Writing to Survive: Extending the Discussion with Gazan Poets

Below is an extension of our editor Nashwa Nasreldin’s essay at New Lines, “Gazan Poets Write to Survive.“

By Nashwa Nasreldin

When I first started writing this feature for New Lines magazine early summer, I didn’t think I’d be able to interview poets who were still in Gaza. Communication with anyone in the Gaza Strip was very challenging and contacts told me they were struggling to even reach their own family members.

The piece I had set out to write began to morph into a more analytical overview of the literary publications that were released since October 7 2023, given that it was overwhelmingly clear the rate of publishing, both poetry and prose, from and about Gaza, was unprecedented.

Then, around two weeks before I was due to file the article, fellow writer and translator Wiam El-Tamami put me in touch with a number of writers in Gaza whom she’d been contacting. Around the same time, poets I’d reached out to suddenly began to respond, too.

Their eagerness to take part, to voice their feelings and thoughts about what it means to be a writer in a time of crisis, was humbling. These were poets being tested to the most extreme degrees, living the sharpest edges of humanity. Yet here they were finding ways in the midst of constant bombing, displacement, trauma, and injury, to talk to me about what poetry and being a writer means to them.

I am immensely grateful for the immense effort they must have made to connect to the internet, so they could respond to my messages on email and the various social media platforms we had to use to stay in touch. Below are works by poets in the article, by Basman Eldirawi, Batool Abu Akleen, Doha Kahlout, Husam Maarouf, Mahmoud Al Shaer, and Mohammed Zaqzouq, just some of the brilliant Palestinian writers from Gaza writing today.

Theirs is not only a poetry for times of crisis, it is a talent for all times.

Basman Eldirawi

Basman Eldirawi (also published as Basman Derawi) is a physiotherapist and a graduate of Al-Azhar University in Gaza in 2010. Inspired by an interest in music, movies, and people with special needs, he contributes dozens of stories to the online platform We Are Not Numbers.

Has Ouda Arrived?

Basman Eldirawi

My friends will meet in heaven

I’ll look up at the sky and ask Issa:

Tell me, has Ouda arrived?

He jokes, Haven’t you heard his voice?

Maybe I’ll strike up a conversation, as always

What does heaven look like?

Did you meet God?

Maybe now they’re working together

In the Gaza that Hiba saw under construction in the sky

When they were down here

Before the war devoured our raw hearts

Burning whatever particles were left of the city

They treat the martyrs who the missiles left in their final forms

They work up there in the new Gaza

In a hospital that’s not threatened with destruction

Then they sing and they laugh and they joke

Hiba sits in a corner, writing a new poem

And they cry in secret for their little ones who remain

Orphans on Earth

Who know parents, but only in stories

And in the remains of photos, the ones not destroyed by the occupier

They ask God to protect them

In their hearts is a fire that won’t be put out

They try to sleep but cannot

Although the night is quiet, and there are no bombs

More poetry by Basman Eldirawi

The Future of Gaza (ArabLit)

The Moment (ArabLit)

This Bread Was Born, This Bread Was Killed (ArabLit)

You Don’t Need Your Glasses, Santa, tr. Tala Ladki (ArabLit)

The Idea Has Failed, tr. Elete N-F & Sarah Lasoye (ArabLit)

I Am Not Jesus (ArabLit)

From Gaza, Answering Darwish (ArabLit)

Basman’s work is also featured in the collection And Still We Write and in the “Gaza! Gaza! Gaza!“ issue of ArabLit Quarterly.

*

To the question, “to whom do you address your poems?” Basman said: “The world, to God, to my friends I lost, to my friends who are still fighting in Gaza, to Eman and her family, to Gaza, to Al Shifa Hospital where I had my internship as a physiotherapist, to my patients, to my place of work in the north of Gaza, to its sea and to the beach where I’d sit with family and friends, to the songs that always remind me of my memories in Gaza, to my house and my stuff left there, to survival, to the war, to death.”

Find Basman on Twitter at @basmanprince.

Donate to Basman and his brother’s GoFundMe.

Batool Abu Akleen

Batool Abu Akleen is an award-winning Palestinian poet and painter. One of the top students at IUG in Gaza, she was displaced in October 2023, but continues writing and sharing her work. She was recently named poet-in-residence for Modern Poetry in Translation magazine.

I Want A Grave

I want a grave with a marble headstone

that my loved ones will water

where they will place flowers,

weeping when the longing lacerates their eyes.

