A feature in the Observer has turned the spotlight on two female poets that it says are at the forefront of a blossoming of poetry as a result of the strife in Turkey and Syria. Kurdish poet Bejan Matur, who was jailed in Turkey in the 1980s, writes poetry that  "sublimates the political and politicises the sublime";  Maram al-Masri is an expatriate Syrian whose adopted country is France, and her most recent book, published in France as Elle va nue la liberté, is being translated into English and has been described as one of the great recent collections of war poetry.

In 2014 Write Out Loud was at London’s Southbank Centre when Bejan Matur took part in an English PEN discussion titled: “Is poetry the strongest form of protest?” . She spoke of being arrested when an 18-year-old law student in Ankara and falsely charged with leading Kurdish separatists. “My poetry starts from that time,” she said. “I was enclosed in a very dark cell – I had to find a way to console my soul. I found words like diamonds, shining in the darkness.”

She said: “To be Kurdish in Turkey, you have to be political. I think this is the difference between east and west, and art and politics. In my country and region, you can’t separate one from the other. I never used political words in my poetry – but at the same time my poetry is really political.”

PHOTOGRAPH: GREG FREEMAN / WRITE OUT LOUD