"One bird is enough in order for the sky not to fall": Poetry as witness in Chris Abani's Kalakuta Republic and Faraj Bayraqdar’s Mirrors of Absence

Abstract

"Poetry of witness" is a coherent tradition in twentieth-century poetry. It is an act against oblivion and forgetfulness, willing to speak the truth to power. "Poetry of witness" is an ethical and political act in the face of "extremity". This paper seeks to investigate the experience of imprisonment in Chris Abani's Kalakuta Republic (2007) and Faraj Bayraqdar’s Mirrors of Absence (2007). Both poets endured conditions of historical and social "extremity" during the twentieth century through political persecution, imprisonment, torture, and exile. Their works are poetic witnesses to the traumatic experiences in which they lived, and serve as counter discourse against the human rights violations committed by their regimes. The works will be read within the framework of "witness literature". The paper seeks to answer the following questions: How did these writers challenge the "history" written by official regimes? How did they expose what goes on inside the cells and the "torture chambers" of the political prisons in Syria and Nigeria? The prison poems chosen for analysis provide different insights into the function of poetry as testimony. The paper attempts to highlight these two writers’ struggle to retain dignity and sanity in a context that forces them either to conform or resist.