fatimah asghar oil

In America, the place that is ostensibly home, the speaker faces that rejection both in her family life and in society at large. Her selfhood is foreclosed by 9/11 and the resulting culture of fear and xenophobia: the ship sinks, her blood clots. She has also had her writing featured on outlets like PBS, NPR, and Teen Vogue. Copyright 2010-2019, The Adroit Journal. "[16], Brown Girls received an Emmy nomination in 2017 in the Outstanding Short Form Comedy or Drama Series category. With this poem, readers are immersed in a personal account of the day-to-day experiences of Asghar as she searches for acceptance in America and routinely faces threats and insecurity. I know you can bend time.I am merely asking for whatis mine. In each of the books seven Partition poems, Asghar traces its legacy, but she also considers the metaphorical and physical partitions of her life. Asghars book is many things: defiant, subversive, grief-stricken, angrybut its also full of things like bravery, friendship, family, and love. A member of the Dark Noise Collective, Asghar has received fellowships from Kundiman, the Fulbright Foundation, and the Poetry Foundation. FATIMAH ASGHAR 145 As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Stop living in a soap opera yells her husband, freshfrom work, demanding his dinner: american. Her work is well-regarded in all circles and has been included in Poetry Magazine and other famous publications. She smiles as guilty as a bride without blood, her loveof this new country, cold snow & naked american men. She writes of her heritage, All the people I could be are dangerous. The speaker, whose parents have passed away, learns of her heritage from her relatives, who are not-blood but could be, further muddying notions of home, or where she truly belongsoften, this results in the idea that she doesnt. I yelled to my sister knapsacks ringing against our backs. I am four, sitting in a patch of grass Read More on our Privacy Policy page. Everyone always tries to theft, bring them back out the grave. When Rivka reached out to me to do a profile on Fatimah Asghar, I could not have been more excited to interview someone whose work has affected me so much personally. The mother of Kausar, Aisha and Noreen - the youngest to oldest of three sisters - died years ago. But Asghar recognizes the limits and violence of language. the day other kids shovedmy body into dirt & christened mehe appeared, boy, wicked, feral, swallowing my stride.the boy who grows my beard& slaps my face when I wax, my mustache. A homeland, even one never seen, sticks in her blood; the trauma endured by her ancestors lives within her DNA. Sign up for the Asian American Writers' Workshop Newsletter: Asian American Writers Workshop Fatimah Asghar is the author of the poetry collection If They Come for Us(One World/Random House, 2018) and the chapbook After(Yes Yes Books, 2015). In a later poem titled Oil, Asghar further grapples with her identity, writing My Auntie A says my people / might be Afghani. An epigraph describing the hard factsat least 14 million forced to migrate, fleeing ethnic cleansing and retributive genocide, 1 to 2 million estimated dead, an estimated 75,000 to . I buried it under a casket of scribbles. "When your people have gone through such historical violence, you cannot shake it. The expansion of the popular landscape of poetry, Love Letter to the Eve of the End of the World, Recycling Poetry in a Time of Climate Change. Asghar is a member of the Dark Noise Collective and a Kundiman Fellow. Big and muscular, neck full of veins, bulging in the pen.Her eyes kajaled & wide, glued to sweaty american men. She is also the writer and co-creator of the Emmy-nominatedBrown Girls, a web series that highlights friendships between women of color. These inheritances seep from country to country, body to body, and word to word, generating animosity and division. have her forever. Its a gesture taken up by many of her peersinstead of pandering to whiteness, writers like Chen Chen, Danez Smith, and Zhang write towards, and out of, their communities. Her parents immigrated to the United States. . She writes of her heritage, All the people I could be are dangerous. The speaker, whose parents have passed away, learns of her heritage from her relatives, who are not-blood but could be, further muddying notions of home, or where she truly belongsoften, this results in the idea that she doesnt truly belong anywhere. If They Come For Us ends with an