A poet who risked his life to escape persecution now wields his words as a powerful tool for empathy. Learn how his form of refugee art serves as a powerful tool for storytelling, revealing the profound experiences of displacement and resilience, and the human side of the refugee experience that is too often overlooked.
It is hard to conceive that words written by a wistful young man can lead to torture, imprisonment, exile, separation from family, unbearable risk-taking and the loss of belonging. Despite such devastation, that young man found the strength to grow into a political activist, using the power of his essays and poetry to share insights, hopes, and dreams of so many refugees.
That is the story of Amir Darwish, a British-Syrian poet and writer of Kurdish origin. As a seventeen-year-old man, he wrote, in his words, “a naïve poem” for Kurdistan, imagining a Kurdish nation’s homeland. His mistake was not in his writing but in choosing the wrong person to share his poem with. Amir lost his naivety then, discovering that a friend is not necessarily a friend but an informant in disguise, that words can bring armed and intimidating Secret Service military to your door, imprisonment and torture.
He escaped only with the help of his mother, who sold her jewellery to buy a passport and a plane ticket to Dubai. And so started a well-travelled refugee journey: going from place to place to find a new home, somewhere safe and where freedom of speech is a right and not considered an act of treason.
The journey to the United Kingdom was highly dangerous. Travelling through Europe and onto the UK a mere two years after the terror of 9/11 was particularly arduous for Syrian citizens. I asked Amir what it takes to make a person risk their life by hanging onto an axle underneath a truck in the freezing cold, trying to hold on when every turn of the steering wheel moved the axle and the constant fear of being crushed between the wheels. He explained.
The relationship between desperation and risk-taking is hard to describe. The root of many choices comes from our love of life – if we love life, we will take any risks necessary to continue living. I loved life but did not like the life that had befallen me with my friend’s betrayal. I knew there was a strong chance that I would be killed in Syria, so I decided if I was going to die and not of natural causes, that I would be in charge of my own death. My death would be because of a decision I made. The truth is that the value of my life far outweighed any risks I might face.
Resilience is an essential trait for any writer, though for Amir and many other refugee writers, it is not just being resilient in the face of publishers’ rejections but rather channelling their trauma, challenges and difficult circumstances into words of prose or poetry to share their stories. Amir shared his thoughts on resilience.
Without resilience, I would not be able to express myself. In fact, I found my writing became stronger the more difficulties I faced. In my poetry, I draw on my pain—moreover, I consider “pain” to be the mother and father of my writing journey. For me, from pain comes creativity.
The premise of TogetherintheUK is to give refugees, asylum seekers, and migrants a platform to tell their stories. In the words of Salman Rushdie, “We need stories to understand each other.” Those stories can be in the written word, poetry, songs, music, art, or any creative form that shares an experience to inspire, comfort, and educate other people.
Writing this story against the backdrop of a week of anti-immigration and racism riots throughout many parts of the UK makes the importance of sharing refugee stories even stronger. Amir coined a beautiful phrase, “Refugee Art,” and explained how important these creative pieces are for several reasons.
Firstly, refugee creativity, in whatever form it takes, acts as a counter-narrative to the rhetoric from the far-right and anti-immigration groups, giving the real back story to refugees. Secondly, perhaps more importantly, it provides visibility to these artists, presenting them as humans, not just statistics or nameless individuals. We should not forget that refugees had fathers, mothers, lovers, relatives, friends and had their own lives before they were made to leave all behind. Art touches everything in our lives, and Refugee Art should shake us out of our complacency – show us the terror of how lives can change instantly and how people can quickly go from living an everyday life to becoming refugees, displaced and sadly, in many cases unwanted.
The loss of identity is a recurring issue for many refugees and asylum seekers and was a consistent theme in many of the stories and poems contained in TogetherintheUK’s anthology of migrant writings, Hear Our Stories. Amir, who in his role as Poetry Editor for the other side of hope, sees the loss of identity in much of the poetry submitted to this literary based magazine by fellow refugees, shared his feelings on the importance of identity.
