#Najwan Darwish

[soracities]

Najwan Darwish, from "In Paradise (II)", Nothing More to Lose: Selected Poems (trans. Kareem James Abu-Zeid) [ID'd]

[haykhighland]

By Najwan Darwish, Palestinian Poet

[feral-ballad]

Najwan Darwish, tr. by Kareem James Abu-Zeid, from Exhausted on the Cross; “Our Defeated Banner”

[Text ID: “If I could come back, / I wouldn’t come under any other banner. / I’d still embrace you / with two severed hands. / I don’t want wings in paradise, / I just want your graves by the river. / I want eternity at the breakfast table / with the bread and oil. / I want you— / earth, / my defeated banner.”]

[poetriarchy]

[superdillin]

It is Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day

And I have some big feelings, as a part of the diaspora. Remembrance Day is an inappropriate title for a time in which Armenians still face genocidal forces. Just last year, Azerbaijan, armed by Turkey, ethnically cleansed over 280,000 Armenians from Artsakh. The illegal colonizer state of Israel, currently in the midst of their 6+ month-long genocide against the Palestinians, has placed the Armenians who call Jerusalem home under threat and siege.

The Armenian struggle and the Palestinian struggle are deeply linked.

In his rise to power, Hitler is quoted to justify his actions against the Jewish, Roma, Queer, Disabled, and other victims of the Holocaust, to say "Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?"

Echoing these chilling words, Palestinian poet Najwan Darwish wrote:

Who Remembers the Armenians? I remember them and I ride the nightmare bus with them each night and my coffee, this morning I'm drinking it with them You, murderer - Who remembers you?

The trauma sustained during a genocide is not limited to the people experiencing it right now. The echoes of that trauma leak forward into the next generations, passed down through survival, and that is so insidious. My grandmother got to live, but did so believing that her parents did not love her, because the trauma they endured prevented them from expressing it. Abuse and unhealthy attachment were passed down because that starving hunger for love and acceptance was passed down. It is so deeply cruel and unfair that our oppressors get to reach through time and hurt our children's children.

We need to band together and stop the present-day abusers, the genocidal monsters that oppress the people of Palestine, Armenia, Congo, and so many others.

We need to uplift art made by those who survived, and by those who are surviving. Art is always targeted by the oppressor to erase cultural identity, to destroy legacy, and to break spirits. Support Palestinian and Armenian poets, and artists, and writers.

If you are one of the many who never learned about the Armenian Genocide, learn today. Ask yourself why people worked so hard not to educate you on this piece of history.

[havingapoemwithyou]

If You Only Knew by Najwan Darwish tr. by Kareem James Abu-Zeid

[firstfullmoon]

Palestinian poet Najwan Darwish: ‘We can’t begin to comprehend the loss of art’

“Poetry has been the colossal record of violence and. . . the colossal record of compassion,” the Chilean poet Raúl Zurita wrote in the foreword to Exhausted on the Cross [Najwan Darwish’s latest collection], and it’s a duty that the poet takes seriously.

[apoemaday]

A Country Called Song

by Najwan Darwish tr. Kareem James Abu-Zeid

I lived in a country called Song: Countless singing women made me a citizen, and musicians from the four corners composed cities for me with mornings and nights, and I roamed through my country like a man roams through the world.

My country is a song, and as soon as it ends, I go back to being a refugee.

[possum-mom]

"Who Remembers the Armenians?" by Palestinian poet Najwan Darwish

Who Remembers the Palestinians? by Armenian writer Sophia Armen

🇵🇸❤️🇦🇲

[fiercynn]

palestinian poets: najwan darwish

najwan darwish is a poet from jerusalem, palestine. he has published eight poetry books in arabic and his work has been translated into over twenty languages. he's been described by the new york review of books as "one of the foremost arabic-language poets".

kareem james abu-zeid has served as his primary translator from arabic to english except where i've named another translator. darwish's collections translated into english are fabrications (2013, translated by sousan hammad), nothing more to lose (2014), exhausted on the cross (2018), you are not a poet in granada (2018), and embrace (2020, translated by atef alshaer and paul batchelor).

darwish has co-founded and directed several cultural and artistic projects throughout the arab world and served as the literary advisor to the palestine festival of literature. he has held many key positions in cultural journalism and has been the chief cultural editor of the arabic-language london-based newspaper al araby al jadeed since 2014. 

IF YOU READ JUST ONE POEM BY NAJWAN DARWISH, MAKE IT THIS ONE (translated from arabic to english by kareem james abu-zeid)

OTHER POEMS ONLINE I LOVE BY NAJWAN DARWISH (translated from arabic to english by kareem james abu-zeid unless otherwise noted)

Pass It at granta

What I Can't Imagine at cordite poetry review

At a Poetry Festival (translated by atef alshaer) at the poetry translation workshop

An Obituary at granta

Identity Card at poetry international

We Never Stop at cordite poetry review

Life in Mount Carmel (translated by kareem james abu-zeid and nathalie handal) at words without borders

[cotarded]

Najwan Darwish, Because of a Woman (trans. Kareem James Abu-Zeid)

[soracities]

Najwan Darwish, "In Latin America" Nothing More to Lose: Selected Poems (trans. Kareem James Abu-Zeid) [ID'd]

[guayaba-podrida]

We humans still don’t seem to understand that we’re all connected. Everyone is a ‘foreigner’ at some time or another. At any moment, any of us can again become a foreigner and a refugee.

Najwan Darwish, "Palestinian poet Najwan Darwish: ‘We can’t begin to comprehend the loss of art’"

[feral-ballad]

Najwan Darwish, tr. by Kareem James Abu-Zeid, from Exhausted on the Cross; “Mount Carmel”

[Text ID: “And I, aimless / between the mountain and the sea / I who follow no one but myself—“]

[missedstations]

"A Violet Darkness" - Najwan Darwish

And all that remains for me is to follow a violet darkness on soil where myths splinter and crack. Yes, love was time, and it too splintered and cracked like the face of our country.

My share of the people is the transit of their ghosts. translated from the Arabic by Kareem James Abu-Zeid

[dk-thrive]

My words are everywhere and silence is my story.

— Najwan Darwish, from "I Write the Land," translated by Kareem James Abu-Zeid, in "Nothing More to Lose" (NY Review of Books, 2014) (via Read a Little Poetry)