Stories of Arrival in Collaboration with Project Feast

As the project has grown, so too Merna’s commitment to nourishing community partnerships. In 2015 Merna established an intergenerational collaboration with Project Feast, an organization that serves refugee women that was located at the Tukwila Community Center and is now in Kent. The Project Feast mission is to “transform the lives of refugees and immigrants by providing pathways to sustainable employment in the local food industry and to enrich communities through exploring ethnic culture and cuisine.” The anthology that resulted from this collaboration brims with memories of homeland gardens, watercolors of fruits and vegetables, treasured family and community recipes, and interviews with the Project Feast cooks conducted by the students. The poetry connects food to place, family, culture and memory. The poems also address themes of food scarcity and survival. The anthology is titled Our Table of Memories: Food and Poetry of Spirit, Homeland and Tradition