Leila Djabali is an intellectual and poet based in Algeria. She was imprisoned and tortured by French colonials during Algeria’s fight for independence; her poetry focuses primarily on this time in her life. Pour mon tortionnaire is one of her poems, written while imprisoned. It vividly captures the abuse, torture, and rape, experienced in the prison, and ends with the gentle, at home life, of the perpetrator, the officer in charge. This poem has appeared in various anthologies such as Women Poets of the World, The Heinemann Book of African Women’s Poetry, and Fire in the Soul: 100 Poems for Human Rights.
Information from the Poetry Foundation.
