A Date With a Literary Scholar, Refaat Alareer

Freshly Baked Souls by Refaat Alareer

As fire balls and sparks descend,
And the little ones rejoice,
Look up, and cheer, unable to comprehend,
Sooner than they expect
They will be blown
(It’s none of their wishes
If only they had known!)
And more freshly grilled balls of flesh ascend.
And fall on full dishes
And fill the boxes.
And the hollow minds.
The full bellies.
They look down. Rejoice. Cheer.
“Freshly baked!”
“Freshly baked!”
“Who wants freshly baked flesh for breakfast?”
“Throw me a piece. “
“Throw me  four.
I have just eaten but crave for more.”

***

The hearts are not hearts.
The eyes can’t see
There are no eyes there
The bellies craving for more
A house destroyed except for the door
The family, all of them, gone
Save a photo album
That has to be buried with them
No one was left to cherish the memories
No one.
Except freshly baked souls in bellies.
Except for a poem .

Mr. Refaat Aleer, a Palestinian poet (although he doesn't think of himself as a poet but a mere blogger) came to visit us in class on the 21st of October 2013. It was a great experience for us to have met such a bold and wise soul. It took him around 1-2 months of effort to reach Malaysia. He taught us a little bit about Palestine, its history and the current condition there.

Palestine from 1946-2012

It was surprising to find out how Palestine evolved over a short period of time. Some of his poems that he recited were If I Must Die, Over the Wall, And We Live On..., I am You and Freshly Baked Souls. His poems were all meaningful and although we were not able to fully relate to his poems as we have never experienced war, we were able to put ourselves in the shoes of the unfortunate Palestinians who are forced to face grief and misery every single day through his poems, it was heart-rending.

 Mr. Refaat also provided us with tips on how to write poetry. He started off with reading his poems from his favourite poet, John Donne. Also, practice makes perfect. Write and write. Read and read. Slowly, you will become more and more inspired and will start seeing details that will be useful in writing poetry.

Mr. Refaat truly is adore-worthy and definitely one of the people I look up to. Thank you for the eye-opening and worthful experience.

War Poetry

What is war poetry?

• Poets have written about the experience of war since the Greeks, but the young soldier poets of the First World War established war poetry as a literary genre. 
• Poems which concentrate on the subject of war. 
• Poems which are written during a war that seems to have a noticeable influence on the poet. 

World War I Poem

Anthem for a Doomed Youth by Wilfred Owen

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
--Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
 Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries for them from prayers or bells,
 Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,-
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
 And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

What candles may be held to speed them all?
 Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
 The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of silent minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

World War II Poem

The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner by Randell Jarrell

From my mother's sleep I fell into the State,
And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze.
Six miles from earth, loosed from its dream of life,
I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.

Modern War Poem

I am You by Refaat Aleer

Two steps: one, two.
‏Look in the mirror:
‏The horror, the horror!
‏The butt of your M-16 on my cheekbone
‏The yellow patch it left
‏The bullet-shaped scar expanding
‏Like a swastika,
‏Snaking across my face,
‏The heartache flowing
‏Out of my eyes dripping
‏Out of my nostrils piercing
‏My ears flooding
‏The place.
‏Like it did to you
‏70 years ago
‏Or so.

***

‏I am just you.
‏I am your past haunting
‏Your present and your future.
‏I strive like you did.
‏I fight like you did.
‏I resist like you resisted
‏And for a moment,
‏I’d take your tenacity
‏As a model,
‏Were you not holding
‏The barrel of the gun
‏Between my bleeding
‏Eyes.

***

One. Two.
‏The very same gun
‏The very same bullet
‏That had killed your Mom
‏ And killed your Dad
‏Is being used,
‏Against me,
‏By you.

***

‏Mark this bullet and mark in your gun.
‏If you sniff it, it has your and my blood.
‏It has my present and your past.
‏It has my present.
‏It has your future.
‏That’s why we are twins,
‏Same life track
‏Same weapon
‏Same suffering
‏Same facial expressions drawn
‏On the face of the killer,
‏Same everything
‏Except that in your case
‏The victim has evolved, backward,
‏Into a victimizer.
‏I tell you.
‏I am you.
‏Except that I am not the you of now.

***

‏I do not hate you.
‏I want to help you stop hating
‏And killing me.
‏I tell you:
‏The noise of your machine gun
‏Renders you deaf
‏The smell of the powder
‏Beats that of my blood.
‏The sparks disfigure
‏My facial expressions.
‏Would you stop shooting?
‏For a moment?
‏Would you?

***

‏All you have to do
‏Is close your eyes
‏(Seeing these days
‏Blinds our hearts.)
‏Close your eyes, tightly
‏So that you can see
‏In your mind’s eye.
‏Then look into the mirror.
‏One. Two.
‏I am you.
‏I am your past.
‏And killing me,
‏You kill you.

What is Poetry? What is Drama?

Poetry

Poetry (ancient Greek: ποιεω (poieo) = I create) is an art form in which human language is used for its aesthetic qualities in addition to, or instead of, its notional and semantic content. It consists largely of oral or literary works in which language is used in a manner that is felt by its user and audience to differ from ordinary prose.
It may use condensed or compressed form to convey emotion or ideas to the reader's or listener's mind or ear; it may also use devices such as assonance and repetition to achieve musical or incantatory effects. Poems frequently rely for their effect on imagery, word association, and the musical qualities of the language used. The interactive layering of all these effects to generate meaning is what marks poetry.

Adopted from http://www.poetry.org/whatis.htm


Drama

• Drama is a unique tool to explore and express human feeling. 
• Drama is an essential form of behaviour in all cultures, it is a fundamental human activity.

Drama is an Ancient Greek word meaning ‘act’ or ‘deed’. The Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle used this term in a very influential treatise called the Poetics. Aristotle classified different forms of poetry according to basic features he thought could be commonly recognised in their composition. He used the term ‘drama’ to describe poetic compositions that were ‘acted’ in front of audiences in a theatron. 

Adopted from http://ehlt.flinders.edu.au/education/DLiT/2001/drama/whatdram.htm and http://dlibrary.acu.edu.au/faculties/learndrama/what_drama.htm