Yusef Bushara Releases ‘Good News’ Poetry

Sudanese-Bermudian writer Yusef Bushara has released his debut poetry collection, ‘Good News.’

A spokesperson said, “The book, already available online on Amazon, will be available locally in the coming weeks. The title Good News is a translation of Bushara’s last name [ﺑﺸﺮى] from Quranic Arabic. At once a personal offering and a collective invocation, the collection responds to the fate Bushara sees written in his family name: to gather and preserve shrines of local delight, love, hope, and promise—and to root these deeply in his Sudanese-Bermudian identity.

Cover of Good News

“Blending poetry and vignette, Good News moves alongside idyllic tropes of island life but never settles into their comfort. Instead, it offers a living, breathing Bermuda—one limned in limestone, tender memory, and everyday resistance. These themes travel with Bushara through the other places he has called home.”

Local poet and performer Sion Symonds said, “Yusef Bushara’s Good News is a patient and considered love letter to all that Bushara himself maintains the patience and care to take notice of. Bushara meticulously illustrates a breathing world through his meditations on community, partnership, culture and identity. With a focus on his own Bermudian-ness, Bushara sings life into his island with celebratory articulations of the nuance and complexity of Bermuda and Bermudian culture as one of his many homes.

“Beginning this book with a nod to one of the most endearing pieces of language in the Bermudian lexicon, the affection term ‘beloved,’ Bushara tenderly opens the space maintaining that every analysis, challenge and meditation begins with the loving act of observing. As with his redefinition of the term, Good News insists that what is seen is to be loved and saturated with light.

“Readers are asked to sit with contemplations on belonging and one’s relationship with cultural identity even when removed, be it physically or linguistically. With due romanticism, as with good news subtly imparted only to be later recognised as such, Bushara encourages us to slow down and sit still on stone docks, at public golf courses, atop skyscrapers wedged between bamboo stalks, and take notice of the chilling mortality implied, the pink of passing taxi drivers, the gold of Black skin soaked in sun, the orange of Sudanese sand, fleeting sun and hibiscus flowers soaked in swizzle hues.

“Good News is Yusef Bushara’s latest triumph as he holds space to question, consider, guide and define. Good News consistently reminds us that good news and good fortune are not only on their way but they have long since arrived; we need merely take notice.”

The spokesperson said, “Yusef Bushara is a Sudanese-Bermudian writer currently based in London completing a master’s degree in comparative literature while working as an editorial assistant at UK Black-owned press, Jacaranda Books. Bushara’s writing has been published internationally in journals including antilang., The Foundationalist, Underbelly Press, and The Caribbean Writer. He is a recipient of the Bermuda Arts Council Grant.

Yusef Bushara, author of Good News [photo courtesy of Adrian Hui]

“Good News is available to order now at this link. In-person purchases will be available across the island at various bookstores, and at Treehouse Bermuda.”

#BermudaBooks #BermudaPoetry #GoodNews

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