'O' takes readers on a journey of abandonment and reclamation
In her third poetry collection, Zeina Hashem Beck is graceful her defiance of fitting self into a box. She embraces the multitudes – mother, citizen, poet, warrior – and presents herself as one whole.
It is easy to subscribe narratives to each memory – and each feeling – so that our sense of self fits neatly into a box. But poets can be good at defying the confines of boxes.
In her third poetry collection O, Zeina Hashem Beck is graceful in that defiance. She embraces the multitudes – mother, citizen, poet, warrior – and presents herself to the reader as one whole.
Made of ghazals, odes, triptychs, and her own is a musical compilation of poems. The concept of a prayer is elevated as Beck contemplates on motherhood and exile. The very first poem, a ghazal, asks, "What to do with prayer?" It lists the ways in which prayer is both a necessity and a farce. It ends, "I'm through, I'm through, I'm through with prayer." The book has just begun.