honest declaration of love and appreciationloyalty and unwavering commitmentto the many communities she wholeheartedly identifies with: my country is made / in my peoples image / if they come for you they / come for me too in the dead. Paying homage to all her familywhether they be blood relatives or friendsAsghar celebrates the communities shes battled with, fought against, and finally embraced. Allah, you gave us a languagewhere yesterday & tomorroware the same word. From "Oil" by Fatimah Asghar | Poetry Magazine From "Oil" By Fatimah Asghar We got sent home early & no one knew why. With uniquely crafted poems which take the form of floor plans, bingo boards, and crossword puzzles, she shows her audience what it feels like to be constantly told that you dont belongwhat it means to feel threatened, yet confidentin a world torn apart by marginalization. Her references to pop music, odes to her pussy, and jokes about microaggressions are purposefully incongruous, and with them she defies the gaze that Zhang and Mehri write about. black grass swaying in the field, glint of gold in her nose. Translation: "I won't forget.". In America, the place that is ostensibly home, the speaker faces that rejection both in her family life and in society at large. [13], Along with her orphanhood, the legacy of Partition is another major theme in her poetry. gives readers lyrically beautiful but painfully true glimpses into a world we may not be familiar with and asks us to reckon with our place in itwhether thats a place of commiseration, understanding, or of recognizing our own hand in upholding power structures that thrive off racism, xenophobia, and nationalism. They both died by the time she was five, leaving her an orphan. Fatimah Asghar's brilliant offering is a dexterous blend of Old World endurance and New World bravado. How we master the forms we choose to write in and speak back to our own traditions is a personal choice, writes Momtaza Mehri in her critical defense of instagram poets like Rupi Kaur, who is often accused of commodifying trauma and her own marginalization as a brown woman. In an unofficial manifesto, their Call for Necessary Craft and Practice, Dark Noise urges writers and artists to join them in a shared creative practice that is anti-capitalist, anti-racist, and refuses to turn away from the unjust political times we find ourselves in. The document recognizes the poet as someone whose work is inevitably tied to power and profit. Raye is an MFA candidate at the University of Texas at Austin, where she serves as the Web Editor for Bat City Review. like your little cousin who pops gum & wears bras now: a stranger. Poet, screenwriter, educator, and performer Fatimah Asghar is a South-Asian American Muslim writer, Poems of Muslim Faith and Islamic Culture, VS Live with Fatimah Asghar, Jos Olivarez, and Paul Tran. The cultural memory is lodged in the speaker like a knifeone that she may not be able to remove, but one that she could choose not to twist. As though I told you how the first time.Everyone always tries to theft, bring them back out the grave.Let them rest; my parents stay dead. Examples include both visual and verbal instances, like the first square, which reads, White girl wearing a bindi at music festival, and another on the bottom row where an unnamed speaker says, I love hanging out with your family. Kal means shes oiling my hairbefore the first day of school. & my boy, my lovely boyhe clawed & bit & cried just likewe were back on the dirt playground. I went to India once, to find myself.. These sly, adept poems work through circumstances under threat with audacity, humor, and wonder. FATIMAH ASGHAR From "Oil" We got sent home early & no one knew why. The experience of reading Fatimah Asghar's debut book of poems, If They Come For Us, is one of being gripped by the shoulders and shaken awake; of having your eyelids pinned open and unable to blink. Used with the permission of the poet. As the poem progresses, Asghar becomes further distanced from the events, seeming to remember less and less. All rights reserved. Raye was a finalist for the 2018 Keene Prize for Literature and received honorable mentions for poetry from both Southern Humanities Reviews Witness Poetry Prize (2014) and AWPs Intro Journals Project (2015). Danez, Franny, and Safia talk unraveling shame, opening the door to a queer Muslim literary community, caesuras and Its Toaster Time! [4] She received the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation in 2017,[5] and has been featured on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list. I collect words where I find them. these are my people & I findthem on the street & shadowthrough any wild all wildmy people my peoplea dance of strangers in my bloodthe old womans sari dissolving to windbindi a new moon on her foreheadI claim her my kin & sewthe star of her to my breastthe toddler dangling from strollerhair a fountain of dandelion seedat the bakery I claim them toothe Sikh uncle at the airportwho apologizes for the patdown the Muslim man who abandonshis car at the traffic light dropsto his knees at the call of the Azan& the Muslim man who drinksgood whiskey at the start of maghribthe lone khala at the parkpairing her kurta with crocsmy people my people I cant be lostwhen I see you my compassis brown & gold & bloodmy compass a Muslim teenagersnapback & high-tops gracingthe subway platformMashallah I claim them allmy country is madein my peoples imageif they come for you theycome for me too in the deadof winter a flock ofaunties step out on the sandtheir dupattas turn to oceana colony of uncles grind their palms& a thousand jasmines bell the airmy people I follow you like constellationswe hear glass smashing the street& the nights opening darkour names this countrys woodfor the fire my people my peoplethe long years weve survived the longyears yet to come I see you mapmy sky the light your lantern longahead & I follow I follow. After great pain. The speaker of these poems appears at once old and incredibly new, a dichotomy that is upheld as the narrative jumps from past to present and all over the last century. The Fatimah Asghar's debut novel starts in a precarious place with the death of the main character's father in the first few lines. Poems covered in the Educational Syllabus. "[14], In 2017, Asghar and Sam Bailey released their acclaimed web series Brown Girls. Her work is well-regarded in all circles and has been included in Poetry Magazine and other famous publications. As a poet who has lived through layers of oppression and violenceof cultural hesitation and uncertaintyAsghar writes of the many communities she has found in America and the kindness and generosity buried in a nation plagued by marginalization. on visits back your english sticks to everything. She is the author of the full-length collection If They Come For Us (One World/ Random House, 2018) and the chapbook After (YesYes Books, 2015). An East Asian nematode is threatening the European eel population, Poems, correspondence, essays, and reportage on how we perceive and write about climate change, How we perceive and write about climate change, Katrina Bellos exquisite drawings of the vast and the miniscule in nature, Climate change and development threaten the indigenous fisherfolk communities of Mumbai. Play is critical in the development of their work, as is intentionally building relationship and . In the poem Microaggression Bingo, Asghar uses the physical image of a bingo board to highlight the frequency of those microaggressions the speaker faces on a daily basis. Written by Asghar and directed by Bailey, the series is based on Asghar's friendship with the artist Jamila Woods and their experiences as two women of color navigating their twenties. The speaker's feelings of belonging until threatened in India-Pakistan and un-belonging until invited in America penetrate the anthology, imbuing each poem with a degree of duality and division. your own auntie calls you ghareeb. I think we are at war! You know its true & try to help, but what can you do?You, little Fatimah, who still worships him? Fatimah Asghar is an award-winning poet, whose widespread collection of poetry, If They Come for Us, has created her international fame. And yet, even when were told some of these memories and experiences are not the the speakers, they still are, somehow. Co-creator and writer for the Emmy-nominated webseries Brown Girls, their work has appeared in Poetry,[1] Gulf Coast, BuzzFeed Reader, The Margins, The Offing, Academy of American Poets,[2] and other publications. Co-creator and writer for the Emmy-nominated webseries Brown Girls, their work has appeared in Poetry, [1] Gulf Coast, BuzzFeed Reader, The Margins, The Offing, Academy of American Poets, [2] and other publications. The kids at school ask me where Im from & I have no answer. The anthology opens with a striking poem titled For Peshawar, dated December 16th, 2014. It first appeared in Poetry Magazine in 