My Roots: Poetry of Place

Amidst all the clamour and confusion, the demands and distractions of our days, where do we find a guided space to delve into our inner lives? A space to ask: Where did we come from, and where are we now?  On June 7, 2025, the Vancouver Writers Fest hosted our annual My Roots writing workshop for immigrants to Canada, where poet Evelyn Lau worked with participants to develop poems exploring their past experiences and present lives.

Discover a selection of poetry from our 2025 My Roots cohort below.

Limiting beliefs by Mara Alvarez

Diasporic Diabetes by Shruthi Budnar

Seven Seeds and Poisoned Rivers by Marianne El-Mikati

From my window in Vancouver by Niamh Elliott-Sheridan

Spending time by Kirsty Ferguson

Provecho by Julia C. Hackstaff

Pierogi by Gosia Ilnicka

When War Comes Home by Mahtab Madadyari

Coca-Cola, God and the Titanic by Kayla Ocampo

Excerpt from “Childhood” By Leila Sadeghi

One cup of tea by Akashdeep Singh

Homeward by Sugandha Talwelkar

Amtrak 517 by Andrés Ignacio Torres

Refined emotions by Antares Valle

Limiting beliefs
By Mara Alvarez

Lie.
Fuck before meals like saying grace.
Drink another’s fear
and piss it out like water.

Pretend the world is endless.
Stop pretending.
Feel, in your whole body
the joyful flame
of creating the impossible.

Love your body.
Use it slowly,
laying fire on fire
with no vow
to stop.

Guilt is heavy,
and offers nothing.

Your back breaks
from building a cage
with no warden,
just a hymn
to something
that was never there.

Diasporic Diabetes
By Shruthi Budnar

How do I encapsulate
the richness of carbs when they mingle with the stench
of sweat?
Shall I name it ‘sickly sweet summer breath’?

My father hands me dreams and dust
A bowl of rice is all it takes to migrate—
Young orphan, he inherits tales
waters it down, doubles the portion
Climbs the ladder, gathers coconuts. A dollop of cream—

A trip to Elephant Garden Creamery for a scoop
goes through
a path
down the memory lane
Coconut milk Ganji tastes best when eaten
On a silver plate after two days of ritual fasting.

What should I name this piece? ‘Mango sticky rice’?
I refuse to glorify diabetic servings
Of diasporic glee

Seven Seeds and Poisoned Rivers
By Marianne El-Mikati

“I count, in grains
of rice, the number
of years I’ve spent in my homelands.
Seven seeds for seven years, memories that grow
more withered in every season that passes without harvest.
Every day since soundtracked by the whir
of an airplane I can’t escape, a festering
wound birthed by the envenomed arrow of hope.

I cook my grandmother’s recipes and let the sour taste
of emptied belonging melt into my mouth, a dizzying
ocean of herbs and sauces softening
into a searing sorrow that burns the prayers
on the tip of my tongue.

I crane my neck to see,
trying to find a fresh path
backwards into my memory,
a sensorial road
leading me to a home I know
only through the deep pulse of my body,
a home that only shelters forgotten bones, a home
that exiles those young enough to dream of more.

I know there is no fertile earth to dig through,
the soil of my mind, a burial site I will forever return to.
I know I have reaped all I can from the seeds I was given,
that missing a dying nation is a haunting prison.

There is a certain kind of grief
that cloaks a life insistent
on continuing, undeterred
by a mind driven mad with remembrance.
There is a bitter aftertaste that lingers
in the mouth of those drinking from a poisoned river,
a stolen youth, the only echoing flavour.

From my window in Vancouver
By Niamh Elliott-Sheridan

I noticed goslings grow to geese,
I witnessed gray whales spouting life,
I lost track of multi-coloured skies and epic purple sunsets.
I have watched marriage proposals and murmuration, winter waves
and mountain silhouettes, snow on the beach and summer parties,
cats in cowboy hats, dogs in sidecars and squirrels leaping to their next meal,
festive fireworks and subtle city stars, cherry blossom petals fall, community
marathons and seawall strolls, cyclists and rollerblades and enough friendship
to make the world feel right again.
All I am missing from my dreamlike view –
Standing proud by a home cooked Irish Sunday roast, is you.

Spending time
By Kirsty Ferguson

Each second is a penny,
Each minute is a pound,
An hour, a crisp fifty note.
A day –
A jeweled crown.

