At the border, 1979Choman Hardi

By Vicky MacConnachie and Laura Evans

Context

Choman Hardi was born in 1974 Iraqi Kurdistan. Her family fled to Iran when she was a month old to escape the regime of Saddam Hussein. She returned to Kurdistan in 1979 at the age of 5. The poem is about her reaching the border and finally seeing her homeland.

What is it about?

Someone crossing the border back into their homeland as a child. The family sound helpless and anxious.

The adults are very emotional about crossing the border back to their homeland and the narrator can't understand why it's so important to them when things look the same on both sides of the border.

Themes and Ideas

HomeImmigrationWar Refugee Life

Identity

The main theme of At The Border, 1979 is home and a sense of belonging and safety. At the time the poem is set, Hardi does not recognise the importance of ‘home’ and does not understand why everybody is so excited. She is disappointed to find that ‘home’ looks exactly the same as everywhere else. Hardi’s message is that ‘home’ is a very important place, although she does not recognise it at the age of 5.

Themes and Ideas- Quotes

“We are going home”- 11“Much cleaner”- 12“More beautiful”- 13“Much kinder”- 14“I can inhale home”- 16“ Kissed his muddy homeland”- 26

Form

The piece follows the convention of anarrative poem telling the story of the eventThere is no rhyme schemeIt is also an example of ‘free verse’ as itfollows no set structure

Audience

• The narrator of the poem seems to speak as if to friends, using familiar language with no sophisticated vocabulary, this also helps to convey a sense of innocence about the narrator

Structure and language

The poem uses a narrative structure to tell the story of the border crossing. The poem uses many features found in narrative writing such as personal pronouns, detailed descriptions and direct speech. The poem has an informal, conversational feel, as if the poet is talking to us.

Structure and language

• The poem uses many images of separation and division, and the poem appears to be split into two sections:Lines 1- 19: Language is simpler and more informal, tone of optimism and excitementLine 20- 27: Change in mood and language, feeling of excitement wanes and a sense of disappointment is suggested

Imagery

• An example of imagery in the poem is: ‘The land under our feet continued

Divided by a thick iron chain’– This gives an impression that everything continues in the same

way and adds a sense of monotony to the event being described – It tells the reader that it is only in the eyes of countries that there

is any division in the land, to the naïve child the land is the same and it is only an artificial divide

• Another is:‘I can inhale home, somebody said.’

– This portrays the image of someone trying to breath in their homeland and to take it inside them

– It also shows that the child is on of the few who are not becoming overwhelmed by the sense of returning

Imagery• Another example is:

‘The autumn soil continued on the other sideWith the same colour, the same texture.

It rained on both sides of the chain’– The descriptive language creates the image of the scene for the

reader so that they understand how it looked to be there and supports the idea that nothing changes either side of the border

Language

The language in the first part of the poem (lines 1 to 19) is quite simple and childish. An example of the childishness is when Hardi says “The border guards told her off”. This almost seems as if Hardi is ‘telling on’ her sister.

In the second part (lines 20-27), the childishness is replaced with more serious and poetic words. “The same chain of mountains encompassed all of us.”

Language

Choman Hardi doesn’t use many sound effects. There is no use of alliteration or onomatopoeia. This could be because Hardi is more concerned about telling her story that using poetic devices.

Hardi does use some repetition in the poem. The word “waited” is repeated. This gives a sense of time passing and also how Hardi might have felt impatient. Hardi also says “the same colour, the same texture”. This repetition outlines her disappointment at her homeland.

Voice

• Overall the voice of the child seems naïve and confused by the strength of the adults reaction to returning to the homeland

• The child’s naivety gives a simple and innocent quality to the poem through the use of language

Voice‘The autumn soil continued on the other side

With the same colour, the same texture.It rained on both sides of the chain’

– It shows the child’s naivety, they are surprised it is raining on both sides of the border chain, this implies that they believed a different country would not have similarities to the previous one

– It also suggests that the child has no illusions of the ‘homeland’ being better than where they are leaving

Voice‘A man bent down and kissed his muddy homeland.The same chain of mountains encompassed all of us’– The use of ‘muddy’ not only gives an impression of

the scene it continues with the idea that the child is disillusioned about moving to this new country

– The final line supports the view as the child seems confused that people are so happy to be return to the homeland that they will ‘kiss’ the land, but for child nothing has changed, they are still surrounded by the same mountains and so may as well be on the other side of the border

Thank you for listening