“This book will not resonate with everyone,” (ix) boldly begins Carolyn Ramzy’s
autoethnographic collection Taslīm: We Are the Prophets. Subtitled Poems on a
Coptic Girlhood, this genre-blended collection showcases the power of an unfaltering
voice. Through poems, personal essays, and diary entries, Ramzy yanks back the
Coptic red curtain to dissect her girlhood, revel in her womanhood, and speak a new
heaven into existence.
The collection’s focus is on taslīm: the oral transmission of ancestral knowledge,
often in the form of sung liturgies and hymns, in Coptic Orthodox Christianity. As a
religious minority in Muslim-majority Egypt, Coptic taslīm carry memories of persecution
and generational trauma that are foundational to Coptic communal identity.
Drawing on Audre Lorde’s “Uses of the Erotic,” and Renato Rosaldo’s antropoesía,
Ramzy demonstrates “the triple bind of diaspora Coptic girlhood” (9) and reimagines
a taslīm of repair and empowerment. Navigating the ambiguities of language,
both English and Arabic, Ramzy’s voice is a clear note in a chorus of words slippery
with meaning.
Confessional poetry is particularly potent when performed out loud, and I believe
that holds true for the poems in this collection. Their consistent alliteration falls
upon the ear deliciously, especially the “C” sound: as in Coptic, Christ, and curl.
The use of italics evokes the urgency and power of a spoken word performance,
even on the silent page. The poems tend to run short, which often works to their
advantage, but other times falls flat. Pieces like “Coptic FGM” (31), “Good Coptic
Girlhood” (48), and “Reparations” (80) leverage their short length and direct, accessible
language to punch straight to the heart of a complex idea, leaving the reader
breathless. On the other hand, some short poems left me thinking only, “Is that it?”
“Re-writing Eve.” (75) is one such piece; “Coptic Porn Star” (88) executes a similar
theme much more effectively because it has the word count to do so. Most of the poems
that lingered with me were the longer ones, simply because they had more room
to operate; “Little Egyptian Drag King” (103–4) is my favourite in the whole collection
because of its rich, detailed imagery that is repeated nowhere else in the book.
