This body pulls me into sleep, like a slow drying beach, the boundary
where the water has been pulls at the tide.
I hover there on the overnight shift,
somewhat conscious somewhat evading life
In this between time between prayers
I hoist my heart with its poisons and jewelry
constructing gratitude: gigantic temporary shallow
My life has been slivered down just strung on a string
to amuse, broken no more garbage than it was before.
Above everything I turn my ego back on itself
confronting my own obsession my fond thoughts
the familiarity with You a deception
of ignorance: I can't know Your Vast Expanse.
I wrap my hands around prayer like a blanket
every time I sleep with You I become more attached
The time I spend talking myself into quiet
Suspended and useless: someone listens unmoved from another room.
Work, from midnight to day
quick effort thrown at poverty and isolation
marks my life with a structure like a cell
block upon block marking space
In these spaces I throw my gratitude at the sky
and to the East, and to my heart
Waiting for a new breath
a meditation for a peaceful life.
I can let go of all the pettiness
I can release all the hate
Let silence and joy fill me
As the wonder of night and quiet eases along.
My family sleeps, the quiet parks wait for daylight
The buildings rock their shadows
You give me a few words to tell myself
About all the blessings I possess.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Concord, California May 2010
As we pass near the playground:
Red roses, and glittering grass
Geraniums wet with light rain.
My son cries not be let down.
Red roses, and glittering grass
Geraniums wet with light rain.
My son cries not be let down.
I'll wait for you to let me wait more patiently
You left this silent body's voice where I listened and spoke to You
in comfort and friendship, honored with the Presence of Spirit
the sense of familiar love that embraces every fiber of the universe.
Quiet I strain for noise any tremor in the still noiseless
space where Your love used to dwell. Fast, pray, chant:
I keep sending out calls for Your return- disempowered
punches with no weight- no connection.
The call to prayer and the house cleaner ring at the same time-
Don't stop calling me to You!
Your grace remains in my devotion to Your memory.
in comfort and friendship, honored with the Presence of Spirit
the sense of familiar love that embraces every fiber of the universe.
Quiet I strain for noise any tremor in the still noiseless
space where Your love used to dwell. Fast, pray, chant:
I keep sending out calls for Your return- disempowered
punches with no weight- no connection.
The call to prayer and the house cleaner ring at the same time-
Don't stop calling me to You!
Your grace remains in my devotion to Your memory.
Thursday May 27,2010
I can sit and drum for twenty minutes
and you sing the same song the whole duration.
The same reverent chant to your mother,
dropping your hands to make a rhythmic beat that hovers.
When the song changes I think you have written this before
with another woman. A drummer or whore
who played on my instruments in my debt soaked house
foreclosure and her body on the wall sighing out.
You put hatred and anger into all the loving work
I set in paint and beats. Why my ego still hurts
my mind when I look at online spanish I don't understand.
Maybe the heated anxious fear of destruction
and the visions of the fire, consuming men in flaming collars in the deepest regions,
their noiseless screams across the pages of all religions.
and you sing the same song the whole duration.
The same reverent chant to your mother,
dropping your hands to make a rhythmic beat that hovers.
When the song changes I think you have written this before
with another woman. A drummer or whore
who played on my instruments in my debt soaked house
foreclosure and her body on the wall sighing out.
You put hatred and anger into all the loving work
I set in paint and beats. Why my ego still hurts
my mind when I look at online spanish I don't understand.
Maybe the heated anxious fear of destruction
and the visions of the fire, consuming men in flaming collars in the deepest regions,
their noiseless screams across the pages of all religions.
Back in the race
Feeling like a victim less and less
Every day striving to grow stronger
working to pray and fast
Enjoying the mercy and grace of Your love
Not friendship, not closeness, not consciousness
but less sleepy, less sedated and fat
All the people who resent me
have less power to violently intrude
constant mercy
constant grace
even far from Your face
You set my feet moving again at a steady pace.
