Arab American Heritage Month has been observed nationally since 2017. According to the Arab American Institute, Arab Americans have ancestries from twenty-two countries in the Middle East and North Africa: Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.

Celebrate the rich culture and contributions of Arabs and Arab Americans with this selection of poems, essays, and artwork.

Contemporary Poems for Arab American Heritage Month

name/s” by Andrea Abi-Karam
Searching for a Palestinian Necropastoral (Eve)” by George Abraham
Heritage Emissary” by Threa Almontasar
Letter to al-Mutanabbi” by Sinan Antoon
Nine Spice Mix” by Zeina Azzam
Ode on an Abandoned House” by Hayan Charara
I Belong There” by Mahmoud Darwish
Punctum / Metaphor” by Carolina Ebeid
Ode to Sudanese-Americans” by Safia Elhillo
Interrogation of an Alternate Timeline” by Hazem Fahmy
WHO REAL؟” by Marwa Helal
It’s Not Really about Them, It’s about Us” by Safia Jama
Raising a Glass with an Arab Nationalist” by Iman Mersal 
The Iraqi Nights” by Dunya Mikhail
Conventional Wisdom (Arabic Saying Translated Twenty Ways)” by Yasmin Seale 
Migrant Earth” by Deema K. Shehabi
Displaced” by Mosab Abu Toha
Gloria” by Lena Khalaf Tuffaha
In the ن of it all” by Kamelya Omayma Youssef 
Freedom” by Saadi Youssef, translated by Khaled Mattawa