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