Nayyirah Waheed — Poetry is for everyone #12

Can you help me crack the case of the Banksy of poetry?

Nayyirah Waheed’s latest book preFICTION cannot be found anywhere. Released in 2021 for free as a digital book only, now it’s as if it never existed. It’s like the streamers removing on demand shows off their platforms without warning never to be seen again (which happened on HBO Max quite recently) except it’s the creator of this work who is the arbiter in the dramatic overshadowing of mystery and secrecy that her work has quite suddenly become shrouded in. Here’s what I have uncovered thus far about the ‘most famous poet on the internet’…

The only information I could track down about the book itself was this review which includes the below image of the book’s cover and a handful of extracts from the text. There was no other press coverage that I could find whatsoever — feel free to contradict me in the comments on this if you can track down more sources!

So what do we have here… an inherently ‘90s Reebok/Nike Air-esque trainer with a challenging to read bit of print beneath it? The book sounds fascinatingly abstract - according to its one review - and a world away from Waheed’s previous works.

Waheed’s first book salt. was published in 2013 and her second Nejma followed shortly after in 2014 but neither, not even her name brings forth a single search result anymore on any of the independent online bookstores that I buy my books through now — bizarrely you can still buy both her books on Amazon which doesn’t seem particularly aligned with Waheed’s anti-establishment stance, but hey. Fortunately I already own both books but if you’re a fan of her work I sort of think you should buy them whilst you can because I’m getting a real sense that a time might come when you can’t.

Her website links to a single cryptic holding page, advocating for Black business though not linking to anything other than her Instagram account:

And the account it links to is an unverified Instagram account (I’m certain it used to be a verified one under a different username) with only 250 followers and no longer shares daily posts of her work as it once did garnering Waheed the crowning title of ‘most famous poet on the internet’. In fact everything has been wiped (hard relate but also seriously, the plot thickens), now it just has three published posts — one from November 2022 promoting a graphic novel/ EP: The E.P.ilogue, the second is a reel posted in May of this year and promises a new book of poetry which looks more in line with her original creations (that at the time of writing has not yet materialised) but but BUT, in some crazy amazing magical kismet alignment she posted a third post just three days ago!! I genuinely had a feeling this might happen so have been periodically checking her account but couldn’t believe it when I saw this post. Could this be an extract from the new work? I have included images of all three posts below.

When you find that there is no form — to express your vision. You create one. You create a new form.

Images from Nayyirah Waheed’s Instagram, posted 28 November 2022.

MTTU here is referring to ‘Madina to the Universe’ an album released in 2021 recorded by an artist named M.anifest who of course also features in her narrative showcased here, as the ‘new astronaut’ protagonist. The link in bio takes you to the newer EP record on all the standard music platforms — I’ve included my favourite song from the EP below Travel Noir. This track, despite having additional female vocals on it has no other artist credited other than M.anifest himself… curious. I have done lots of digging around M.anifest too who has a much more visible online presence but those leads didn’t lead… anywhere. Is she the singer? Is she the lyricist? Is she the producer? Is she his partner? A few of the other songs do share credentials but I cannot see Waheed’s name amongst them.

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Image of the reel from Nayyirah Waheed’s Instagram, posted 29 May 2023.

Images from Nayyirah Waheed’s Instagram, posted 6 September 2023.

I mean, aren’t you INTRIGUED?

What else do we know about her? Her poetry is deceptively simple and I adore it. Comparisons are often drawn between her and Rupi Kaur (Instagram incidentally is how I discovered them both) but Waheed’s work for me is far more lived in than Kaur’s, dare I say, more sophisticated, or mature even? There are unquestionably similarities between them — to the point of plagiarism though? Some people think so — that Kaur’s work is derivative of Waheed’s, not the other way round. The structure of their work is the most notable parallel, they also self-published their first books; Kaur’s Milk & Honey was released in 2014, after Waheed’s salt. and just a few months after Nejma. But although Kaur admits she has been influenced by Waheed, Kaur began performing her poems years before Instagram ever existed, in 2009, so she had skin in the game. There is a Wikipedia page which claims that Waheed herself has accused Kaur of plagiarism, also that she’s pals with Yrsa Daley-Ward and she’s a fan of poet Sonia Sanchez but judging by the gross number of inaccuracies on my own Wikipedia page (sorry, not sorry yes I have looked it up) I’m not taking any of that as fact.

