Stavanger welcomes new Guest Writer

Norwan arrived in Stavanger City of Refuge earlier this year. Norwan (pseudonym) is a female poet from Afghanistan, born in 1984. Due to her own and her family's safety she will remain anonymous - only using her chosen pseudonym Norwan.

Norwan has written both poems and texts describing what it is like being a woman in Afghanistan. Although expressing herself has led to serious threats to herself and others, Norwan still feels it is important for women in Afghanistan to speak up

There are very few who write out of Afghanistan. Most of the stories about life of women in Afghanistan are written by foreign female writers or male Afghan writers, she says.

 -

An Afghan Poet

(by Norwan)

Mothers

Sisters

Friends

Where are you?

Can you hear me?

I am a writer

An Afghan woman writer

But no one cares for my writings

No one reads them here

It is a crime

For a woman to write.

I am an Afghan woman writer

I don’t dare to read my poems aloud

The words cry when I write

The sentences hug me and say,

“Take it easy!”

My writing is cheap

It only brings tears.

I am an Afghan woman writer

Where can I write?

Somewhere I can hide my words

There is a mountain of papers in my heart

And a bank of stories to write

But I am afraid.

Hey, women of the world

Can you hear me?

Help me

Before I’m forced to

Bury my writings.

Let me write my last poem

Let me ask

Where can I find a lucky woman?

Where can I go to see a happy woman?

Where?