Inhale/Exile

Disgrifiad Cymraeg / Welsh Description

Yn ei chasgliad cyntaf o gerddi Inhale/Exile , mae Abeer Ameer o Gaerdydd yn cyflwyno ei chyndeidiau o Irac i ni, a chawn hanesion megis y portread o'r cyfarwydd ar ben to yn Najaf, dewrder a goroesiad ar hyd y cenedlaethau a'r wraig sy'n coginio i'w chymdogion ar ddiwrnod coffa ei mab.

Disgrifiad Saesneg / English Description

Cardiff-based poet Abeer Ameer writes of her forebears in her first collection, Inhale/Exile . Dedicated to the 'holders of these stories', the book begins with a poem about a storyteller on a rooftop in Najaf, Iraq, follows tales of courage and survival throughout, ending with a woman cooking food for neighbours on the anniversary of her son's death.

Dosbarthu

Byddwn yn dosbarthu eitemau sydd mewn stoc o fewn 3 diwrnod gwaith, fel arfer drwy Royal Mail Tracked 48. Ar gyfer archebion o flaen llaw, byddwn yn dosbarthu’r eitem o fewn 3 diwrnod gwaith ar ôl ei derbyn gan ein cyflenwr.

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Bywgraffiad yr Awdur / Author Biography

Abeer Ameer was born in Sunderland and grew up in Wales. She trained as a dentist in London and completed an MSc, developing an interest in treatment of anxious patients and mindfulness. Her poems have appeared widely in journals and anthologies including Acumen, Poetry Wales, Planet, Magma, Poetry Wales, Red Poets, New Welsh Review and Long Poem Magazine. Inhale/Exile is her first collection of poems. She lives with her family in Cardiff.

Adolygiad y Cyhoeddwr / Publisher Review

Marianne Hirsch coined the term ‘postmemory’ in the early 1990s to describe ‘the relationship that the “generation after” bears to the personal, collective, and cultural trauma of those who came before.’ At the time, Hirsch was writing about Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel, Maus , which tells the story of Spiegelman’s father’s experience of the Holocaust. Maus is a powerful book due in no small part to the fact it was written (and drawn) at a distance of some miles and years from the real-life experiences it depicts. That geographic and generational distance between the lived experience of the father and the creative output of author – the ‘postmemory’ – is a key element of Maus . It provides a unique space for reflection in the complex relationship between Spiegelman, his father, and his memories; it is one of the sources of the emotional power the book holds. It’s perhaps fair to say that in a very similar way Abeer Ameer’s debut collection, Inhale/Exile , is a great example of the poetry of postmemory. Ameer was born in Sunderland, grew up in Wales and now lives in Cardiff. Her British identity is entwined with her Iraqi heritage and she explores her identity and perspectives on life, place and family throughout this collection. Just as the graphic novel is the medium through which Spiegelman explores a complex and traumatic subject at distance, you can sense that poetry is the medium through which Ameer explores her familial past. Like Spiegelman, Ameer’s relationship with her subject matter is a time and a place that, through generations and geography, she’s a step away from. And like Spiegelman, the art she creates in the form of her poetry is both excellent and powerful. Poetry is commonly a first-person medium (I, me, my...), but Ameer as a writer is absent from this collection. The subjects on display here are all figures from her life, her family’s past, and countrymen of Iraq. While never explicitly described as such, many of the poems detail what one assumes are her parents’ experiences. Their titles are never ‘mum’ or ‘dad’, but instead they’re referred to by the varying roles they play at different stages of life. ‘The Lodger, 1968’, for example, appears to portray her father on his arrival in the UK. It is a classic portrayal of a newly-arrived immigrant: ‘He craves his homeland / the poetry and birdsong / his mother’s cooking / his father urging him to read.’ It is a sweet poem that uses a child’s Christmas song as the hook on which the naivety and innocence of her father hang. It follows narrative clues from earlier poem ‘The Student’, hinting that the subjects are the same people. Elsewhere the presumed parents of Ameer appear in recurring poems as the ‘fugitive’s wife’ and the ‘waiting groom’. ‘The Fugitive’s Wife’ is a five-part poem split throughout the book; together the parts form a moving narrative. ‘The Waiting Groom’ goes alongside this series, as well as fitting together with gentle humour with ‘Iraqi Bride in Transit’ – the recurring theme being misunderstood nuances in language, mixing up the concept of being a ‘pharmacy student’ and simply ‘doing drugs’. The closest Ameer comes to making an appearance in her own poems is in the wonderful ‘On Staying Warm’. The confusion of a new immigrant being torn between Arabic songs and the Bee Gees is a mix of old world/new world that is passed down to the next generation, with the same experiences mirrored in listening to the same music in the car on the school run. You can recognise Ameer as a child in the car, and her apparent appreciation of the inheritance of experience from her mother is touching. This is not all about family though. Ameer is focused on using this slim book to give colour and character to Iraq and its people. She shares beauty and details of a country that is often crudely and simply defined by war and tragedy in the eyes of the West. It's incredibly powerful and telling of her role as a poet when she writes of the West in ‘The interpreter’: ‘They have no use / For the dozen Arabic words for Love / Or the ninety-nine names for God who is greater.’ There is love, there is complexity, and a multitude of details that are usually hidden from outsiders. Similarly, in ‘Green Ink’, the poem is full of details and artefacts of a family life creating a home away from home. ‘A kerosene suitcase full of hand-woven loofas, date syrup, bricks of olive / and bay leaf soap, the glass cups and saucers her mother sent.’ This is a new side to Iraq. Ameer succeeds with this collection in marrying her past, her family, the personal and the political. The insights into her parents’ lives are touching, and sit alongside portraits of a country she clearly loves. Her own experiences as the child of immigrants clearly and powerfully impact on this poetry of postmemory.