If you had leave home, what would you take with you? And what would you leave behind?
These were some of the questions International Women’s Group Glasgow North addressed during their Many Voices workshops with poet and founder of the Belonging Project, Marjorie Lotfi Gill.
International Women’s Group is a community group based in North Glasgow. The group is run by women for women, and many of its members are refugees, asylum seekers or migrants.
We are pleased to share some of the poems the group wrote collectively:
Moving
-after Marjorie Lotfi Gill
She wanted to leave a light on
a small garden full of jasmine and roses,
a lemon tree for summer,
fresh mint in a pot and sunflowers indoors.
She wanted to leave a card with words,
and caravan bread and salt, milk
and sugar for welcome, a blue eye,
a bronze hand and a horseshoe
for safety, for luck.
The Suitcase
She can’t take her language – the words
of her family – in the suitcase, or the children,
screaming with joy in the street, crying
in the hamman, Turkish bath.
She can’t take Jacko her parrot, grey
with a red tail, with her his whole life,
who could talk back.
She can’t take the smell of flowers –
white jasmine or other misk lil
which release scent only at night.
She can’t take the drum or the party
or the company of women singing
youyouyouyouyouyouyouyou
She can’t take the smell of fresh bread
from the corner baker – pushka, barbari,
fougasse, mourisse with the black seeds –
or any of her favourite dishes prepared
by her mother (she learned to cook them
herself once her mother got old).
She can’t take the real Ramadan, all
of the month – shops open all night,
closed during the day except
in preparation for Eid; or its tortuous smells –
coriander, shorba, all kinds of tagine – prepared
in every house at the same time ready for the break
of the fast at sundown; or the women meeting
for the small prayers of boqualah, tying knots
and wishing something for others,
the men going together to mosque
like Friday prayers but every day,
or the tea and coffee and baklava
and sweets made with orange-blossom
especially for after prayer.
She can’t take her grandmother’s voice
in the daily telling of her story, evenings
before bedtime, before the end of each day.
Going Home
Fresh sardines straight from the sea
The smell of winter – frozen weather, Christmas trees, clementines
Visiting my mother’s grave
The company of a warm family at every event, family parties
No longer worries about being misunderstood
Visiting my brother at the cemetery every Friday, bringing flowers
Feeding my cat
Being with people who remember your life
Getting caught out on my bad language
The right sabzi ras el hanout, bardagoush, mint, saffron and olive oil
To be with my son and sister and brother in Libya
Drinking small cups of coffee on the roof
Catching up with childhood friends on motherhood, how time has passed
Mama’s couscous every Friday – meat potatoes, red vegetable sauce
Beautiful kaftan and kabilijobha and karako and shidha and erhda
Dancing at my brother’s wedding
The post Many Voices: Stories of Journeys and Belonging appeared first on Scottish PEN.