Every day striving to grow stronger
working to pray and fast
Enjoying the mercy and grace of Your love
Not friendship, not closeness, not consciousness
but less sleepy, less sedated and fat
All the people who resent me
have less power to violently intrude
constant mercy
constant grace
even far from Your face
You set my feet moving again at a steady pace.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Disconnected
Homeless shelter in my dreams
My cat doing tricks
Shake lie down
Three men in suntan lotion
Screaming I want my clothes
Give me my clothes
Crying for my son
The breakfast room in the hotel
Music that gets stuck in my mind:
“It’s Saturday Night and I ain’t got nobody”
An overflowing coffee cup
Milk on the counter and the floor
Sitting alone in a full room
People taking the chairs from my table
Tennis on the TV above the fire.
My cat doing tricks
Shake lie down
Three men in suntan lotion
Screaming I want my clothes
Give me my clothes
Crying for my son
The breakfast room in the hotel
Music that gets stuck in my mind:
“It’s Saturday Night and I ain’t got nobody”
An overflowing coffee cup
Milk on the counter and the floor
Sitting alone in a full room
People taking the chairs from my table
Tennis on the TV above the fire.
Friday, July 2, 2010
Gene Doty on ghazals
"When I say 'ghazal,' I mean 'ghuzzle'"
Copyright © 1996, 1998 by Gene Doty. Most recent revision 12 November 1998.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This article and the accompanying poems first appeared in Lynx, XI:2, June 1996.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Visit The Ghazal Page for original ghazals in English, reviews of books of and about ghazals, essays on the ghazal in English, and a blog related to ghazals and poetry in general.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A ghazal with the radif roots
A ghazal with the radif weariness
As more poets use the ghazal form (pronounced "ghuzzle") in English, questions arise as to what an English ghazal will be. In an important and helpful article, Agha Shahid Ali argues for a strict adaptation of the Near Eastern form, including the monorhyme ("qafia") and refrain ("radif"). On the World-Wide Web, Abhya Avachat gives an almost identical definition, with examples in Hindi.
Based on Ali and Avachat, here are what I understand to be the basic features of a ghazal in Persian, Arabic, Urdu, Hindi, etc.:
A ghazal is a series of couplets. Each couplet is an independent poem, although a thematic continuity may develop. This feature leads to "jumps" between couplets, a discontinuity similar to the linking in a Japanese renga. According to Elizabeth T. Gray, Jr., what in English is a couplet is, in Persian, one long line with a strong caesura.
Traditional themes that focus on romantic love and mysticism.
Both lines of the first couplet (called the "matla") and the second line of each succeeding couplet have the same monorhyme ("qafia") and refrain ("radif").
The refrain (radif) is the same word or short phrase (or even syllable, according to Ali).
A. J. Arberry says that each couplet of the Persian ghazal ends in a monorhyme (words ending with the same vowel+consonant combination), but he does not mention the refrain.
All the couplets are in the same meter. (Ali does not mention meter.)
The poet "signs" the last couplet ("makhta") by including her/his name or pen name ("takhallus").
Poems published in English as ghazals usually have only the first feature. Agha Shahid Ali insists that a poem cannot be a ghazal without inclusion of all the features. He especially insists on the radif/refrain. Avachat says that sometimes the radif is omitted. John Drury's description of the form, like others I've seen, is not clear on these specifics, but does encourage experimentation.
It is clear that, in Persian, Urdu, Hindi, etc., the ghazal is a specific and demanding form. While I sympathize with Ali's impatience with American poets using the term for poems that don't fit the traditional definition, I have some questions and comments about the adaptation of the ghazal to English.
If the radif/refrain and qafia/monorhyme are so important, why are ghazals hardly ever translated into English with that form? Arberry's versions of Rumi and Elizabeth Gray's version of Hafiz only rarely end each couplet with the same word or phrase. Annmarie Schimmel's versions of Rumi do make some use of the refrain/radif. I also found an example in the Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics that does translate the radif/refrain and qafia/monorhyme. It's not a very good English poem.
