New Zealand Poetry Society PO Box 5283 7KH1HZ =HDODQG 3RHWU\ Lambton Quay WELLINGTON 6RFLHW\ Patrons Dame Fiona Kidman Te Hunga Tito Ruri o Aotearoa Vincent O’Sullivan President Margaret Vos With the Assistance of Creative NZ Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.poetrysociety.org.nz is the number of writers in this country who could now readily identify with the statement given in my JAAM F ¬ G 7KLV0RQWK V0HHWLQJ essay by the Australian poet and emigrant, Dmitris Tsoulamas. Tsoulamas stated that there are those who leave 'their home either out of love of adventure, or David Howard because of personal impasses, or because they were Thursday March 18th 2004 hounded by semi-democratic or entirely fascist regimes…for these victims of intellectual disquiet, of 8.00 p.m. Turnbull House analytical disposition and perspicacity, the problem takes & on complex and particularly troublesome dimensions: … Readings from a loosening of the fabric of their whole existence, a chasm ‘Writing the Landscape’ Course between the here of their struggles and the there of their IIML Victoria University memory which keeps growing uncontrollably … For those people there's but one salvation: language, to which they cling like a shipwreck to flotsam, and on which all The Multilinguists: their passion and everything meaningful in their lives is the Rise of Migrant Poetry & centred.' the Poetry of Exile Keeping Tsaloumas' statement in mind, go out to a local poetry reading in Wellington now and you may not In JAAM 7 (May 1997), I wrote an essay on the be hearing the usual pub or Beat street poets, but instead Malaysian-Chinese poet Ee Tiang Hong who had may probably hear a rich and diverse mix of ethnic emigrated to Australia. I touched then, in a somewhat poetry, from as far away as Ethiopia, Chile or Iraq. simplistic manner, on the intellectual dilemmas facing the Usually this poetry focuses on political turmoil and political poetry exile. At the time - the mid-1990s - the conflict in their native countries. This particular subject influx of new migrants and refugees were just starting to influenced the First Wellington International Poetry enter New Zealand. I had treated the essay as a chance to Festival (organised by Ron Riddell and Saray Torres) in write on a recent trend in international literature but could October 2003 - its theme was Peace and Reconciliation. find few local examples to cover apart from the well As well, in Auckland last year, a major conference on the known like the Second World War Dutch immigrant poet, Poetics of Exile was held with an anthology to be issued Riemke Ensing or the German poet and exile Karl in due course. These were significant events in the history Wolfskehl. of New Zealand poetry. For the first time in Wellington . So I chose to write on Ee's poetry in Australia. and Auckland, poets from traditionally faraway countries Today the number of local writers who are political came together to share their words and issues. émigrés, immigrants or refugees surprises one. So much Of these poets, there are a number I would list here as so that Linzy Forbes has been gathering their writings for forming part of a new movement in poetry, a movement a major anthology he is producing through Inkweed. So, that I would term the Multilinguists. These are poets who in this new essay, I wish to touch again upon the have learnt to speak in several languages or have had continued rise of these developments - this time in recent their work translated and published in several countries. New Zealand poetry. In the old days we grew up with English and Latin and Over the last year and since I have been a member of maybe French but now we are finding and hearing new the Wellington writers' group Writers International languages and cultures beyond the old Imperial influence (formed by Susan Pearce), I have developed a growing of English and the Classics. appreciation of the new cultures that make up our This to me has helped to produce some of the most increasingly diverse country. I have seen first-hand the exciting poetry in recent years. Further, their unusual use contribution they make to the development of our local of English has also helped to enliven the language of poetry and to the broadening of our traditional ‘Kiwi’ contemporary poetry. culture. And what strikes me most about this development D New Zealand Poetry Society: © March 2004 Newsletter Editor: Jenny Argante, [email protected] (07) 576 3040 1 The Wellington-based Iraqi poet Basim Furat (whose The hotels need work is published and translated in several countries) no management writes, for example, in a Romantic and