August 9, 2024

Ash and Air: a Poetry Folio from Gaza

by Nadine Murtaja

trans. by Fatema Alhashemi

Perhaps it is simple to describe what makes a home: a witness to one’s childhood, time with family, a wish goodnight gifted in the twinkling of a star or the crash of the sea. Perhaps it is describing the loss of a home that is far more difficult. Nadine Murtaja, author of the poetry chapbook Ash & Air, writes on this loss with skill and sincerity. A writer living in Gaza, Murtaja’s poetry is a poignant yet painful description of watching one’s home be redefined, stolen, or destroyed.

In Murtaja’s work the world around her is not just a warzone, it is an artificial landscape. The stars are warplanes, the sea is ripped to pieces, the fog rises with the stench of the dead, the earth quakes from bombs, the rain melts tents into the ground… The natural world she references is only seemingly familiar, hiding horror behind its deceptive exterior. Her poems teach us that the siege on Gaza extends beyond homes and cities. The siege also has its spindly fingers wrapped around the warmth of the sun; it has ripped the sea from Gaza’s horizon. 

Ash and Air is the poetry of a young woman who is both writing through and in resistance to a very tangible fear of death. Since the recent escalation of the Zionist genocide in Gaza, I have found myself wondering what role writing has to play in such a moment. Murtaja’s poetry reminded me. To write is to both stay alive and to live on. While Ash and Air is full of uncertainty and pain, it will live on to see a liberated Palestine and as such, is a chapbook that perfectly captures the flame of the Palestinian spirit, Sumud, and resilience. 

Murtaja’s chapbook is available for purchase from Amygdala Books. The volume includes both the English translations by Fatema Alhashemi and the original Arabic poems. All sales go to Nadine to support herself and her family in meeting their basic needs in Gaza.

—Mizna staff

I might turn
              twenty
              next month
I might not. . .

—Nadine Murtaja (trans. by Fatema Alhashemi)

from Ash and Air

Let us
reinvent
war
as a lie.

War                        the creed
of the red sky
choked                  with ashes. . .

Suns                        enshrouding
souls that prayed
for the quench                    of rain. . .

War                         the path
of an atheist.

I was never
an atheist
but I renounce                      war.

Let us
not lie
this time.

Rise above the limits

of fear
and scream.

Embrace the trembling child
and comfort him
with truth.

Tell him

the key he found
in his grandfather’s drawer
was not for a museum
but his stolen home.

Tell him

his uncle
did not travel
not once
yet he is gone
and will never return.

Tell him

the sea is vast
but they tore its chest
and left
but a tiny piece
for us.

The twenty third earthshake…
The twenty fourth…
              Breathe.
              Breathe
so your chest makes room
              for air
              for sorrows. . .

I might turn
              twenty
              next month
I might not. . .

              Twenty years
                             from which wars
                             stole the largest
                             fragment

                             of memory.

It pains me truly that
               once this pain
               comes to an end

I must return
        to a previous life

but now
               to streets
                             without
                                           their colorful rocks
                             without
                                           lovers
                                           who sewed love
                                           on sidewalks.

A Return
               to eyes
                             with
                                           more lines
                                           more melancholy.

How sad is it to wait
for my father’s embrace
               once this pain
           comes to an end

               to congratulate us
               for remaining alive. . .

. . .دعنا نخلقُ الحربَ كذبة
. . .الحربُ عقيدةُ السماء الحمراء المختنقةِ بالرمادِ
. . .شموساً. . . تحملُ بينَ أكفانِها أرواحاً قد صلَّتْ لاستسقاءٍ المطرِ
.الحربُ طريقُ المُلحدِ. . . وما كنتُ يوماً ملحداً… لكنّي كفرتُ بالحرب
. . .دعنا لا نكذبُ هذه المرةَ، ونتمردُ على حدودِ الخوفِ ونصرخُ
نقبِّلُ الطفلَ المرتجفَ ونُطبطبُ عليه بالحقيقةِ
نخبرهُ بأنَّ المفتاحَ الذي وجدهُ في درجِ جدِهِ لم يكن لمتحفاً بل كانَ بيتَهُ
. . .المسلوب
. . .وأنَّ عمَّهُ لم يسافرْ قط وأنَّه لن يعودَ
. . .دعنا نخبرهُ. . . بأنَّ البحرَ كبيرٌ لكنَّهم قد مزَّقوا صدرَهُ ووهبوا الجزءَ الصغيرَ لنا

الهزة الثالثة والعشرون. . . الرابعة والعشرون
. . .تنفسي تنفسي ليتسع صدرُك للهواء والأحزان

قد أبلغ العشرين من عمري في الشهر القادم وقد لا أبلغه، عشرون عاماً سرقت الحروبُ منها الجزءَ الأكبرَ من الذاكرة، ما يؤلمني حقاً بأنني مجبرةٌ بعد أن تنتهي هذه الأيام ان أعود لحياتي السابقة، ان أذهب إلى الجامعة، أن أدرس، أن أخرج للشوارع وأن أرى العيونَ التي ازدادت خطوطاً وازدادت ظلمة

. . .كم من المحزن أن أنتظرَ حضنَ أبي بعد أن ينتهي كلُّ هذا الوجع وأن يبارك لنا بأننا مازلنا على قيد الحياة

Header photo taken by the author and used with her permission.

Nadine Murtaja, twenty-one years old, is a Palestinian poet. She writes poems, short stories, and novels, in Arabic and English. She was studying dentistry but the war prevented her from completing her studies. She believes that the purpose of being alive is to fight and defend the Palestinian cause. 

Fatema Alhashemi is a writer, translator, and researcher based in NYC.

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