Recently I acquired Arberry's Hafiz: Fifty Poems, which contains older translations of Hafiz's ghazals by several people. These translators render Hafiz in a number of English forms, but one of them, Walter Leaf, uses all three devices in his versions. (His versions aren't necessarily the best English poems in the collection). Leaf's tramslations were originally published in Versions from Hafiz, an essay in Persian metre, in 1898.
Agha Shahid Ali does not mention meter at all (even though he denounces "free verse" ghazals). Avachat's piece says that each couplet ("sher") must have the same meter. So does Arberry. With our long tradition of "free" verse in English, I can't see that anyone is in a position to insist that English ghazals conform to any metrical constraints. (Obviously, meter or rhythm is significant).
Avachat emphasizes more clearly than Ali that each couplet must be an independent poem. (He does allow for an overall thematic unity). Is this the core of the "ghazal perspective"? Can this independent linking of couplets be the basis for English ghazals outside the specifics of radif/refrain and qafia/monorhyme? In this connection, I don't understand Ali's gratuitous swipe at surrealism. Both the ghazal and surrealism seem to share discontinuity and unexpected juxtapositions. It seems only natural that American poets would frame ghazals in surrealist terms.
In his Hafiz: Fifty Poems, Arberry says that at the end of his life, Hafiz was "experimenting in a sort of surrealistic treatment of the ghazal" (32).
Traditionally, the last couplet of a ghazal contains the poet's "signature," the poet's name or pen-name.This couplet is called the makhta. Should poets writing in English incorporate the signature couplet? A signature sometimes seems precious to me, although it can also effectively conclude the poem.
Since writing the previous paragraph, I have found the signature couplet much more useful. It adds a completion to the ghazal that is very satisfactory. I've revised a few earlier ghazals by adding a makhta to them.
What about theme? Should English ghazals be limited to the traditional themes of wine, sexual love, and mystical love? While my own poems deal a lot with love and mysticism, I think the ghazal as an English form should have as wide a range of themes as possible.
I first read about ghazals in Lynx, in a short note which presented them as having "jumps" between couplets. I found the idea provocative; it lead me to write a number of poems which I have called ghazals. Perhaps that is not the best term for these poems, but it does indicate something about their intention. Another poet recognized a poem I read publicly as a ghazal (even though it lacked radif/refrain), which indicates that there is something already recognizable about the ghazal as an English form.
The German Romantics were interested in ghazals. Schlegel and Goethe wrote them. August, Graf Von Platen (1796-1835), published a collection, Ghaselen in 1821. Here is a couplet (matla) from one of his ghazels, with an English translation by Edwin Morgan.
Du bist der wahre Weise mir,
Dein Auge lispelt's leise mir;
Truest of sages are you to me,
Your eye speaks softly true to me;
Graf von Platen used both both monorhyme/qafia and refrain/radif, and the translator has replicated them in English.
In a recent collection of poems, The Country Without a Post Office, Agha Shahid Ali includes three ghazals. Two of these are original in English. Both use the radif/refrain and one of those, a qafia. Metrically, they are longish (six to seven feet) iambic lines. Both poems are good examples of what a traditional ghazal in English can be.
Hemant Kulkarni, M. D., from Nagpur in Central India, has also shown an interest in ghazals in English and a concern that English ghazals observe the form properly. His essay in Lynx, "The Philosophy of Ghazals," de-emphasizes the Discontinuity between couplets, stressing that there is "some thread of connection" between successive couplets. A study of the connections between links in traditional renga can suggest some of the ways couplets in a ghazal can connect. Dr. Kulkarni's essay hasvaluable information and insights.
Dr. Kulkarni's English ghazals show how the form can look in English. Here are the opening (matla) and closing (makhta) couplets of one of his ghazals:
I hate to think of the day that gives me pain at night
But I still recall the Sun that used to rain at night.
. . . . .
Not only have but live all your dreams dear 'Friend'
Did Kekule not observe the snakes in chain at night?
blockquote
Lynx publishes ghazals by several poets, notably William Dennis and Bruce Williams, among others exploring the form in productive ways. Jane and Werner Reichhold are also working with ghazals, as well as encouraging the form in Lynx.
