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Bad Diaspora Poems
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE FORWARD PRIZE 2023*Diaspora is witnessing a murder without getting blood on your shirt.'A once in a generation poet'CALEB FEMI, author of POOR'Energising, radical and remarkable'JACK UNDERWOOD, author HAPPINESS'A new turn in global anglophone poetry'KAYO CHINGONYI, author of A BLOOD CONDITIONThe definition of diaspora is the dispersion of people from their original homeland. But what does it mean to write diaspora poetry? Momtaza Mehri's debut collection poses this question, taking us from Mogadishu to Naples, Lampedusa to London. Mixing her own family's experience with the stories of many others across nineteenth- and twentieth-century Somalia, Bad Diaspora Poems confronts the ambivalent nature of speaking for those who have been left behind.We meet the poet, the translator, the refugee, the exile, and the diaspora kid attempting to transcend their clichéd angst. Told in lyric, prose and text messages, and taking place in living rooms and marketplaces, on buses and balconies, on transatlantic journeys and online, these are essential poems about our diasporic age.
115 pages, Hardcover
Published July 6, 2023
22 people are currently reading
4969 people want to read
About the author
Momtaza Mehri
7 books15 followersMomtaza Mehri is a poet and researcher working across criticism, education, and radio.
She is a former Young People’s Poet Laureate for London, and columnist for Tate Etc, the arts magazine published by the Tate network of galleries. Her work has appeared in The Guardian, Granta, POETRY, BOMB Magazine, Wasafiri, frieze, Art Review, and elsewhere.
In 2023, Mehri won an Eric Gregory Award and the Forward Prize for Best First Collection with Bad Diaspora Poems. It was also shortlisted for the 2023 Charlotte Aitken Young Writer of the Year Award. She is also a recipient of a Somerset Maugham Award. In 2024, she won a Sky Arts Award.
Mehri is obsessed with slippage and spillage.
She is a former Young People’s Poet Laureate for London, and columnist for Tate Etc, the arts magazine published by the Tate network of galleries. Her work has appeared in The Guardian, Granta, POETRY, BOMB Magazine, Wasafiri, frieze, Art Review, and elsewhere.
In 2023, Mehri won an Eric Gregory Award and the Forward Prize for Best First Collection with Bad Diaspora Poems. It was also shortlisted for the 2023 Charlotte Aitken Young Writer of the Year Award. She is also a recipient of a Somerset Maugham Award. In 2024, she won a Sky Arts Award.
Mehri is obsessed with slippage and spillage.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews
February 8, 2024
The only lie here is in the title where they call these "bad" poems.
Incredible.
Incredible.
February 22, 2024
'these diaspora poems are monsoons of second-hand nostalgia. our diluted vials of passion' !!!!!
March 23, 2024
Crossing between Somalia, Italy and London and proceeding from the 1830s to the present day, this debut collection sets family history amid wider global movements. It’s peopled with nomads, colonisers, immigrants and refugees. In stanzas and prose paragraphs, wordplay and truth-telling, Mehri captures the welter of emotions for those whose identity is split between countries and complicated by conflict and migration. I particularly admired “Wink Wink,” which is presented in two columns and opens with the suspension of time before the speaker knew their father was safe after a terrorist attack. There’s super-clever enjambment in this one: “this time it happened / after evening prayer // cascade of iced tea / & sugared straws // then a line / break // hot spray of bullets & / reverb & // in less than thirty minutes we / they the land // lose twenty of our children”. Confident and sophisticated, this is a first-rate debut.
A few more favourite lines:
Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.
A few more favourite lines:
IX. Art is something we do when the war ends.
X. Even when no one dies on the journey, something always does.
(from “A Few Facts We Hesitantly Know to Be Somewhat True”)
You think of how casually our bodies are overruled by kin,
by blood, by heartaches disguised as homelands.
How you can count the years you have lived for yourself on one hand.
History is the hammer. You are the nail.
(from “Reciprocity is a Two-way Street”)
Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.
December 5, 2023
Winner of the 2023 Forward Prize for Poetry
I have not read poetry of such astounding beauty and force since Natalie Díaz's 2020 collection Postcolonial Love Poem, and what makes Bad Diaspora Poems all the more impressive is the fact of it being a debut collection. Here, former Young People’s Poet Laureate for London Momtaza Mehri blends criticism, essay, erasure, and autobiography with the lyric form to consider the varied forms and meanings of diaspora.
Given their thematic focus, Mehri's poems are arranged like a historical record which begins with the first colonial incursions in Somalia and takes us through to the author's personal history and experience, using figures such as “the poet, the immigrant, the exile, the refugee, the runaway, the working-class artist, the translator, and the diaspora kid attempting to transcend their clichéd angst” to foreground the slippages of identity and belonging that characterise the burden and shame — both real and imagined — of the diasporic figure.
The titular poem evokes the studied nostalgia of 'diaspora' poetry — poetry that begins from an idea of the poet as representative of their culture and custodian of an inherited loss; which dresses a wounded and paradoxical disconnect from the homeland in (empty) symbols of (borrowed) yearning:
A remarkable achievement.
I have not read poetry of such astounding beauty and force since Natalie Díaz's 2020 collection Postcolonial Love Poem, and what makes Bad Diaspora Poems all the more impressive is the fact of it being a debut collection. Here, former Young People’s Poet Laureate for London Momtaza Mehri blends criticism, essay, erasure, and autobiography with the lyric form to consider the varied forms and meanings of diaspora.
Given their thematic focus, Mehri's poems are arranged like a historical record which begins with the first colonial incursions in Somalia and takes us through to the author's personal history and experience, using figures such as “the poet, the immigrant, the exile, the refugee, the runaway, the working-class artist, the translator, and the diaspora kid attempting to transcend their clichéd angst” to foreground the slippages of identity and belonging that characterise the burden and shame — both real and imagined — of the diasporic figure.
The titular poem evokes the studied nostalgia of 'diaspora' poetry — poetry that begins from an idea of the poet as representative of their culture and custodian of an inherited loss; which dresses a wounded and paradoxical disconnect from the homeland in (empty) symbols of (borrowed) yearning:
Exotic fruits bop in buckets. Sweet mangoes, pomegranates, figs.Questioning the ability of poetry to respond to the tensions and ambivalences that comprise the diaspora, Mehri calls attention to the fact that
Ripe signifiers weighing down the basket of poems such as these.
What's yours to claim isn't always yours to take.Brilliant and biting, each poem here unpicks and nuances our ideas of migration, memory, community, self-righteousness, and representation with exceptional control and lyricism. Try as I might, I can't pick favourites — this is a bouquet of a collection, to be devoured whole even as you will admire each flower and every composite petal.
A remarkable achievement.
June 17, 2025
UPDATE: I met her in person, I rambled about my thoughts and I could see her think ‘???’ but it’s fine. I got a signature and she read my favorite poem from the collection so I think I won actually
I felt so seen throughout this whole collection. A masterclass in intertextuality; Mehri positions her own “homeland’s” history in such a rich historical context that the events feel universal and connective. The tears I cried while reading this are a result of the insanely carefully crafted layers every single poem in this collection holds. This is one for the ages.
I felt so seen throughout this whole collection. A masterclass in intertextuality; Mehri positions her own “homeland’s” history in such a rich historical context that the events feel universal and connective. The tears I cried while reading this are a result of the insanely carefully crafted layers every single poem in this collection holds. This is one for the ages.
December 18, 2024
i’m not smart enough for all the references layers and languages but damn when it hits it hits
July 19, 2023
from 'Reciprocity is a Two-way Street'
You think of how casually our bodies are overruled by kin,
by blood, by heartaches disguised as homelands.
How you can count the years you have lived for yourself on one hand.
History is the hammer. You are the nail.
[...]
Nightly, you strive to write an imprecise translation of this.
Arterial blood is theatrical, like the desire for a time before your time.
The world will not stop when you do, or even before.
Yes, being the one who survived, the one who made it to this side,
is a full-time job. But no one asked you to take it.
Diaspora is witnessing a murder without getting blood on your shirt.
Your body is the evidence of its absence. (11)
from 'The Plural Possible'
We are together for better & for worse. Fanon's cavernous We, the We of the Algerian, the Martinican, the exiled South African mother, the Sahrawi guerrilla, the Somali teenager in the Libyan prison camp. Fanon's We had the capacity to contain them. His colleagues believed in a We too shrunken for reciprocity. Politics is a parsing of the We, the maintenance of its enclosure/s, the engulfment of all who attempt to defy its confines. Territory as terror. The plural personal is the evidence of murderous affinity. It is always an absence. Who is betrayed by every assumed We? (77)
'2020'
July marks the 60th anniversary. The poet is the antagonist of linearity.
The diaspora poet is born an antagonism.
You begin where you were told the story started.
You keep the timer ticking. (81)
from 'Bad Diaspora Poem'
What's yours to claim isn't always yours to take. Kafka refused Canaan,
though it tried to swallow him. Diaspora poems are quicksand. Original sin.
A never-ending arrival. Distrust follows like a faithful dog.
[...]
Going somewhere we don't know yet, an everywhere
of interminable retreat. We have no name for it yet. Only soon come.
Settle or be unsettled. Diaspora poems celebrate what can never be won.
You think of how casually our bodies are overruled by kin,
by blood, by heartaches disguised as homelands.
How you can count the years you have lived for yourself on one hand.
History is the hammer. You are the nail.
[...]
Nightly, you strive to write an imprecise translation of this.
Arterial blood is theatrical, like the desire for a time before your time.
The world will not stop when you do, or even before.
Yes, being the one who survived, the one who made it to this side,
is a full-time job. But no one asked you to take it.
Diaspora is witnessing a murder without getting blood on your shirt.
Your body is the evidence of its absence. (11)
from 'The Plural Possible'
We are together for better & for worse. Fanon's cavernous We, the We of the Algerian, the Martinican, the exiled South African mother, the Sahrawi guerrilla, the Somali teenager in the Libyan prison camp. Fanon's We had the capacity to contain them. His colleagues believed in a We too shrunken for reciprocity. Politics is a parsing of the We, the maintenance of its enclosure/s, the engulfment of all who attempt to defy its confines. Territory as terror. The plural personal is the evidence of murderous affinity. It is always an absence. Who is betrayed by every assumed We? (77)
'2020'
July marks the 60th anniversary. The poet is the antagonist of linearity.
The diaspora poet is born an antagonism.
You begin where you were told the story started.
You keep the timer ticking. (81)
from 'Bad Diaspora Poem'
What's yours to claim isn't always yours to take. Kafka refused Canaan,
though it tried to swallow him. Diaspora poems are quicksand. Original sin.
A never-ending arrival. Distrust follows like a faithful dog.
[...]
Going somewhere we don't know yet, an everywhere
of interminable retreat. We have no name for it yet. Only soon come.
Settle or be unsettled. Diaspora poems celebrate what can never be won.
March 1, 2024
This experimental poetry collection focuses on matters of race, migration and diaspora in fascinating and diverging ways. The style and language really captured my interest, and provided a provocative form to the entire piece. I also thought the small intertextual references to other artists brought an extra dimension to her exploration of community and border-crossing. Overall, Mehri is a wonderful new voice in contemporary poetry!
February 18, 2025
Masterpiece
April 16, 2024
A grammar/of differences we liquefy and scatter, in the name of our borderless love.
Poems so elegant
Poems so elegant
February 27, 2025
100000/10 thanks isabell <3
February 18, 2024
Incredible - highly deserving of Forward Prize for Best First Collection in 2023. Must read.
May 5, 2024
miglior raccolta di poesie che ho letto negli ultimi anni
March 12, 2024
this hurted
March 4, 2024
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
💬 “These diaspora poems are monsoons of second-hand nostalgia, our diluted vials of passion.”
💬 “Eventually, you’ll have to stop impersonating a skimmed stone. There are other ways of parting.”
💭 If diaspora is defined as the dispersion of people from their original homeland, then what does it mean to write diaspora poetry? This is the question Mehri’s incredible debut poetry collection, BAD DIASPORA POEMS, explores.
The collection is set out like a kind of historical record, starting in the 1830s with the first colonial incursions in Somalia, reaching the present day later in the collection. Throughout, Mehri weaves her own family’s history with the stories of so many others, creating a rich tapestry of the diaspora experience - its nuances, its paradoxes, its complexities.
In the collection, Mehri explores the complex relationship between the diaspora and their home country, and the impact this can have upon an individual, or group’s, identity and sense of belonging - and where, if anywhere, they see as home.
Although each and every poem was breathtaking, some favourites of mine were RECIPROCITY IS A TWO-WAY STREET, SUFFICIENTLY MEMORABLE PASSWORD RECOVERY FOR THE REFUGEE PARENT, and I SCREAM, YOU SCREAM, WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM. But honestly I could list countless others here; they were all incredible with some lines that stopped me in my tracks, demanding a reread.
Mehri’s poetry is both beautiful and biting, an ode to the immigrant experience. Although I am by no means a big poetry reader (yet), this is one I can see myself revisiting multiple times and I cannot wait to see what Mehri writes next.
💬 “These diaspora poems are monsoons of second-hand nostalgia, our diluted vials of passion.”
💬 “Eventually, you’ll have to stop impersonating a skimmed stone. There are other ways of parting.”
💭 If diaspora is defined as the dispersion of people from their original homeland, then what does it mean to write diaspora poetry? This is the question Mehri’s incredible debut poetry collection, BAD DIASPORA POEMS, explores.
The collection is set out like a kind of historical record, starting in the 1830s with the first colonial incursions in Somalia, reaching the present day later in the collection. Throughout, Mehri weaves her own family’s history with the stories of so many others, creating a rich tapestry of the diaspora experience - its nuances, its paradoxes, its complexities.
In the collection, Mehri explores the complex relationship between the diaspora and their home country, and the impact this can have upon an individual, or group’s, identity and sense of belonging - and where, if anywhere, they see as home.
Although each and every poem was breathtaking, some favourites of mine were RECIPROCITY IS A TWO-WAY STREET, SUFFICIENTLY MEMORABLE PASSWORD RECOVERY FOR THE REFUGEE PARENT, and I SCREAM, YOU SCREAM, WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM. But honestly I could list countless others here; they were all incredible with some lines that stopped me in my tracks, demanding a reread.
Mehri’s poetry is both beautiful and biting, an ode to the immigrant experience. Although I am by no means a big poetry reader (yet), this is one I can see myself revisiting multiple times and I cannot wait to see what Mehri writes next.
July 18, 2023
This is a powerful first collection from Momtaza Mehri. It's powerful poetry given solidity by the fantastic phrasing. It sings.
Again I mention Anna Akhmatova's 'Requiem' and the role of the poet as witness. When she was asked 'Can you describe this?' when recognised outside the prison where her husband and son were held. And she replied, 'I can'. There's an echo of that thought in the poem 'Ubertragung' - Who can name it all & stand to tell the truth of it?
I'm a bit too tired to give this the full review it deserves. Suffice it to say I think you should read it. I think for a first collection it shows a maturity and control that one probably shouldn't expect. Whole poems are superb, but within them are phrases that stab at you like a stiletto that will be remembered for a long time.
My favourite poems in the collection are Rimbaud in Harar, Delete as Appropriate , A Guest Takes Off Her Shoes, and Untitled , but the whole collection is worth a read.
Again I mention Anna Akhmatova's 'Requiem' and the role of the poet as witness. When she was asked 'Can you describe this?' when recognised outside the prison where her husband and son were held. And she replied, 'I can'. There's an echo of that thought in the poem 'Ubertragung' - Who can name it all & stand to tell the truth of it?
I'm a bit too tired to give this the full review it deserves. Suffice it to say I think you should read it. I think for a first collection it shows a maturity and control that one probably shouldn't expect. Whole poems are superb, but within them are phrases that stab at you like a stiletto that will be remembered for a long time.
My favourite poems in the collection are Rimbaud in Harar, Delete as Appropriate , A Guest Takes Off Her Shoes, and Untitled , but the whole collection is worth a read.
July 14, 2024
So this was a struggle. I usually read poetry books one at a time and try to savour and reread and rereread until tasted and digested.
Which is wrong. Poems are no more like food than set breakfast 4 at Pontis in Chesham is like Starlight Express or The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock or or Apocalypse Now or the Toyora Aygo or The Repair Shop or my Granny's fish pie or the final movement of Beethoven's 6th symphony or Monday's Agile project stand-up meeting or the smell of a baby's head where the neck laps against the start of the head.
So, I read it start to finish in one go. And it made more sense as I made less. And the bell tolled more sharply as playtime came to an end. And the cars on the motorway sounded less like a river in the distance and more like the gasping and approving crowd at Centre Court.
And they were much better because I was a better reader and listener because like the poems I was both exemplar and critique. I was both chooser and the chewed, the cud and the could, the wood and the trees.
Which is wrong. Poems are no more like food than set breakfast 4 at Pontis in Chesham is like Starlight Express or The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock or or Apocalypse Now or the Toyora Aygo or The Repair Shop or my Granny's fish pie or the final movement of Beethoven's 6th symphony or Monday's Agile project stand-up meeting or the smell of a baby's head where the neck laps against the start of the head.
So, I read it start to finish in one go. And it made more sense as I made less. And the bell tolled more sharply as playtime came to an end. And the cars on the motorway sounded less like a river in the distance and more like the gasping and approving crowd at Centre Court.
And they were much better because I was a better reader and listener because like the poems I was both exemplar and critique. I was both chooser and the chewed, the cud and the could, the wood and the trees.
January 7, 2024
even as a lover of poetry i oftentimes struggle with the authenticity of poets. a lot of contemporary poetry can sound pretentious. this collection did not suffer from this issue in my opinion (maybe because its content is explicitly political?) and mehri's poems are beautifully crafted. you can tell that each word written was deliberately chosen. most importantly, mehri knows what she's writing about - both due to her lived experience and her knowledge of appropriate histories, literature & (pop) culture.
favourites:
- reciprocity is a two-way street
- preludes
- this little, this late
- a violet coagulation of dispersals
- delete as appropriate
- apricot season
- muddied commitments
- glory be to the gang gang gang
favourites:
- reciprocity is a two-way street
- preludes
- this little, this late
- a violet coagulation of dispersals
- delete as appropriate
- apricot season
- muddied commitments
- glory be to the gang gang gang
October 27, 2024
"Arterial blood is theatrical, like the desire for a time before your
time.
The world will not stop when you do, or even before.
Yes, being the one who survived, the one who made it to this side,
is a full-time job. But no one asked you to take it.
Diaspora is witnessing a murder without getting blood on your shirt.
Your body is the evidence of its absence."
"Mother, let me mourn what I have never seen.
Rub my scalp and tell me who I could have been.
Feed me a morsel or two. This hunger terrifies me.
My feet are wet. My heart is a squeeze of envy.
Thumbprints only muddy the sleeves of a family album.
I would die to relive even the most ordinary of your days."
time.
The world will not stop when you do, or even before.
Yes, being the one who survived, the one who made it to this side,
is a full-time job. But no one asked you to take it.
Diaspora is witnessing a murder without getting blood on your shirt.
Your body is the evidence of its absence."
"Mother, let me mourn what I have never seen.
Rub my scalp and tell me who I could have been.
Feed me a morsel or two. This hunger terrifies me.
My feet are wet. My heart is a squeeze of envy.
Thumbprints only muddy the sleeves of a family album.
I would die to relive even the most ordinary of your days."
June 26, 2025
"Let this be the fragmented measure of our exquisitely accumulated realness. Realness as quantified by the lusciously clandestine currency of struggle, whatever that means to whoever is asking."
Utterly astounding. Best thing I've read in upwards of two years. Truly erudite and sensual and yearning and singular. I think my favourite poems are Apricot Season; The Apocalypse Will Taste Like Concentrated Grape Juice; A Violet Coagulation of Dispersals; and From A Distance, Anteo Zamboni Glimpses the White Horse.
6 stars. If not more.
Utterly astounding. Best thing I've read in upwards of two years. Truly erudite and sensual and yearning and singular. I think my favourite poems are Apricot Season; The Apocalypse Will Taste Like Concentrated Grape Juice; A Violet Coagulation of Dispersals; and From A Distance, Anteo Zamboni Glimpses the White Horse.
6 stars. If not more.
November 28, 2023
I picked this up thanks to an upcoming event with Mary Jean Chan, and I’m glad I did - I’ll watch out for works in the future by Momtaza Mehri! Her poems are beautifully lyrical, though I felt occasionally like the poems flew over my head (à la Will Harris - I need to read more history); the ones that did land for me really packed a punch.
January 4, 2026
Okay picture this. Another person had an experience I can only try to imagine, OK ? Very different from mine, very intense, terribly vivid.
Well this book is like of that person reached into my heart, opened its little trapdoors, and screamed at it THIS IS HOW I HAVE BEEN LIVING, ISNT IT INTENSE?? but using gorgeous sentences and imagery instead.
It's really moving, I loved it.
Well this book is like of that person reached into my heart, opened its little trapdoors, and screamed at it THIS IS HOW I HAVE BEEN LIVING, ISNT IT INTENSE?? but using gorgeous sentences and imagery instead.
It's really moving, I loved it.
February 13, 2024
Mehri's poems bring to light swept-under truths in eloquent, swallow-sized language – a must read for anyone who has experienced diaspora, is a child of, is a descendent of... a brilliant, thought-provoking, tear-jerking collection.
March 12, 2024
4.5 stars
favourites:
- ‘A Few Facts We Hesitantly Know to Be Somewhat True’
- ‘Rimbaud in Harar’
- ‘Reciprocity is a Two-way Street’
- ‘Somewhere in Napoli, Sometime in May’
- ‘Procession’
- ‘This Little, This Late’
- ‘Apricot Season’
favourites:
- ‘A Few Facts We Hesitantly Know to Be Somewhat True’
- ‘Rimbaud in Harar’
- ‘Reciprocity is a Two-way Street’
- ‘Somewhere in Napoli, Sometime in May’
- ‘Procession’
- ‘This Little, This Late’
- ‘Apricot Season’
February 18, 2024
Best poetry collection I've read
February 21, 2024
Life altering
Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews