Khadija Monis is a creator. Her words flow like water as she recites one of her most recent poems, written in her native Persian after she graduated from Cornell University in May of 2025. The poem is about a soft-hearted girl born among mountains and stones. It describes not just her elegance and beauty, but also her hard work, motivation, and strength. Khadija created this poem in fifteen minutes, inspired by the picture her cousin sent of the place where she was born. The poem is about herself, as she reflects with mixed feelings on where she came from—a woman fleeing violence in Afghanistan—and where she is now—a recent graduate in Ithaca, New York. For Khadija, poetry is a means of transforming pain into beauty. Her creation, through poetry and otherwise, is a form of self-expression that leads to healing.
Khadija had spent 14 years in Pakistan as a refugee before returning to her home country of Afghanistan after finishing high school. After that, she began her undergraduate studies at the Asian University for Women in Bangladesh. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she had to take her university classes online from her home in Afghanistan, but everything changed when the Taliban took over the Afghan capital of Kabul in 2021. Khadija had to flee her home once again. She, along with nine fellow students, arrived in Ithaca later that year. Although she had escaped the Taliban’s violence, she found herself in a strange new place. “I vividly remember when I arrived in Ithaca, it was the middle of the cold winter,” Khadija recalls. “Everything felt unfamiliar.” The unfamiliarity went beyond the quiet winter night. She also had to deal with everything else that was new to her: the language, the culture, the health insurance, the tax system, the homesickness, the loneliness that came from family separation, and the loss of sense of self.
Khadija’s high school experience is quite different from that of the average student at Cornell University. In Pakistan, she used incomplete hand-me-down textbooks and studied with teachers who themselves did not receive sufficient training. When her Cornell TAs said, “This is high school calculus,” Khadija knew they could not be talking about the high school she attended. Despite that, she was determined to finish her undergraduate degree in global and public health sciences. One semester, she pushed herself to put in over 20 hours of extra work in office hours to pass a biochemistry class. Balancing school and her part-time jobs was not easy, but Khadija pulled through.
Although Khadija had to work hard to overcome challenges that came with moving across the world to a new country, she was not alone. Her friends who fled Afghanistan at the same time were always there to talk through personal problems and exchange advice. On top of that, Ithaca Welcomes Refugees (IWR) assisted her with creating a bank account, applying for health insurance, and filing taxes. Most importantly, since Khadija was physically unwell when she first arrived in Ithaca, IWR provided her with transportation to classes and doctor appointments until she finally felt better, to the point where she was able to channel her inner creator again.
The nature of Ithaca, which was once unfamiliar and scary, has become the site that witnesses Khadija’s healing. Its gentleness calms her from the chaos of migration that she had previously been through. She often takes her difficult emotions to places like Cayuga Lake to self-reflect through poetry. In moments where she feels invisible and small, her rhymes would make her feel seen. “My words can affect people,” explains Khadija. “Even if you don’t exist, your words will, and [they] will help people.”
Khadija’s creation and her ability to help others go beyond poetry. In 2023, Khadija created an organization called One Woman’s Education. The organization’s first project was to help one Afghan woman enroll in a private university. After that woman completed her degree in midwifery, One Woman’s Education continues to work with her through a secret workshop series on menstrual health and hygiene for young girls in Afghanistan. The woman receives support and training on how to run these workshops safely and effectively. “[Creating] something that is helpful and connects me back to the people that I am connected to and care about, especially women and underserved communities, […] keeps me hopeful and motivated.” Khadija hopes to continue assisting other women in Afghanistan, who can’t otherwise continue their studies, through One Woman’s Education.
Through her own journey of healing through creativity, Khadija has also come to see public health as “a poetry of care and community.” It is through public health that she sees herself being able to give back. “I have been helped by people,” she says as she reflects on all the support she has received since arriving in Ithaca. “I have the responsibility to give back to the people.” Having graduated from her undergraduate program, Khadija now pursues a graduate degree in public health. “I see myself as a leader, a creator, and a founder wherever I go. I see that potential in me. My dream is to have a hospital and a school for women in Afghanistan, to teach them how to be strong, to be themselves, and to create their own words,” says Khadija with hope in her eyes. We at IWR are excited to see the future that she creates, both for herself and for the world.
English translation of the poem featured in the photograph above:
Do you want to know who I am?
Khadija Monis
An ideal daughter, born between the mountains and stone—
strong yet gentle, proud yet humble.
My roots run deep, my spirit unbroken.
I’ve grown tall, like a tree grounded in its own soul.
Greener than the meadows,
I carry both elegance and beauty.
There is fire in my heart,
but in my eyes, it is always the sun—
never the fear of night.
My heart is soft,
yet when needed, it can rise as a storm.
Like a mountain, I keep my silence,
and let my smile be my gift to the world.