Several well-known poets, including Adrienne Rich, Jim Harrison, and Denise Levertov, have worked at least briefly with ghazals. It seems to me, though, that the more recent poets working with ghazals are engaging the form more seriously than the earlier efforts in English.
The issue of Lynx with Dr. Kulkarni's essay and ghazals also has an essay by Harsangeet Kaur Bhullar which describes the place of ghazals in Indian and Pakistani popular culture, as well as describing the form.
Having read these various pieces on ghazals, I want to make the following suggestions about ghazals written in English:
Poets unfamiliar with traditional ghazals should learn as much as they can about the form in its original cultures and the poets who produced ghazals. I would like to see translations accompanied by literal versions with notes that would help those who don't know the original language to grasp the form better.
Let's refrain from establishing the definitive ghazal form in English prematurely. As poets writing in English learn more about the form in Persian, Urdu, Hindi, etc., let us experiment with as many possibilities as we can.
I would like to see a variety of English ghazals, using the monorhyme/qafia and refrain/radif, using other rhyme schemes, no rhyme schemes, using strict meters, loose meters, "free verse," and so on. Let's see what the form can do and become in English.
Placing the monorhyme/qafia directly before the refrain/radif can easily overload the line in English. Some poets writing English ghazals have experimented with other placements of the monorhyme. I suggest that we have a choice—using either the monorhyme or the refrain. In English, either will carry the ghazal form well. Also, the monorhyme can be placed in midline when there is a refrain, although this placement tends to obscure the monorhyme (which might not always be a bad thing). Translators tend to use monorhyme rather than refrain, which often isn't even mentioned in discussions of the form.
We should maintain the independence of each couplet. It seems to me that the "DisUnities" (Ali's term) define the stance of a ghazal as opposed to its form. Omit that jump from couplet to couplet and, however well the poet used the radif/refrain, the qafia/monorhyme, and the makhta/signature, I do not think the result would be a ghazal in any sense.
Apparently ghazals are not titled. Should English ghazals be titled? Untitled poems in English seem to bother some editors and readers. There is, however, the precedent of haiku and tanka.
Since writing the paragraph above, I hade decided on the following practice: identifying ghazals with a radif by the radif, much as untitled poems in English are identified by the first line; giving ghazals without a radif a fitting title. (In The Country Without a Post Office, the ghazals are identified only as "Ghazal" in the table of contents and by the first words of the first line in the acknowledgements.) I feel that some kind of title is merited because of the length and density of the ghazal, as opposed to haiku and tanka which are quite brief and have a much different perspective.
If it turns out that the English ghazal requires the radif/refrain, the qafia/monorhyme, and the makhta/signature, then perhaps we can devise another term for poems that have a sequence of independent couplets but lack those forms. (Avachat cites the Hindi term for such ghazals: "'gair-muraddaf Ghazel'"). Free ghazal is a possible term for ghazals without radif or qafia.
I would hate to see the English ghazal so confined by formal restrictions that it would be a minor form, used only for poets to demonstrate their technical cleverness (rather like sestinas or villanelles). I believe the ghazal promises to be a major form in English poetry if given room to sink its roots.
I have been experimenting with the form in a strict sense. I'm finding that selection of the radif/refrain sets an important tone/direction for the poem and helps engage my imagination.
AHA Books Online has just published a collection of 30 of my ghazals. Both free and traditional ghazals are included. There are also what I call "parasyntactic" ghazals, one or two with qafia and radif. The parasyntactic ghazals are composed of individual words selected for sound, rhythm, and connotation, but arranged so that no syntactical structures arise. These ghazals are intended to suggest, to supply the reader's imagination almost-meaningful (referential) patterns.
