about this project

Hi everyone,

Welcome to my (semi-)new poetry project. As some of you know, I was living in Jordan from fall 2011 to spring 2013. Since before I got there, I thought about putting together a collection of poems from my time there, and now I'm finally making that a reality.

I originally imagined the collection as something binded and printed. But books of poems are expensive to print and use a lot of trees...

The spoken word and the oral tradition are important in Arab culture and also in my life. I found a lot of comfort and joy in the sounds of the Arabic language and the sounds of Koranic recitation. Many of these poems will be written and recorded.

I wasn't sure if I was going to follow through with this idea because of "time," but a very smart and awesome poet said to me recently- “[I stopped writing because] I was so lazy or ‘busy.’ Foolish." I hope you all will follow along and encourage me to continue.

I loved experimenting with poetry in college, and I had the coolest, wackiest teachers and friends. The beats and rhythms important to slam poetry are still a conscious part of my writing.

But Jordan was most importantly a time of self-reflection for me. I worked hard to learn about myself and to feel compassion for myself so that I could then better understand and connect outside of myself. As a foreigner to many of the things I'm writing about, my most important writing goals here are for starkness, simplicity and humility.

I hope even one of these poems will share some of my laughter, confusion, awe, struggle, visual feasts, tears, epiphanies and more, both for those of you who were with me in body and those of you who were with me in spirit.

 

bismallah

Melissa