Their tears won’t reach me

so I won’t grieve.

I want a grave just for me

for my friends to talk to me

where I’ll have the right to be alone one last time.

I want a grave that doesn’t touch another

so my beloved can plant a bougainvillea to shade me from the summer sun

to dress me in a purple gown in the spring

to give me a warm cover in winter when its leaves fall.

I want a grave in a cemetery with neighbors who have wrapped themselves in life

flirted with it

planted a kiss on each of its cheeks

then slumbered.

I want a grave

I don’t want my corpse to rot in the open road.

More poetry by Batool Abu Akleen:

“Blazing Sun” and “Milad Birth,” co-translated by Batool Abu Akleen and Cristina Viti (Modern Poetry in Translation)

“Untitled,” translated by the ArabLit collective (ArabLit)

“How I Cook My Grief,” translated by Yasmin Zaher (Triangle House)

“The land of weary crows” (We Are Not Numbers)

“I did not steal the cloud” (Rusted Radishes, winner of the Barjeel Poetry Prize)

An interview with Batool:
Poetry Is What Keeps Me Alive

An excerpt of the talk with Batool is also featured in the collection And Still We Write and in the “Gaza! Gaza! Gaza!“ issue of ArabLit Quarterly.

To the question, “to whom do you address your poems?” Batool said: “My poems are a way for me to express my resistance, to show that even if they took my home and my beloveds, even if they tried to take everything from me, I still have a voice, and I’ll spread it around the world. My poetry is not written for the Gazans because we saw enough pain. Victims don’t need to read the pain which they are already living. It’s for the outside world. It’s addressed for the humans who believes in our desire to live. I write poetry to document all the aspects of death, displacement, humiliation, and the longing of getting back home. I want my poems to be my echo when I am killed by those monsters as they killed before my grandma, my professor Refaat Al Areer, and my friends whom a lot of them are poets and artists.”

Find Batool on Twitter at @abuakleen

Find Batool on Instagram at @batool_abu_akleen

Doha Kahlout

Doha Kahlout is a Palestinian poet and teacher of Arabic. She graduated from Al-Azhar University with a BA in Arabic Language and Media Studies. In 2018, Kahlout published her first collection of poetry, Ashbah (نشرت, “Similarities”), with Dar Tarik Publishing House. She has also contributed to publications of the Qattan Foundation and Dar Tibaq Publishing House.

More by Doha Kahlout:

“Images from the War,” translated by Yasmine Seale (The Yale Review)

“When Food Doesn’t Taste Like Home,” translated by Katharine Halls (Vittles Magazine)

Doha’s work is also featured in the collection And Still We Write and in the “Gaza! Gaza! Gaza!” issue of ArabLit Quarterly.

To the question, “to whom do you address your poems?” Doha said: “I am writing to the world, and while it may seem as though, in my writing, I am addressing myself, my goal is for the images and scenes I write to reach the world, for it to hear our voice and see our sadness, for the world to know and believe.”

Find Doha on Instagram @doha_kahlout

Donate to Doha’s GoFundMe

Mahmoud Alshaer

Mahmoud Alshaer is an editor, curator, and poet who, until October 2023, was deeply involved in cultural work in Gaza, leading initiatives such as Majalla 28 and Gallery 28 and coordinating the cultural program at Al Ghussein Cultural House in Gaza’s old city.

More writing by Mahmoud Alshaer:

Part I: I Don’t Want to Forget Who I Am, ed. Wiam El-Tamami (ArabLit)

Part II: I Don’t Want to Forget Who I Am, ed. Wiam El-Tamami (ArabLit)

Letters to Oraib (PEN/Opp)

Mahmoud’s work is also featured in the collection And Still We Write and he was co-editor of the “Gaza! Gaza! Gaza!” issue of ArabLit Quarterly.

To the question, “to whom do you address your poems?” Mahmoud said: “I don’t address anyone; sometimes my friends, who have gathered to help me endure the horrors of this war, through a [GoFundMe] campaign page I created to save my family and help them in this war, and little by little the updates page for this campaign has become a witness to what is happening to me and my family.”