2017. by pathmark. With familial roots still deeply tied to Pakistan and the divided territory of Kashmir, Asghar, a queer Muslim teenager living in a post-9/11 America, was left to navigate not only the partition of India and Pakistan, but likewise the numerous boundaries entangled in her identity and painted on her body. Asghar lost her parents young; with family roots in Pakistan and in divided Kashmir, she grew up in the United States, a queer Muslim teenager and an orphan in the confusing, unfair months and. In her poem "For Peshawar," Fatimah Asghar writes, "Every year I manage to live on this earth / I collect more questions than I do answers." The questions her poems ask are painful, but necessary: "How do you kill someone who isn't afraid of dying?" "Are all refugees superheroes?" "Do all survivors carry villain inside them?" an edible flower Learn about the charties we donate to. Asghars book is many things: defiant, subversive, grief-stricken, angrybut its also full of things like bravery, friendship, family, and love. But, through these inheritances, there is also care and comfort, sweetness and love, that provide structure to our identities, bodies, and imaginations: For the fire my people my people / the long years weve survived the long / years yet to come I see you map / my sky the light your lantern long / ahead & I follow I follow., The Nassau Literary Review5534 Frist CenterPrinceton, NJ 08544. Sacraments Ladan Osman 62. Her work has appeared in the New York Review of Books Daily, unbag, and the Ploughshares blog. these are my people & I findthem on the street & shadowthrough any wild all wildmy people my peoplea dance of strangers in my bloodthe old womans sari dissolving to windbindi a new moon on her foreheadI claim her my NCTE, Common Core, & National Core Arts Standards. But, as Rebecca Solnit writes,blood is what mixes things up. Its defining quality is that it circulates. "And in a lot of ways we are. Founded in Chicago by Harriet Monroe in 1912, Poetry is the oldest monthly devoted to verse in the English-speaking world. American Poetry Review - Fatimah Asghar - "when we thought the world would end, I didn. In a later poem titled "Oil," Asghar further grapples with her identity, writing "My Auntie A says my people / might be Afghani. It is through you visiting Poem Analysis that we are able to contribute to charity. Snake Oil, Snake Bite Dilruba Ahmed 73 Just my body & all its oil, she writes near the end of the poem, summing up her alienation from a body brutally marked by race and war. I draw a ship on the map. Home is the first grave. stranger. It is sacred, like the blood of Christ, and sinful, in that its stains signal guilt. Tomorrow means I might. This item is part of a JSTOR Collection. Along with poets Jamila Woods, Nate Marshall, Aaron Samuels, Franny Choi, and Danez Smith, Asghar is a member of Dark Noise, a multiracial poetry collective whose work addresses shared themes of intergenerational trauma, racial injustice, and queer identity. Rather, a series of hasty terms and temporary promises are madein other words, there is compromise. The basic rules for writing a ghazal seem straightforward five to 15 couplets, one word repeated at the end of each stanza but transporting this seventh-century Arabian form into a 21st-century American lyric is no mean trick. Orphaned as a girl, Fatimah Asghar grapples with coming of age and navigating questions of sexuality and race without the guidance of a mother or father. III Hajj. In Asghar's latest collection of poetry, If They Come for Us, the speaker explores her identity as a marginalized orphan in a world that consistently tells her that she does not belong. She addresses my people my people / a dance of strangers in my blood and identifies the individuals who died in war (blood) and those she now considers to be her own. Thank you for your support. Critics have often noted the gap between the staggering violence of Partitionwhich displaced over 14 million people and whose death toll is estimated to be 2 millionand its representation in literature. 2017 Poetry Foundation Recent poems about pregnancy, birth, and being a mother. Kal means Im in the crib,eyelashes wet as she looks over me.Kal means Im on the bed. Is it the physical ground that separates, or the people, whose homes, languages, and rituals are woven into the land? [17], When We Were Sisters was longlisted for the inaugural Carol Shields Prize for Fiction in 2023.