Symbolist vein no maintenance which is so against the grain of contemporary New no overhead there are no complaints Zealand poetry and its often laconic idiom that his poetry it is like a dream surprises line by line: come true I crossed the borders accidentally The winged soupmakers My decorations are question marks check in freely Distances were whinnying flying swifts And their coldness kneels on our lives and most welcomed Crushing our days as it suits honoured guests. And my dust is covering the walls and windows, Swift newcomers But does not come near to my stature they zip and twitter overhead, Since the stroll of the first war their swirling shadows I mean the foolishness of the General, dappling the ground I entered the city like sparkles Like a dog from the ball In whose face the houses were barking of the closed disco My mother arranges the Stars which are mixed With her hair, The swift boarders And drinks tea in which she dissolved her sadness, leave behind empty nests Roads are streaming on my feet sculpted with their saliva And the fruits of the trees are dangling hard as tea-cups On the horizon, the nests, glued to the walls Horizon is an illusion for the eye are their payment Who can hold its shadow? Our mistakes are a homeland leaning on a spear Knocked loose And our dreams are growing on balconies. soaked in water (from I crossed the borders accidentally JAAM 21) steamed or boiled the nests make Furat's poetry (translated here by Abbas Elsheikh) has long, chewy, already influenced the likes of Anna Jackson, whose transparent strands latest collection, Catullus for Children, contains a poem the best nests soup that uses an epigraph from Furat's poem quoted above. Another poet enlivening the English language is the At the end Israeli poet Moshé Liba. Liba, by contrast, is not a they check out swifts as they came, political poetry exile but instead has been living here as they do not pay cash the partner of the Netherlands' Ambassador to New do not use credit cards, Zealand. His new collection, Over the Waters the empty nests (HeadworX), takes a humorous look at his recent travels pay the rent in Australasia, Asia and the Pacific, and includes some fine word-play: Thailand 22nd July 2003 Birds’ nests soup Others I'd include in this trend are poets like Yang The shuttered shops Lian, Kapka Kassabova, Rossella Riccobono, Emad of Pattani, in Thailand Jabbar, Sudesh Mishra, Majid Addam, Sugu Pillay, Puri are not the sign Alvarez, and even the locally born Ron Riddell (whose of an economic disaster, most recent book, El Milagro de Medellin y otros the empty hotels poemas, has been published in a bilingual Spanish- with small holes punched into their walls English edition in Colombia). These poets to me are are rather the sign producing some of the most innovative poetry at present of boom times (for instance, The First Wellington International Poetry the bounty of the birds’ nests Festival Anthology) and overseas the trend is seen in anthologies like Unsettling America. An Anthology of A birds’ hotel Contemporary Multicultural Poetry (Penguin, 1994). It's is a good investment: great, then, that some of these poets have been or are board up windows living here and are contributing so much to broadening for darkness punch holes in the walls our understanding of poetry in New Zealand for ventilation, for traffic run pipes along 0DUN3LULH for humidity set up sound systems FG to welcome guests: the swift birds New Zealand Poetry Society: © March 2004 Newsletter Editor: Jenny Argante, [email protected] (07) 576 3040 2 F G In the April edition of the newsletter there will be a 2ELWXDU\ form listing all nominations received plus blank spaces for write-ins. This will be your proxy voting form - you can cut it out, complete and sign it, and post it to the NZPS, or alternatively e-mail your vote to [email protected]. As always this is your society and the Committee wants to hear your voice, so get ready to ‘rock the vote’. F G )URP WKHH(GLWRU Good to see Takahe 50 reviewed by Iain Sharp in the Sunday Star-Times on 1st February – it’s such a boost -DQHW)UDPH¦ -DQHW)UDPH when this happens for small press magazines, which are Janet Frame, the writer of Owls Do Cry and An Angel so essential to a writer’s growth. At my Table, has died in Dunedin at the age of 79 from Incidentally, I forgot to mention in my own review leukaemia. last month that Victoria Broome – a well-known “New Zealand has lost a national treasure,” says New Christchurch poet - is on board as a co-editor and Zealand Society of Authors (PEN NZ Inc) President deserves equal praise with her colleagues, and that William Taylor.