Visit and donate to Mahmoud’s Go Fund Me page

Mohammed Zaqzouq

Mohammed Zaqzouq is a researcher born in Khan Younis in 1990. He studied Arabic language and literature at Al-Aqsa University and is a contributor to various Palestinian and Arab platforms. Mohammed is an active member in literary and cultural organizations shaping Gaza’s cultural landscape and the former general coordinator of the “Utopia for Knowledge” assembly. Currently, he coordinates community library and youth teams at the Tamer Foundation for Community Education. His poetry collection The Soothsayers of Khanun won the Khalili Poetry Award at the First Palestinian Cultural Forum for Creative Writers in 2018.

More writing by Mohammed Zaqzouq:

Where I Write Now, tr. Wiam El-Tamami (ArabLit)

Writing from the Vortex of War, tr. Katharine Halls (The Ideas Letter)

Mohammed’s work is also featured in the collection And Still We Write and he was co-editor of the “Gaza! Gaza! Gaza!” issue of ArabLit Quarterly.

Donate to Mohammed’s Go Fund me page.

Husam Maarouf

Husam Maarouf is a poet from Gaza. He has published two poetry collections, Death Smells Like Glass and The Barber Loyal To His Dead Clients, and the novel Ram’s Chisel.

More writing by Husam Maarouf:

“Where I Write Now,” tr. Wiam El-Tamami (ArabLit)

At Passages through Genocide.

Husam’s work is also featured in the collection And Still We Write and in the “Gaza! Gaza! Gaza!” issue of ArabLit Quarterly.

Husam is a news and features writer who is available for commissions. You can read some of his work at Electronic Intifada, Raseef22, Majalla, and al-Jazeera. You can reach out to him about paying work at husamart@gmail.com.

A Short List of Recommended Books & Journals

BOOKS

[…], by Fady Joudah (Out-Spoken Press)

Don’t Look Left: A Diary of Genocide, by Atef Abu Seif’ (Comma Press)

Daybreak in Gaza, by Mahmoud Muna and Matthew Teller (Saqi Books)

Ibrahim Nasrallah: Palestinian, by Ibrahim Nasrallah (tr. Huda Fakhreddine) (World Poetry)

Gaza, the Poem Said Its Piece, by Nasser Rabah, tr. Ammiel Alcalay, Emna Zghal, Khalid Al-Hilli (forthcoming from City Light Books)

Out of Gaza, ed. Atef Alshaer and Alan Morrison (Smokestack Books)

Poems for Palestine, by Publishers for Palestine

JOURNALS

Massachusetts Review, LitHub, Asymptote, ArabLit Quarterly, Jadaliyya, Protean, Mizna, The Markaz Review. Readers are invited to add more.

Nashwa Nasreldin is a writer, editor and translator of Arabic literature. Her book translations include the collaborative novel by nine refugee writers, Shatila Stories, and a co-translation of Samar Yazbek’s memoir, The Crossing: My Journey to the Shattered Heart of Syria. A journalist and former current affairs documentary producer, Nashwa has reported on stories from around the Middle East and North Africa. She is a contributing editor of ArabLit.org and ArabLit Quarterly and is the commissioning editor at the Poetry Translation Centre.

Photos above, clockwise from top left: Mohamed Al Zaqzouq, in a greenhouse; Husam Maarouf, World Poetry Day 2022 at the French Consulate in Gaza; Husam Maarouf during one of his readings at al-Mishal centre in Gaza in 2017; Husam Maarouf in Gaza 2020; Batool Al Akleen at a creative writing workshop with Al Qattan Foundation Centre several years ago, which was organized in one of the oldest houses in Gaza, Al Ghussain House; Doha Kahlout during a book signing ceremony on the 10th of October 2021; Basman Eldirawi at the book fair in Frankfurt as part of the We Are Not Numbers book tour, on the 18th of October 2019; Husam Maarouf during one of his readings at al-Mishal centre in Gaza in 2017; Batool Al Akleen at a creative writing workshop with Al Qattan Foundation Centre several years ago; Mohamed Al Zaqzouq, in a greenhouse; Husam Maarouf during one of his readings at al-Mishal centre in Gaza in 2017; Batool Al Akleen during the Palestinian Festival of Literature at Al Qattan Foundation Centre in 2023; Basman Dirawi at the outpatient physiotherapy department in Al Shifa hospital in Gaza, 2022 with his two friends, Essa and Ouda, who were killed by Israel in the 2023/4 genocide; Batool Al Akleen sitting beneath the olive tree, in the refugee camp where she is
currently living. This has been her writing spot since they moved. She says: “I used to go every day
and sit under this tree, I write, think, and read some poetry.”