Since 1975 the international dispute over the former Spanish colony of the Western Sahara has persisted between Morocco and the Polisario Front, which continues to seek an independent state. This paper discusses the performance of oral poetry and song in Hassaniyya Arabic spanning from Western Sahara to Sahrawi refugee camps in southwestern Algeria. It highlights the influence of these expressive genres since 1975 in articulating projects of nationalism and resistance and dealing with ambiguity on both sides of the divide in a prolonged period of political uncertainty. Public performances of poetry and song express ideas of nationhood and human rights and serve as a critical mode of communication, social dialogue and political critique within the greater Sahrawi diaspora, especially through the widespread circulation of cassettes and radio and internet broadcasts. By drawing upon the symbolic and popular appeal of an indigenous art form in colloquial Arabic, Sahrawi poets have adapted traditional genres to modern political realities to reframe contemporary understandings of citizenship and exile. The paper argues that salient poetic tropes emerge from and contribute to larger discourses of Sahrawi identity, including nostalgia for nomadic values, state-mandated erasure of tribal affiliation in the camps, and veneration of Sahrawi women and their role in state-building processes. The findings are based on ethnographic research conducted in transnational Sahrawi communities in southern Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania and Algeria from 2006-09.