to pursue the angle of repetition to leave a longer mark upon the shores of humanity. There are gentle lullabies slipped into the poems like loving songs of comfort to herself and her readers because she understands the agony of unveiling the heart for a greater love to reside. Her lines weave an ancient wonder in the simple beauty of nature and fantasy as she makes the sole journey to find her way back home. Her vivid imagery in the awakening arousal of the innocence of the soul in its finest hour are some of the most touching feelings I took away after reading her book. Her determined energy in moving forward, the dark battles in overcoming being stomped over in her inner healing journey is astoundingly expressed and the way she describes how love enters and calms the storms with subtle grace and enchantment, evokes the stunning crescendo of something magical beginning.
Her pieces flow like the seven seas and over the rainbow of hope. Her poems are never titled and when you read her work, you will understand why. It just wouldn’t make sense to name her pieces because they flow into each other, like a story ballad of all the periods you feel like you somehow lived in once long ago. I suppose this holds true for most of us, especially if you are a reader who photographs scenes, imagines how it all could have been like and stores them in your memories of time. Well, Ismet’s writings are like the waterways for canals to slip into the boats of time traveling. Reading Oceans 7 is literally like following a mermaid as she takes your ship into the stories of the seas in a heart that knows how the balance of time, healing and growth leads to transformation.
Some of my favorite quotes from each part of her book are:
Roaming through this life and between the thousands of lives I’ve lived before, I feel homeless in my body.
I feel like a caged lion that is ravenous for the wild except that the cage is not locked… I am only trapped inside my mind.
I am a gypsy who knows how to dance on quicksand. I make you dream to tango with me to the music of the falling rain.
-Black Sea Of Darkness
Is there a way out of grief? Sometimes, I smile. Sometimes, I fall apart.
My heart is fractured beyond repair. You died once but I am dying every day.
All the love you cannot reveal echoes in your blood stream turning you into a poet, an artist.
-Blue Sea Of Tears
I believe we should celebrate the beauty they brought into our lives because happy smiles shared must never turn into tears.
He treats her the way the waves treat the shore. He doesn’t want to lose her but he doesn’t let her in.
I should have known that YOU were the ocean but I didn’t.
-Orange Sea Of Farewells
I try to teach my wayward heart to rhyme with your majestic silence. How do I quiet my mind?
You were leading the dance but all along, I was conducting the music.
What devours you more, I wonder, your solitude or the love you hold back?
-Amber Sea Of Fire
You splash the wind and the rain with the colors of your soul. Oh, I have never seen a brighter rainbow.
To the wild side of the unknown, I carry you in my heart like my North Star, like an anthem, like a prayer.
I am falling hostage to your light. You capture my heart.
-Viridian Sea Of Hope
I was the ocean all along your journey and here I am, still waiting silently for the rivers inside your veins to flow towards me.
It takes a moment to fall in love; a lifetime to forget.
Of all the words you spoke, it was your silence that tore my heart open into loving you.
-Scarlett Sea Of Love
I belong to the moon and just like her, I go through phases to become whole.
I change my heart but my soul remains wild and free through every shade of me.
As you wear you inner truth, like a crown over your head, I am in awe of you.
-White Sea Of Light
I will quiver your stillness and walk you to the wild side of your heart.
You hold the flames of my blood and I carry your blues down my spine.
Sure, you are the ocean—wild, moody and so mysteriously deep but darling, I know just how to swim.
-Somewhere Over The Rainbow
May 13, 2025
Oceans 7 is Inset’s debut book of poetry and is a true delight to read. Her journey of poetic words takes the reader into her world of romance and romantic overtures blending in 3/4 time as we waltz through her poetic verses on an ocean of poetic pageantry. This book calls to my heart the way the ocean always calls to my soul. I am drawn to these words and the imagery they create in my mind.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews