Warsan Shire (Warsan Shire)

Who is she?

Warsan Shire is a Somali-British poet, writer and teacher (Wikipedia, Warsan Shire). The Poetry Foundation notes she was born in Nairobi, raised in London, and was the first Young Poet Laureate of London (Poetry Foundation, Warsan Shire).

Early life

She was born on 1 August 1988 in Kenya to Somali parents, and came to the United Kingdom with her family at the age of one (Wikipedia). She studied creative writing at London Metropolitan University and graduated in 2010 (same source).

Her poems

She writes for and about people whose voices are often not heard, such as refugees and migrants (Wikipedia). Her lines "No one leaves home unless / home is the mouth of a shark", from the poem "Home", have been called "a rallying call for refugees and their advocates" (Wikipedia). She has said she works "through memory, my memories and other people's memories, trying to essentially just make sense of stuff" (same source).

Her main books are:

• Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth (2011), a short collection (Poetry Foundation)
• Her Blue Body (2015), a limited pamphlet (same source)
• Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head (2022), her first full-length collection (Wikipedia)

She has read her poems in Britain, Italy, Germany, North America, South Africa and Kenya. Her work appears in collections such as Ten: The New Wave (2014) and New Daughters of Africa (2019) (Wikipedia). She is poetry editor at Spook magazine and teaches poetry workshops.

Her poems have been translated into Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Swedish, Danish and Estonian, among others (same source).

Prizes and Lemonade

In 2013 she won the first Brunel University African Poetry Prize (Wikipedia). She was chosen as London's first Young Poet Laureate (Poetry Foundation).

Beyoncé used her poetry in the film Lemonade (2016), after reading her piece "For Women Who Are Difficult to Love". Beyoncé used her work again in Black Is King (2020) (Wikipedia).

In short

A poet writing in English about Somali migration and families. See Somalis in London.