Lebanese poet Jawdat Fakhreddine wrote his collection of poems, Lighthouse for the Drowning , while living in exile in the United States during Lebanon's civil war. The book was published in Arabic in 1996, and in 2017, BOA Editions published the first English translation. Fakhreddine is in Rochester for a bilingual poetry reading organized by BOA, but first, we talk to him about the story behind the collection, how poetry can serve as a symbol of liberation for war-torn communities, and how