Quote by Layla al-Akhyaliyya: “Love is a kind of madness, and the sanest lovers are those who know it.”

Real love does not follow logic or reason — it takes you somewhere beyond ordinary thinking. But the people who handle love most wisely are those who are at least aware of how much it has unmoored them, rather than pretending they are still in control.

Layla al-Akhyaliyya lived during the Umayyad Caliphate, the first era of dynastic rule in Islamic history following the period of the four Rightly Guided Caliphs. She moved in tribal and court circles and her poetry was highly regarded by early Islamic critics.

Arab poet born around 660 CE in the Hijaz region of Arabia, one of the most celebrated female poets of the early Islamic period. She is known especially for her elegies and love poems, many written in correspondence with the poet Tawba ibn Humayyir.