The Poetics of Grief with Hala Alyan

This week we are joined by Hala Alyan, a Palestinian-American writer, poet, and clinical psychologist, who is also a professor at NYU. A specialist in trauma and cross-cultural identity, and the author of the award-winning novel Salt Houses, as well as four collections of poetry, including The Moon that Turns You Back (2024), Hala brings her expertise as a psychologist and a writer to talk about bearing witness to genocide, and the fatigue, anger and repetition that accompanies the grief of witnessing. She also reads poetry for us, and speaks openly about her own personal vulnerabilities and struggles as she considers how poetry as a form can activate connection by reaching across time and cultures, while saying what cannot be said, and what will not be heard.