Glistening in sapphires,
Rubies, pearls, aquamarine,
Each tick of the hour hand,
Emeralds and tourmaline.

They say diamonds are
A girl’s best friend.
And maybe that’s just true –
As I’d collect them by the dozen
For just one day with you.

So, take me to the mines,
I’ll dig for sparkling stones,
To spend our days,
And years, together –
Time,
The most precious element known. 

Provecho
By Julia C. Hackstaff

When I think of you and that sunny afternoon dread, it weighs

When I think of you and the endless hours I had to wait to get up from the table ’til I finished
my food, it weighs

When I think of the throwing, the shouting, the hate flying across the kitchen one corner to
another, it weighs

My whole life has been weighed down by you
Your effortless non-caring way of pretending everything was fine
I learned that from you

No repairs, no questions asked, no acknowledgement of any sort

I am full, stuffed through my ears, beyond my brains and behind in every way
Full of rage, confusion and despair

A silent rage that tip toes around at nights, shows up in the most unexpected situations, and
robs from me every opportunity of joy…

Your rage is my rage
You force fed it to me

As much as I held back, pretended, vomited, washed away every bite, lick and devouring effort
on your behalf; it still made its way into me… ’til it grew bigger than my heart, my gut and my
soul

When I think of you and that sunny afternoon dread, I weigh… and I can’t go back to when I
was a bird who flew away into the night, lost in her stories…

… light as her feathers

When I think of you, I learned that I am full of your rage.
But mine, mine is different and it needs the space yours is taking up.

Pierogi
By Gosia Ilnicka

Pierogi don’t need an “s”.
Pierogi are already plural.
Without your useless sound.

They can be soft, not chewy.
Sometimes crispy with a brown skin.
Add some sour cream on top.

Pierogi never had cheddar inside.
Boiled potatoes and cottage cheese
are more than enough.

Only Babcia can make them best.
Getting up at 4 am,
waking everyone up.

You refused to eat them so early.
Now there are none.
and she is gone.

When War Comes Home
By Mahtab Madadyari

The bricks are shaking.
Lights fly across the sky
like comic strips you know
you’re not supposed to enjoy it.

Fear speaks through every voice—
people running, shouting names
that sound familiar,
common in your town,
perhaps someone you once knew.

You text to ask, Are you okay?
Though you’re not sure how you feel yourself.
You’re in shock.
War is at your door.

Its dark, misty breath
has touched the clay alleys
of your gentle, humble city.
The home you thought
would stay untouched
until you grew old.

Even the trees seem afraid,
shimmering in the flashes
that pierce the night.
Those calm, tall trees,
the birds,
the shopkeepers,
the quiet faces you passed—
never smiling,
never stopping.

Now the mundane is gone.
Those soft sounds and daily sights,
the routes you took home—
all replaced
by sirens and fear.

Should I cry?
Should I pray?
What is right to do
when brutality knocks?

Who decided this fate?
Who allowed it?
The air tastes of gunpowder,
and I choke—
on greed, on lies,
on the thirst for power.

You can’t shut your eyes.
Can’t scroll past it.
War isn’t a reel.
It’s here.

In your living room.
In your sleep.
In your breath.
A shadow on all you love.

There is no safe place
until all wars
are gone.”

Coca-Cola, God and the Titanic
By Kayla Ocampo

The city awakens
By the constant vibrato
Of passing cash boxes
Driving to catch the limelight
Its speed oblivious to the
Muted gleams of frail galvanized
Steel roofs and penniless hot
Sweaty years

”All the great stuff in the skies is down here,”
he said
As he flew too close to the sun
The ashes of cold summer dreams
Fall on the tongues of
Early morning risers

Miscalculated, unaware
We bring the heavy darkness
On our backs, carrying them
To point B

But paradise ruptured from the birth of dreams
The bearer is the
Farmer of her deeds
Wounded, but crafting with tender hands
Knowing not all words, but the right ones
As we pass along a faithful
Peaceful night

Excerpt from “Childhood”
By Leila Sadeghi

Childhood might be a beginning for many,
But for me, it was an end—
An end to all the things
I was supposed to dream about when I grew up.

When I came home from school,
Opened the door My mom,
with a smile I loved—
And asked,
“What was your favorite food?”

I didn’t know then
That a smile could carry different meanings—
Acceptance, resignation, survival.
Sometimes it was just a way of saying:
We have no choice. We make do.

