As a writer, activist and artist, Suheir Hammad feels that she has "traveled with (her) poetry further than she could have imagined." Taking her first breath in Jordan and growing up in New York she started out with a strong habit of many writers, simply reading. "I was most definitely one of the nerdiest kids I knew. I read everything I could get my hands on. I would finish the stories in my mind once I was done with a book," she says.
At 21-years-old Hammad was heavily engaged in organizing community around issues of social justice. "I read a poem at an event at NYC's The University of the Streets. The event was to draw attention to the call to stay the execution of Mumia Abu Jamal. A producer of a program on WBAI attended the event and invited me onto his show the next night for a program (focused on) Mumia's life. That same night an editor at Harlem River Press heard two poems on the air. Within a week, I'd walk into my future publisher's office with a folder of never seen before poems from under my mattress."
Since then Hammad has performed all over the world, she was co-writer and original cast member of Tony-award winning Russell Simmons Def Poetry Jam on Broadway, she has won numerous awards and wrote Zaatar Diva, Born Palestinian Born Black, Drops of this Story, and her most recent collection of poems titled Breaking Poems. This is a collection that Hammad holds dear to her heart. "I love these poems, they are heavily and many times over coded and I do wonder if they will invite the reader to read through the lines and make their own connections to sound and meaning."
For more information on Suheir and Breaking Poems visit Cypher Books. If you are in the New York City area on October 30, 2008 Suhier will be reading at the Bowery Poetry Club.
Photo Credit Tarek Aylouch
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