The Vital
by Zainab Imran
Poetic responses to Glasgow Women's Library's exhibition ‘We Make Museums: Sustaining and Changing Worlds’, co-commissioned by Glasgow Women's Library and PAMphlet.
Artwork by Sohaila Baluch.
Photo by Lauren McDougall, courtesy Glasgow Women’s Library.
Photo by Lauren McDougall, courtesy Glasgow Women’s Library.
Handle
response to ‘Duplicates Only’ by Sohaila Baluch
Care isn’t service here. A ring is not a ring, in a vitrine. Dust can speak to your fingers more than a latch, more than a storm door, a Tensa barrier. Care is transformation, of homes and spaces and lives ; round metal sounds come through the headphones I think of my own home sounds rice churning in a steel bowl of water my mother’s bangles clinking together. We overlook temporalities — no, we forget they can
be
ours to claim. This tea towel, muddied by my fingers. These shelves, lined with lettered meaning. The archival boxes — they can belong to you the way you belong to this space. Say
it
again and again, under your breath as you board the bus, smooth the hair on your child’s head. We do not take the past out of a document, but we push the marginalia further with each read. Let us in. Let us handle. We leave fingerprints on the glass, like rain puckering the metal with copper. Passing words,
passing objects, not down but between us, like unhushed laughter.
Artwork by Alixandra Prybala.
Photo by Lauren McDougall, courtesy Glasgow Women’s Library.
A sun that won’t leave
response to ‘The Saltire Series’ by Alixandra Prybala
Have you ever known a country like this? Bring your best shoes. Write a prayer in the personal details section. Who is more useful than a sun that won’t leave? You have a choice to stare at it, a sun that sings to your skin differently than it did at home, or you can look away. You can let them define your country and let your mind go blank at the visa office. Authority is a silhouette, the shape of an island. The garlands, the necklaces, delicate photos and rhymes, bobbins, toys, last words, perfumes; home in your handwritten notes. Look outside, there are trees peeling their leaves yellow. No one may know your country and I am sorry. Who holds your flag in your mind? Tell us the colours that matter the most to you. Tell me what happens when we are unrecognisable. When the light and laser snaps through the pages of a passport and all the borders shrink until the map is empty, rendered a piece of paper. What’s better to identify than your buddha dove? Your glasses case. Better is the pottery made with soil that isn’t foreign to you. Make your flags hum with sweetened language reserved for hushed phone calls. Who does belonging belong to?
Artwork by Alixandra Prybala.
Photo by Lauren McDougall, courtesy Glasgow Women’s Library.
Something More
response to ‘A Feminist Jukebox of People Trying to Change the World’ by Ruth Ewan
‘...bad girls / have always found each other / bin detritus /
underage thinker / wrong walking woman …’
—Joelle Taylor, homosapien in ‘C+nto & Othered Poems’
wicked woman / walks alone / takes the long shady /
route / to the blessed / jukebox she’s / been the /
wife / and the husband / for too long /
walks to / the bar that is / a library that is a /
prayer space / that is a nursery / for tattooed and /
veiled nans / that is a / climbing frame of /
derelict music sheets / has a jukebox /
that / does not sing / instead it roars /
instead of / a boot on / her chest / her heel /
clips the / street’s back / like a tightrope walker /
the rain / suckles /on her buzzcut / the bricks /
of the library / rustle / like a forest / when /
she steps in / who can stay quiet / in a bar /
so full of / smarts / the women who / glisten /
sing dance on / top of shelves / fanning their /
words / like feathers / from a lost / paradise /
listen / the discoball / is reflecting a / video /
around the room / a zoetrope / of a protest /
marching back / and / forth / we’ve / been /
here before / we’ll / be / there again / for now /
the bar / is serving / feminine lyric excellence /
the dancefloor / is dazzled by / something /
more than / girl power / she is in constant /
craving / she is dancing / to a ballad / of fury /
we want to / be president / foxgloves / more /
than the world’s / wife / she / won’t/ hush /
she doesn’t / want you to / walk her / home /
Zainab Imran is a poet, facilitator and museum worker based in Edinburgh. She was a recipient of the Edwin Morgan Poetry Award in 2026. In 2022, Zainab won the Royal Society of Literature Sky Arts Award for Poetry and was shortlisted for the Queen Mary Wasafiri New Writing Prize in 2024. Her work has appeared in Gutter, Propel, Wasafiri and fourteen poems.
'We Make Museums: Sustaining and Changing Worlds' showcases three new artists’ commissions by Sohaila Baluch, Ruth Ewan, and Alixandra Prybyla selected by the GWL community for their complementary approaches to social justice, compassion, feminist protest, and anti-racism. The exhibition was part of Glasgow International and continues until Saturday 26th September. Find out more about 'We Make Museums: Sustaining and Changing Worlds' and join Glasgow Women's Library for A Feminist Jukebox of People Trying to Change the World (LIVE), 1pm to 2.30pm, to mark the exhibition's closing day.
We Make Museums is supported by Paul Hamlyn Foundation and Glasgow International Festival of Visual Art.
Thanks to Glasgow Women’s Library for initiating this co-commission and supporting writer and editorial fees.