There weren’t many choices.
I had to accept some:
I couldn’t be the one I thought I may want.
I became what my language defined,
the land, or the history behind

And the dream—
The one I thought I should become—
If achieved, would no longer be mine.
It would erase me,
Replace me with someone new,
Someone who no longer knew.

One cup of tea
By Akashdeep Singh

I hear the sighs when I close my eyes
of places,
of languages,
of sounds,
and of the way the city smelt
when I left.
Every morning, I open them
with the one cup of tea I’m supposed to have
to keep my connection alive.
I still pour that boiling water
into the same cup I’ve had for years.
The concoction of of leaves and spices
that’s at once the same and not.
But still it brings me back
to 5PM on a weekday evening
when father would sneak into the kitchen
after whispering “will you have a cup?”
to everyone awake
and proceed to make some
waiting for no nods.
One day, I’d offered to help
and was born the first of many,
the ancestors to this one I hold.
This one, that wakes me up,
and puts me back to sleep;
that nurses me to health,
and arrests my nerves;
that feels like home,
and also like distance.
It must be the omitted milk, I wonder
or is it the bickering I miss?
Is it the leaves that are different
or the other three portions I miss?
Seven years, it’ll soon be
countless sips of coffee or tea,
and one solitary cup that
holds all that and more.
In this city of cafes and bubble teas
this one cup meekly stands
defiant, unyielding
in my little campaign daily
for one cup of tea.
For tis the cup that holds back the sighs,
and brings water to my roots.

Homeward
By Sugandha Talwelkar

I am a stranger here
The densely packed aisles of the grocery store
stand guard back to back,
staring beneath unforgiving lights.

They gape at me curiously
through brightly colored packs,
large and small, tins and cans.
The letters on them familiar,
yet the meaning slips my glance.

Food, the basic human need,
urges me to move my feet
explore furthermore
read the signs up above.
“International” the placard reads.
Rice, Noodles, and Curry I see
the essence of my homeland
narrowed into stereotypical limits

The newness refreshing at first
now feels alienating.
I move through the labyrinth
to the only place
that still feels home to me

For Tomatoes, red, juicy, ripe
stay the same across geography.
Onions, though massive,
retain their acidity
The tartness of lemon and lime
consistent across seas.

Sugar tastes the same level of sweet
some would argue with me
But how can I forget
the joy of sneaking
mini crystals of sweetness
from my mother’s pantry?

Familiarity has many forms,
comfort many physiques.
You leave more than people behind
when you venture out
to become your own tree.

Amtrak 517
By Andrés Ignacio Torres

crossing geographies, one border at a time,
convincing the officer
that I’m safe
no matter my origin,
the coat of arms on top of my passport,
the amount of last names on the first page
( yes, two words. no, no hyphen. ),
the lack of stamps between its pages.

packing twenty six years in a suitcase
that can only carry twenty three kilograms
everything fits
when you don’t really
belong anywhere.

convincing your own self
that everything will be alright,
no matter the absence of a way back.

walking to the bistro car
and finding no real food
just a cheeseburger
if that even counts as cheese.

getting lost between
the silhouettes of mountains
that are drawn towards the horizon
from the train windows.

trying to find amongst them
a place to call home.

Refined emotions
By Antares Valle

 There is a sack of sugar 
in the corner of my nostalgic memories. 
I can see it there, static, 
full, closed, mysterious, heavy, inviting. 
I know it belongs to my grandfather, 
who lived one hundred years 
and then went back to the soil where he used to grow sugar cane. 

He was a farmer, 
but before that he was so many things: 
an orphan, a child without childhood, a little man living on a hacienda in post-revolutionary Mexico, 
a sweeper, a sugar packer at the sugar mill, 
a bricklayer, a blacksmith, a football player, 
a photographer, a musician, a thinker, 
a crystallization operator, an eternal learner, 
a sugar lover, 
a storyteller, a master of memory, able to recall the tiniest details, 
gone. 

I approach the sack of sugar because I want to open it, 
unwrap the stories to write a book. 
The strings are very well tied. 
While I try to unravel them, 
small grains of sugar pop from the sack 
and I can only think about the sweet tales that will emerge from them. 

Unraveling, digging, digging to understand, to get to the center, 
to find the emotions and create from them. 
Oh sweet, coated-truth, 
burnt sugar cane, ashes, 
a way to recognize my pain, to face it without realizing it was there.