A Memory That Burns

A Memory That Burns is a an evening of poetry, reflection, and collective creation led by Gazan poet Mohammed Moussa, founder of the Gaza Poets Society. Rooted in lived experience and shaped by exile, Moussa’s spoken-word performance bears witness to a memory that is not merely a recollection of pain, but a tapestry of joy, resistance, and unbroken lineage. His work speaks to loss and survival, to what has been taken and what endures, insisting that memory itself is a living force, one that refuses erasure.

Through poems forged in and beyond Gaza, Moussa explores how remembering becomes an act of meaning-making. To be Palestinian is to carry a memory that is both a burden and a beacon. It is dangerous to live with this memory, to die with it, to dream with it. A Palestinian who remembers is a revolution in human form. To remember is to resist; to speak of that memory is to protest; to think of return is to wield hope as a weapon.

It is the story of a people who refuse to be erased, who weave their past into their present and their dreams into their future. To fight for memory is to fight for more than survival—it is to fight for meaning, for identity, for the right to exist as a complete human being.

Founded in 2018, the Gaza Poets Society (website | Facebook | Instagram) is the first spoken-word poetry community in the Gaza Strip, dedicated to supporting emerging Gazan poets and connecting them with the international literary community.

The evening will be hosted by renowned poet and community worker Sarah Clancy and will feature a panel discussion, exploring the role of poetry and art in times of genocide and displacement, followed by a participatory creative session. Audiences are invited to write poems or create visual responses to “the city held in the palm of the sea” (poems to Gaza) as an act of shared witness and care, with opportunities to share work aloud in a collective discussion. Selected contributions will be published in Gaza Verse: Art Beyond Borders, a journal of solidarity and song by the Gaza Poets Society, continuing a collaboration rooted in remembrance, resistance, and artistic connection.

A Memory That Burns is ultimately a gathering around a promise. In this war, every act of remembering is an act of defiance. Every story told, every song sung, every step taken toward return is a victory. For the Palestinian, memory is not just a record of what was—it is a promise of what will be. And in that promise lies a power that no oppressor can extinguish.

This gathering is presented in collaboration with Artists Against Genocide and Comhlámh.

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Host or Publisher Imagine! Belfast Festival of Ideas & Politics