This manuscript, titled "Underpainting," is a collection of poems that reflect on childhood, family, war, beauty, and my own passage through girlhood as the child of a Somali father and an American mother. The poems touch upon the mythological figure of Helen of Troy, 9/11, and the way that trauma glows beneath the surface of present lived experience. Like layers of paint, suppressed experiences never truly disappear, even if partly obscured within the prism of memory. My poems grapple with self-presentation into womanhood, and the dressing down of beauty, lending another dimension to "underpainting," a term used in art books that illustrate techniques of the old masters of Renaissance painting. The brighter layers of paint flicker and cause the shadowy canvas to glow from within. Each poem in this manuscript peels away another layer of experience, dream, or reverie to lay bare some emotional truth of terrible beauty—and mystery. Like a painting, or any work of art, a memory poem is always abstract, always symbolic, yet somehow it reveals emotional truth with stark precision.
Subject (authority = RUETD)
Topic
Creative Writing
RelatedItem (type = host)
TitleInfo
Title
Rutgers University Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Identifier (type = RULIB)
ETD
Identifier
ETD_6372
PhysicalDescription
Form (authority = gmd)
electronic resource
InternetMediaType
application/pdf
InternetMediaType
text/xml
Extent
1 online resource (iv, 49 p. : ill.)
Note (type = degree)
M.F.A.
Note (type = statement of responsibility)
by Safia Jama
RelatedItem (type = host)
TitleInfo
Title
Graduate School - Newark Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Identifier (type = local)
rucore10002600001
Location
PhysicalLocation (authority = marcorg); (displayLabel = Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey)
I hereby grant to the Rutgers University Libraries and to my school the non-exclusive right to archive, reproduce and distribute my thesis or dissertation, in whole or in part, and/or my abstract, in whole or in part, in and from an electronic format, subject to the release date subsequently stipulated in this submittal form and approved by my school. I represent and stipulate that the thesis or dissertation and its abstract are my original work, that they do not infringe or violate any rights of others, and that I make these grants as the sole owner of the rights to my thesis or dissertation and its abstract. I represent that I have obtained written permissions, when necessary, from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis or dissertation and will supply copies of such upon request by my school. I acknowledge that RU ETD and my school will not distribute my thesis or dissertation or its abstract if, in their reasonable judgment, they believe all such rights have not been secured. I acknowledge that I retain ownership rights to the copyright of my work. I also retain the right to use all or part of this thesis or dissertation in future works, such as articles or books.