Fugitive/Refuge

Dynamically pairing traditional and experimental forms, Philip Metres traces ancient and modern migrations in an investigation of the ever-shifting idea of home.In Fugitive/Refuge, Philip Metres follows the journey of his refugee ancestors--from Lebanon to Mexico to the United States--in a vivid exploration of what it means to long for home. A book-length qasida, the collection draws on both ancient traditions and innovative forms--odes and arabics, sonnets and cut-ups, prayers and documentary voicings, heroic couplets and homophonic translations--in order to confront the perils of our age: forced migration, climate change, and toxic nationalism. Fugitive/Refuge pronounces the urge both to remember the past and to forge new poetic forms and ways of being in language. In one section, Metres meditates on the Arabic greeting--ahlan wa sahlan--and asks how older forms of welcome might offer generous and embodied ways of responding to the challenges of mass migration and digital alienation