I consider myself a British-Syrian poet and writer of Kurdish origin, not only to keep everyone happy, the British, the Syrians and the Kurds, but it is how I feel comfortable with my identity. Identity is crucial for me; it is who I am, how I represent myself, and how I present myself for others to view me. Identifying with Britain, Syria, and Kurdistan reflects many aspects of my life, including my culture, traditions, and loyalties. It is also essential that refugees represent themselves as the same as other people; I have family problems in my life, just like other people have family problems; this is part of the “human package” and how refugees should be viewed. We like, dislike, love, and disagree like everyone else.
In defiance of those who incite racism and anti-immigration, many people are asking how they can show refugees and asylum seekers that not all of us feel the same. I asked Amir what would matter to him, and his response was straightforward: show kindness and take the time to talk with refugees to understand their story.
I was standing at a bus stop in 2014 when the war in Syria was at the height of its turmoil, and an elderly gentleman started a conversation with me by asking where I was from. His question did not offend me; it was a good way to start our conversation. I told him I was a Kurd from Syria, and he asked if he could take me for coffee because he wanted to understand what was going on in Syria. He offered me something more important than financial help; he offered me “sentimental help”, and it was done out of pure kindness on his behalf. When I see acts of kindness like this, to me or other refugees and migrants, when people see us as human beings who have come from a country that is being torn to pieces, it reminds me of an Arabic expression that translates to say that if the world is emptied of good people, it will demolish. Despite all that is happening in the world today, it is still a good place, and we still can help each other.
The betrayal of a friend ignited Amir’s refugee journey. Nonetheless, Amir remains hopeful for a better future.
I still believe that the light will shine eventually, even for Syria and Aleppo, the place where I grew up and where many of my memories still live. Even when there is no clear solution for Syria to be seen, I still have that hope; that small light is still inside me, and I want to keep that light forever.
Amir’s world changed because of his art; his ability to share thoughts and aspirations to connect with people. His art, his words in stories and poetry, will help change the world.
Amir Darwish
Born in Aleppo, Amir Darwish came to Britain as an asylum seeker in 2003. He has a BA in History from Teesside University, UK, an MA in International Relations of the Middle East from Durham University, UK, and an MA in Creative and Life Writing from Goldsmiths University, UK. As a poet, Amir has published his work in the UK, USA, Pakistan, India, Finland, Turkey, Canada, Singapore and Mexico. His two collections of poetry are Dear Refugee (Smokestack, 2019) and Don’t Forget the Couscous (Smokestack, 2015). His work has been translated into Arabic, Bengali, Estonian, Finnish, Italian, Spanish and Turkish, amongst other languages.
Amir also acts as Poetry Editor for the other side of hope a UK-based literary magazine edited by migrants.
TogetherintheUK (TGIUK)
For a deeper understanding of migrant lives and their stories in the UK, go to TogetherintheUK.
To immerse yourself in the rich anthology of migrant writing compiled by TogetherintheUK, purchase a copy of Hear Our Stories from Support Us
Amir was happy to share with TogetherintheUK a poem from his forthcoming collection.
Our Story
Our steps in the snow acted as breathing places for you to stay alive and tell our story to those who forgot theirs.
The water reflects our inner golden hearts.
The pain in kidneys, their throbbing bumpy signals they send all over the world.
Our brains are blank sheets, we fill with what was chosen for us.
Our bodies scattered all over the world, like millions of white dressed pilgrims in Mecca on Eid.
We spit our love of happiness and stand at the hill of death.
Shivers of striking wind as our debris fall on one another.
Here, in these foreign lands, we emptied our brains
We poured the vessel held for centuries
While too many dreams go into each other at once
The Volga,
the Nile,
the Euphrates,
the entire world is part of it
and to tell the story is to reach judgment day,
recreate the universe,
end it,
yet the story is not told.
Amir Darwish