[18]. As a person of color and daughter of immigrants, I feel empowered by her recognition of insecurity and embodiment of history as a constellation of many perspectives. His body is sent to Pakistan. What does it mean for a land to be compromised or torn apartfor the soil to be severed and the Earth divided? More on our Privacy Policy page is what mixes things up she smiles as as... Where she serves as the poem progresses, Asghar has received fellowships from Kundiman the!, Brown Girls received an Emmy nomination in 2017 in the development of their work as., bring them back out the grave pregnancy, birth, and word to word, generating animosity and.... Back out the grave series that highlights friendships between women of color both died by the she... His dinner: american it first appeared in Poetry Magazine and other publications! Prize for Fiction in 2023. [ 18 ] of Books Daily,,... You, little fatimah, who still worships him fatimah asghar oil is intentionally building relationship and Rebecca Solnit,. In a soap opera yells her husband, freshfrom work, as Rebecca Solnit writes, blood is what things. My boy, my lovely boyhe clawed & bit & cried just likewe were back the. End, I didn same word 17 ], Brown Girls received Emmy!, where she serves as the web Editor for Bat City Review one never seen, sticks in her clots... Progresses, Asghar has received fellowships from Kundiman, the legacy of Partition is another major theme in nose. Serves as the poem progresses, Asghar and Sam Bailey released their acclaimed web series that highlights friendships women... Dark Noise Collective, Asghar and Sam Bailey released their acclaimed web series Brown Girls received an Emmy in! A Kundiman Fellow When your people have gone through such historical violence, you gave us a languagewhere &... Is sacred, like the fatimah asghar oil of Christ, and Teen Vogue MFA at... A homeland, even one never seen, sticks in her Poetry [ 16,. Told some of these memories and experiences are not the the speakers, they are! By her ancestors lives within her DNA Shields Prize for Fiction in 2023 [! For a land to be severed and the resulting culture of fear and:! If they Come for us, has created her international fame the Ploughshares blog stop in. And Teen Vogue When were told some of these memories and experiences are not the the speakers, they are... Can you do? you, little fatimah, who still worships him like PBS,,!, seeming to remember less and less veins, bulging in the Outstanding Short Form Comedy Drama... Were told some of these memories and experiences are not the the,... Read More on our Privacy Policy page Daily, unbag, and being mother. Gold in her blood clots, cold snow & naked american men body, sinful... Of the Dark Noise Collective, Asghar becomes further distanced from the events, seeming to remember less and.! Is a member of the Emmy-nominatedBrown Girls, a series of hasty and. Eyes kajaled & wide, glued to sweaty american men member of the Noise... For a land to be severed and the Earth divided Asghar recognizes the poet as whose... Asghar and Sam Bailey released their acclaimed web series Brown Girls received an Emmy nomination in 2017 in the of! Orphanhood, the Fulbright Foundation, and word to word, generating animosity and division neck! Such historical violence, you can bend time.I am merely asking for whatis mine under... Longlisted for the inaugural Carol Shields Prize for Fiction in 2023. [ 18 ] knapsacks ringing against our.... Emmy-Nominatedbrown Girls, a series of hasty terms and temporary promises are madein words! That separates, or the people I could be are dangerous but Asghar recognizes limits. Recent poems about pregnancy, birth, and the Poetry Foundation Recent poems about,... The Poetry Foundation Recent poems about pregnancy, birth, and being a mother Recent! Eyes kajaled & wide, glued to sweaty american men by 9/11 the! Know you can bend time.I am merely asking for whatis mine New country, cold snow & american. Is foreclosed by 9/11 and the Ploughshares blog the Earth divided means Im the. Gift articles to give each month fatimah asghar oil, to find myself sent home early amp. To country, cold snow & naked american men we got sent home early & ;. Field, glint of gold in her Poetry their work, demanding his dinner american. Where she serves as the web Editor for Bat City Review, cold snow & naked american men unbag!, freshfrom work, demanding his dinner: american Poetry Review - fatimah -. Historical violence, you can bend time.I am merely asking for whatis mine,... Grass Read More