The Dance of the Fig Tree

Three generations of women: Téta, the grandmother, Fadwa, the mother, and Emné, the daughter who captures the tenderness of her fore-bearers. The poems in this collection recall and restore a family lineage broken by war, death and exile.

This translation of the 2021 Émile-Nelligan Prize-winning collection will attract readers interested in Middle Eastern literatures and those who value poetry written with the urgency of survival, memory, and longing. These short lyric poems weave a narrative that registers one of the primary concerns of the 21st century: migration.