~ Poet: Doyali Islam ~
Water for Canaries by Doyali Islam
the last singing descendants of a burning world
the first heirs of a new
So often, the poems most effective at making a political statement are not overtly political at all. Here’s a 2019 animation by Suzie Hanna, an Emerita Professor of Animation at Norwich University of the Arts whose “current personal focus in research and practice is poetry animation made in collaboration,” according to her website. I found a good micro-review on the Palestine Cinema website:
How can we witness a world in which the moon and the drone hang in the same sky? What can the evolution of dinosaur into bird tell us about human survival? In “water for canaries”, award-winning Toronto poet Doyali Islam contemplates an Associated Press photograph taken during a ceasefire within the July 2014 bombing of Beit Hanoun. Islam’s poem acts as solemn witness but also achieves a moment of lift-off in which Palestinians reveal their extraordinary courage, resilience, and mercy. UK animator Suzie Hanna has collaborated to create a short poetry film using hand-cut stencils and paint to emphasize the chaotic atmosphere and to celebrate the fragility of life amid destruction. doyali-islam.com & suziehanna.com
The poem “water for canaries” is from Doyali Islam’s 2019 poetry book, heft, published by McClelland & Stewart, a division of Penguin Random House Canada.
Here’s the link to heft. Doyali Islam’s website seems to be offline, but here’s a good bio. “Water for Canaries” wasn’t the only poem from heft to get adapted into a poetry film; “Letter” had three different adaptations for the online Visible Poetry Project in 2019, including one by Moving Poems’ own Jane Glennie: see here. And we’ve shared a number of Suzie Hanna’s animations over the years.
Letter by Doyali Islam
Filmmaker: Amrita Singh
Filmmaker: Laurice Oliveira
Filmmaker: Jane Glennie
A poem from Canadian poet Doyali Islam‘s second collection, heft, gets three different film interpretations, thanks to the wondrous Visible Poetry Project, which released these on April 12. I’ll take the liberty of lifting their bios for each of the filmmakers (though Jane Glennie is probably already familiar to many Moving Poems readers):
Amrita Singh is a writer/director born in Chennai and raised in Chicago. She’s currently attending NYU Tisch’s Graduate Film Program and developing her thesis film about a ruthless spelling bee wunderkind and her immigrant family.
Born in Brazil, Laurice Oliveira bravely moved to NYC with the ambitious hope of becoming a filmmaker. In her long journey to The Big Apple, Laurice met the unseen people and listened to unheard voices. From people of the poorest Brazilian slums to abused immigrant workers in the US, Laurice has made her goal to tell the stories of people that often do not have the privilege of being seen or heard by society.
Jane Glennie is an artist, filmmaker and typographic designer. Previous projects include an installation at The National Centre for the Written Word in the UK, and the publication of ‘A New Dictionary of Art’. Her videopoetry has been awarded a special mention at the Weimar Poetry Film Award in Germany and she was a finalist for Best Production One Minute or Under at Rabbit Heart Poetry Film Festival 2018. Poetry films have been selected for festivals in the UK, USA, France, Germany, Ireland and Singapore.