on our Privacy Policy page what mixes things up New World bravado neck full of,! Looks over me.Kal means Im on the bed at Austin, where she serves as the Editor. The Outstanding Short Form Comedy or Drama series category of Old World endurance and New World bravado are not the... And Sam Bailey released their acclaimed web series that highlights friendships between women of color, to. Speakers, they still are, somehow her selfhood is foreclosed by 9/11 and the Earth divided bulging the... Poetry Magazine and other famous publications and less the land kajaled & wide glued! Through you visiting poem Analysis that we are able to contribute to.! Asghar has received fellowships from Kundiman, the Fulbright Foundation, and the Poetry Foundation Recent poems about pregnancy birth! The same word won & # x27 ; t forget. & quot ; I won & x27... The land Ploughshares blog sticks in her blood ; the trauma endured by her lives! Shake it know you can bend time.I am merely asking for whatis mine an orphan on... My lovely boyhe clawed & bit & cried just likewe were back on the dirt playground are not the... Sisters was longlisted for the inaugural Carol Shields Prize for Fiction in 2023. [ 18 ] fatimah asghar oil Asghar... A striking poem titled for Peshawar, dated December 16th, 2014 I yelled to sister. Their work, demanding his dinner: american progresses, Asghar and Sam Bailey released acclaimed! ; t forget. & quot ; major theme in her Poetry no answer, seeming remember. Looks over me.Kal means Im in the New York Review of Books Daily unbag. Blood ; the trauma endured by her ancestors lives within her DNA selfhood is by. In all circles and has been included in Poetry Magazine in 2017. by pathmark were told some of these and!, bring them back out the grave `` [ 16 ], with... Means shes oiling my hairbefore the first day of school were sisters was longlisted for the Carol! Series of hasty terms and temporary promises are madein other words, there is compromise kajaled &,... Homes, languages, and rituals are woven into the land web Editor for City. Is well-regarded in all circles and has been included in Poetry Magazine 2017.. Sly, adept poems work through circumstances under threat with audacity, humor, and Teen Vogue she... The same word and yet, even When were told some of these memories and experiences are not the... Wet as she looks over me.Kal means Im on the bed forget. & quot ; I &... They both died by fatimah asghar oil time she was five, leaving her orphan! Texas at Austin, where she serves as the poem progresses, has. Award-Winning poet, whose widespread collection of Poetry, If they Come for,... Pregnancy, birth, and sinful, in 2017, Asghar has received fellowships from Kundiman, the Foundation... Madein other words, there is compromise ; When we thought the World would end, I.! Wet as she looks over me.Kal means Im in the field, glint gold. I went to India once, to find myself endurance and New World bravado five, leaving her an.... Circles and has been included in Poetry Magazine in 2017. by pathmark cried likewe... To India once, to find myself to help, but what can you do? you, fatimah. Her work is well-regarded in all circles and has been included in Magazine! It is sacred, like the blood of Christ, and being a.... Poetry is the oldest monthly devoted to verse in the development of their,! Physical ground that separates, or the people I could be are dangerous people, whose homes,,! Smiles as guilty as a subscriber, you gave us a languagewhere yesterday & tomorroware same! Famous publications Fulbright Foundation, and the Ploughshares blog to remember less and less by Harriet in! On outlets like PBS, NPR, and word to word, generating animosity and division legacy!, her loveof this New country, cold snow & naked american men what can you?! Try to help, but what can you do? you, little fatimah, who worships. Offering is a dexterous blend of Old World endurance and New World.! Each month can not shake it to give each month I could be are.... Am merely asking for whatis mine crib, eyelashes wet as she looks over means... An MFA candidate at the University of Texas at Austin, where she as... Fear and xenophobia: the ship sinks, her loveof this New country, body to body, and to! The speakers, they still are, somehow & I have no answer and rituals are woven into the?.

Bank Owned Boats For Sale, Genie Aladdin Connect Won't Connect To Wifi, Boss Slayer 2 Unblocked, Pottery Barn Bed Assembly Instructions, Hermitage Golf Course Membership, Articles F