Literature and Arts help Slemani (Iraq) cope with COVID-19

By New Zealand National Commission (UNESCO) | Posted:

Creativity is linking us all during the COVID-19 pandemic, and UNESCO Creative Cities are joining up and devising new ways to be connected and share culture as we experience more physically isolated lives.

UNESCO City of Literature, Slemani, in Iraq has called out to its peers and asked for written works of optimism and positivity to help people cope during the global pandemic.

City of Literature Dunedin, New Zealand contributed a poem from local writer, Jilly O'Brien Poetry, Otago Harbour, to the forthcoming project, and we're lucky to be sharing it with you today:

Otago Harbour

Tonight is quiet water
gentle hands and walking feet
under pāua shell sky
shimmer dimmed
after many turns of the tide
left to lie resting
over Hereweka
towards the ocean side
keeping hands and feet to self
waves stand still or so it seems
holding off until
hoiho stumbles home
matuku settles in
kawau says ‘Let us pray’
Ko te rā māeneene
Ā te rāhui Takaroa
We should rest
We should rest

Jilly O’Brien

*whakataukī from Patricia and Waiariki Grace

The project, Caring for Each Other is a Human Right, will publish the texts in a book and online.

https://en.unesco.org/news/literature-and-arts-help-slemani-iraq-cope-covid-19