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Whilst researching this piece I was away from home (and my books) so downloaded the re-released digital versions of salt. and Nejma and found they were not at all as I remember them which means to say, relatively straightforward collections of poetry. At first I thought I was going mad! I discovered that the versions I downloaded have been retroactively edited, even their covers look oddly digitised. Our steadfast source for all things pre and post preFICTION (the one review) mentioned this but failed to mention that the originals were completely erased in the process, certainly in terms of digital copies at least. These new versions reflect the same linguistic form as her recent and since mysteriously withdrawn work, though these versions were released in 2019, pre preFICTION — to somehow reclaim them, I wonder? Her creations are so prolifically posted online that I wouldn’t blame her for feeling as though they got snatched away from her too soon, or her work is being plagiarised like having a song sung back to you barely moments after you’ve found its melody. It genuinely feels now though like the books are written in a code that only Waheed is privy to. Perhaps once you have immersed yourself in the full spectrum of the book’s experience you begin to get a feel for it, the intention being that it is a more of a sensory experience that transcends the written word.

A sample from one of the first pages in the 2019 digital re-publication of salt.

An image from the original paperback version of salt.

Understandably you might argue that internet fame is what made Nayyirah Waheed shrink away from the public eye to such an extreme degree but even prior to that like the interminably sequestered Banksy, no image of her has ever been confirmed online or otherwise — though she isn’t so notoriously faceless as Banksy is, I guess because poetry isn’t as sexy as fine art? I beg to differ.

I knew nothing of this mystery until I began writing this piece. Nayyirah Waheed was just someone whose poetry I loved, whose books I bought years ago. I had no need to seek out her likeness. Now, she’s become an even more fascinating conundrum to me than a cryptex stumbled upon in a museum of hidden treasures.

Though I perhaps admire her even more for her closely guarded anonymity in a world obsessed with image and access, her original works are still poems that I deeply treasure, no matter how commonly popularised many of them have become, so I am sharing a handful of my favourites below — with a whole lot more curiosity about the artist who remains hidden, behind them.

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Five poems by Nayyirah Waheed

1

my
mother
was
my first country.
the first place i ever lived.


— lands

2

there is you and you.
this is a relationship.
this is the most important relationship.


— home

3

the hard season
will 
split you through.
do not worry.
you will bleed water.
do not worry.
this is grief.
your face will fall out and down your skin
and
there will be scorching.
but do not worry.
keep speaking the years from their hiding places.
keep coughing up smoke from all those deaths you
have died.
keep the rage tender.
because the soft season will come.
it will come.
loud.
ready.
gulping.
both hands in your chest.
up all night.
up all of the nights.
to drink all damage into love.


— therapy

4

i want more 'men'
with flowers falling from their skin.
more water in their eyes.
more tremble in their bodies. 
more women in their hearts
than
on their hands.
more softness in their height.
more honesty in their voice.
more wonder. 
more humility in their feet. 


— less

5

do not choose the lesser life.
do you hear me.
do you hear me.
choose the life that is. yours.
the life that is seducing your lungs.
that is dripping down your chin.

What do you make of all this? Were you already familiar with Waheed’s work, or that her identity was cloaked in secrecy? Did you read preFICTION before it was withdrawn? Do you know how I can get a copy? Do you have any insider intel that can help solve the riddle of who she really is? I’d love to hear from you.

I am now an affiliate of Bookshop.org so if you’d like to read more from any of the featured artists on our growing poetry curation, I have put together a selection on my page <3

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