Warsan Shire

Souvenir

Language: english

Translations: german (Souvenir)

Souvenir

I think I brought the war with me
on my skin, a shroud
circling my skull, matter under my nails.
It sits at my feet while I watch TV.
I hear its damp breath in the background
of every phone call. I feel it sleeping
between us in the bed. It lathers
my back in the shower. It presses
itself against me at the bathroom sink.
At night, it passes me the pills, it holds
my hand, I never meet its gaze.

Warsan Shire

photo © private

* 01.08.1988, Nairobi, Kenya
lives in: London, United Kingdom

Warsan Shire was born in 1988 in Kenya to Somali parents, she grew up in London, where she still lives. She won her first prize at an international slam event and is now the editor of the magazines Literary arts mashup and Spook. She leads workshops, in which poetry is used as a tool to try to overcome personal traumas.

Her poems have been published and featured in various literary publications, such as the Poetry Review, Magma and Wasafiri as well as have been featured in the collections Book of Younger Poets (Salt, 2011) and Ten: The New Wave (Bloodaxe, 2014). Poems of her have been translated into Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Swedish, Danish and Estonian etc.

photo © private

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