Language of a New Century- Van

Nothing gives me as much hope, and personal empowerment, as the language that fills the tongues and lungs of those whose lives continue despite a damn-near unfathomable existence due to the war engines of capitalism— felt as settler colonialism, colonization, imperialism, fascism, globalization, etc. The heart of the stories I want to tell are in these experiences that weave childhood (that nostalgia and sometimes newness of terror), these universal human experiences that can be expounded upon with the specific (where identity can relate to monotony or mortality, where home can relate to dark trails in the woods behind your home or dark years of displacement where every direction leaves you ungrounded). 

Our selection of poems this week lift up some of the poets who have gotten great attention for their craft. Similar to some of my sentiments about the poets last week, these works are able to craft a form that follows the function of the piece. So beyond the beauty in the language, much of which is written in a particular style to be accessible and in the context of poor people’s language of resistance and resiliency, these words take root in poetry movements that borrow from traditional poetry styles and free verse them. The past styles echo in present just as the past sense of place echoes in the present sense of place. *personally, these craft techniques blow my mind and I want to eat them for breakfast, lunch and dinner.*

I want to hone in one of my favorite writers here, Youssef, using him to add a bit of context to my reading of Darwish, before diving into what I liked from the poets I knew less about, but feel in love with their work instantaneously. 

Saadi Youssef is a revolutionary Iraqi poet, amongst many other things, and would fit quite well under the contemporary term “Artivist.” His political activism courses through his journalistic and literary works, which is in abundance at this point. Notably, he is a huge part of modern Iraqi poetry, influencing many of my writing comrades, in the moment called Jama’at al-Ruwwad (Group of Pioneers). Something his work is hinged on is holding the complexity of place as it relates to the exile, which he has lived experience with, and as it relates to marginalized people (but particularly, that of compounding oppression). Might I add, as it relates to marginalized people globally— so he nails this concept of intersectionality in what I consider a non-academic way.

In America, America, he opens with “God save America, My home sweet home!” And without a blink of an eye, he drops us into his past imprisonment in one of the well-known prisons in the Iraqi desert. The sentence kinds of trails off, the ellipses that takes us to vivid language that is quite specific to Iraq, and yet holds a tone, one that is distant enough to feel relatable. “The general” turns into all generals, those who see the world as forts and battlefields rather streams and trees and summer memories. 

Here, we must dive into what place means: 

As the media safely hides themselves from the horrors (soon to be spectacles) of war, they collect the treasure of the defeated and their identity. I cannot stop thinking about this form of preservation as it relates to the “world’s eyes” of journalism, and thoughts around of what is being “captured” are the sentiments that “We existed. We were. So now we still are.” Similar to some of the thoughts I had after reading Marwa Al-Sobouni’s The Battle for Homs, home and identity need to be examined to see if they can be destroyed. Do scarred landscapes and bodies represent a destroyed identity (can it be stolen and lost, can it be captured and preserved?)

For writers who are speaking from their experiences or their peoples’ experiences as refugees, place has such a different meaning. Home sweet home can be the very place of those who call you the enemy. And so as place shifts between Iraq and America, we are dug deeper into the images of both. Blues shifts the tone to snapshots of memories, Blues being the wails and melancholies and language of homelessness. There are juxtaposed imagery that evoke nostalgia, the sweetness of America, a language only made possible by easing away from the harshness that is war-torn Iraq, into the Blues rooted in black America, this musicality allowing us to shift into the childhood memories of Iraq before exile and dark years. It’s in the rhythms, repetition, and evocation of traditional Iraqi poetry (perhaps something older, songs and stories that I am unaware of). Even those unfamiliar with his homeland can feel the heartbeat of thousands who have sang, danced, smelled what he is speaking of. 

Similarly, Darwish comes from a radical refugee background as well. He was part of Israel’s Community Party and has a pretty big presence in the Israeli literary world, despite being vocally anti-Zionist and the backlash that has been made against his work being taught. I don’t know as much about this author’s background (mostly what has been mentioned to me by Jewish friends who have read his work in Hebrew, though he largely writes in Arabic). I feel like their work speaks to how I read Youssef, to which place is layered and textured not only by ancient walls but the ancient wars that brought them to be, layered with mystical divisions of people, and that world of displacement. In Jerusalem, the line “No place and no time” doesn’t just hit onto metaphorical transfiguration but that of the body of the displaced, to feel ungrounded and questioning one’s identity without home. I appreciate that place is made off the physical map here, and more in the human imprint on the land, notably because it adds to the aimlessness of the narrator. 

Ah! My favorite work from this week’s reading is that of Patrick Rosa, a Filipino writer that has gotten a lot of attention early last year. An Instance of an Island is surreal, placing us in that context with the first line:

One way to erase an island is to invent

a second island absolved of all the sounds

the first one ever made.

Chills. Outside of his outstanding language, which brings that world-building detail so that the reader feels as if they can navigate this world all on their own, Rosal grounds us in a fantastical world that quickly becomes real. “Many, many years ago…” transitions that very place into a reality, although it still lands on us as a fable or folklore. I don’t know for sure, but I would assume that this is about the Culion leper colony (the US tired to get rid of leprosy in the Philippines, and pretty much many places, but dumping folks elsewhere, in this case a small island). But admittedly, I was thrown off by the use of emperor as the decision-maker, didn’t know if that was a political choice or due to the folklore-style. 

An undercurrent to this magnificent story is the larger displacement that is happening. As the incurables get sent to the island, colonization, which arguably was the sole reason for such an epidemic (in that the most common strain there, I believe, was the one belonging to Europe, North Africa and the Americas). Filomena and Josefa carry the fury of not just their own displacement, they are the servant class to Spanish royalty and people, the colonizers who erase islands by naming and claiming territory and waters. There is something beautiful here, on the island. 

The place is never described as home, but in the details we can hold complexity of place. One can own something that can never be stolen, or rather, something that can always be found even when there is very little. The gourd is the guitar, the sounds made from it are not meant to be named. It holds the ocean, not naming it. It is held together by emotional imprint, not so much so that the unbroken world can make them whole, not so much that they belong to the island, but to the extent that place and self join together.