Connecting with Ancestors: Finding Love in the Ancestral Timeline

Date: Saturday, February 14, 2026

Time: 11: 00 am - 1:30 pm

Language: English 

Registration fee: 250 AED 

Location: Kutubna Cultural Center, Madina Avenues, Nadd Al Hamar, Dubai

Connecting with Ancestors, a poetry workshop led by Shahd Thani, invites you to channel your ancestors on the page. There will be brief writing meditation to help ground participants, and we will end with a group writing activity.  Participants will be guided through a series of exercises, taken through a journey of memory, to meet grandmothers and grandfathers, and make their personal heritage sing in poetry. In this workshop, we will be discussing love in the ancestral timeline and what love means to you.

Shahd Thani is an Emirati poet and short story writer. She is the winner of the 2026 First Chapter ELF Seddiqi Writer’s Fellowship. Her writing explores themes of heritage, spirituality, and identity. She takes an active role in the UAE’s literary community. Her most recent event was Echoes of Modernity, a contemporary poetry evening curated as part of the “100 Years of Sharjah Libraries” initiative in collaboration with House of Wisdom. She hosted Desert Stanzas as part of the Emirates Literature Festival, and was a key participant in the Rumi Celebration Poetry Night at House of Wisdom. She also curated and emceed the Ramadan Nostalgia Evening hosted by the House of Wisdom on World Poetry Day 2024, where she performed alongside esteemed poets. As a featured poet at Emirates Literature Festival Community Nights, Shahd has shared her work with diverse audiences, and in August 2024 conducted two sold-out workshops titled Connecting with Our Ancestors at Kutubna in Dubai. Passionate about nurturing emerging talent, Shahd is a founding member of Untitled Chapters, where she has mentored young writers, fostering a deep love for the written word. Shahd holds a Master’s degree in Strategic Marketing from the University of Wollongong and a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature and Translation from the University of Sharjah.