Cirrus@Austlit

'If I must die, you must live to tell my story. As I write, it's hard not to think of Palestinian poet Dr Refaat Alareer and this line of his. I have been thinking a lot of him, of the Heba Abu Nadas and Roshdi Sarrajs, the creatives, the journalists, the truth-tellers; of the archives that were bombed, the universities and the libraries that were bombed, the museums and the cultural centres and the hammam-all bombed to concrete confetti. These aren't just crimes against humanity, they are crimes against history, as Ibram X Kendi writes.'  (Publication abstract)

'This week on the ABR Podcast we celebrate twenty years of the Peter Porter Poetry Prize with readings from six winners. We invited these poets to reflect on the prize and their winning poems. Hear fresh readings from Judith Beveridge, A. Frances Johnson, Damen O’Brien, Sara M. Saleh, Alex Skovron and Judith Bishop. The 2024 Porter Prize, worth a total of $10,000, closes on October 9.' (Introduction)

'With her first full-length poetry collection, Sara M Saleh introduces us to the polychromatic lives of girls and women as they come into being amidst war, colonial and patriarchal violence, and exile and migration. This searing work interrogates and represents the complexity of Arab-Australian Muslim women’s identities as they negotiate an irresistible world full of music and family, grit and grief, love and loss.

'Saleh’s poetry is not only an inherently political act, but a deeply personal one, charged with multilayered conversations and meditations amongst three generations of women in Sara’s family. Her poems dazzle with an incantatory force of spirit, survival and selfhood, proving without a doubt that Saleh is one of this country’s most compelling, contemporary poets.' (Publication summary)

'Jamilah has always believed she knows where her home is: in a house above a paint shop on the outskirts of Beirut, with her large, chaotic, loving family. But she soon learns that as Palestinian refugees, her family's life in Lebanon is precarious.

'Songs for the Dead and the Living is a coming-of-age tale played out across generations and continents, from Palestine to Australia. Sara M Saleh offers a breathtaking portrait of the fragilities and flaws of family in the wake of war.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Jazz Money is a poet and artist of Wiradjuri heritage creating work across installation, digital, performance, film and print. Money’s first poetry collection, how to make a basket (UQP, 2021) was the 2020 winner of the David Unaipon Award. This transcript documents the in-conversation between Money and Sara M Saleh, a poet, writer and human rights lawyer. This exchange marked the launch of how to make a basket and occurred on the unceded lands of the Dharug people in December 2021 at Arts & Cultural Exchange (ACE, formerly Information + Cultural Exchange). This event was co-presented by ACE and Sweatshop Literacy Movement. Throughout their conversation Money and Saleh share necessary and valuable thoughts about poetry as a democratic form, the power of story in contributing to personal and collective identities and the ethics and responsibility of writing.' (Introduction)

'Thirty years ago, my folks migrated to a city half-dipped in ocean. To this day, they are sepia-faced and prayer-shaped, coal soot and cedar hills still rolling underneath their fingernails.' (Publication abstract)