Copyright © 1996, 1998 by Gene Doty. Most recent revision 12 November 1998.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This article and the accompanying poems first appeared in Lynx, XI:2, June 1996.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Visit The Ghazal Page for original ghazals in English, reviews of books of and about ghazals, essays on the ghazal in English, and a blog related to ghazals and poetry in general.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A ghazal with the radif roots
A ghazal with the radif weariness
As more poets use the ghazal form (pronounced "ghuzzle") in English, questions arise as to what an English ghazal will be. In an important and helpful article, Agha Shahid Ali argues for a strict adaptation of the Near Eastern form, including the monorhyme ("qafia") and refrain ("radif"). On the World-Wide Web, Abhya Avachat gives an almost identical definition, with examples in Hindi.
Based on Ali and Avachat, here are what I understand to be the basic features of a ghazal in Persian, Arabic, Urdu, Hindi, etc.:
A ghazal is a series of couplets. Each couplet is an independent poem, although a thematic continuity may develop. This feature leads to "jumps" between couplets, a discontinuity similar to the linking in a Japanese renga. According to Elizabeth T. Gray, Jr., what in English is a couplet is, in Persian, one long line with a strong caesura.
Traditional themes that focus on romantic love and mysticism.
Both lines of the first couplet (called the "matla") and the second line of each succeeding couplet have the same monorhyme ("qafia") and refrain ("radif").
The refrain (radif) is the same word or short phrase (or even syllable, according to Ali).
A. J. Arberry says that each couplet of the Persian ghazal ends in a monorhyme (words ending with the same vowel+consonant combination), but he does not mention the refrain.
All the couplets are in the same meter. (Ali does not mention meter.)
The poet "signs" the last couplet ("makhta") by including her/his name or pen name ("takhallus").
Poems published in English as ghazals usually have only the first feature. Agha Shahid Ali insists that a poem cannot be a ghazal without inclusion of all the features. He especially insists on the radif/refrain. Avachat says that sometimes the radif is omitted. John Drury's description of the form, like others I've seen, is not clear on these specifics, but does encourage experimentation.
It is clear that, in Persian, Urdu, Hindi, etc., the ghazal is a specific and demanding form. While I sympathize with Ali's impatience with American poets using the term for poems that don't fit the traditional definition, I have some questions and comments about the adaptation of the ghazal to English.
If the radif/refrain and qafia/monorhyme are so important, why are ghazals hardly ever translated into English with that form? Arberry's versions of Rumi and Elizabeth Gray's version of Hafiz only rarely end each couplet with the same word or phrase. Annmarie Schimmel's versions of Rumi do make some use of the refrain/radif. I also found an example in the Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics that does translate the radif/refrain and qafia/monorhyme. It's not a very good English poem.
Recently I acquired Arberry's Hafiz: Fifty Poems, which contains older translations of Hafiz's ghazals by several people. These translators render Hafiz in a number of English forms, but one of them, Walter Leaf, uses all three devices in his versions. (His versions aren't necessarily the best English poems in the collection). Leaf's tramslations were originally published in Versions from Hafiz, an essay in Persian metre, in 1898.
Agha Shahid Ali does not mention meter at all (even though he denounces "free verse" ghazals). Avachat's piece says that each couplet ("sher") must have the same meter. So does Arberry. With our long tradition of "free" verse in English, I can't see that anyone is in a position to insist that English ghazals conform to any metrical constraints. (Obviously, meter or rhythm is significant).
Avachat emphasizes more clearly than Ali that each couplet must be an independent poem. (He does allow for an overall thematic unity). Is this the core of the "ghazal perspective"? Can this independent linking of couplets be the basis for English ghazals outside the specifics of radif/refrain and qafia/monorhyme? In this connection, I don't understand Ali's gratuitous swipe at surrealism. Both the ghazal and surrealism seem to share discontinuity and unexpected juxtapositions. It seems only natural that American poets would frame ghazals in surrealist terms.
In his Hafiz: Fifty Poems, Arberry says that at the end of his life, Hafiz was "experimenting in a sort of surrealistic treatment of the ghazal" (32).
Traditionally, the last couplet of a ghazal contains the poet's "signature," the poet's name or pen-name.This couplet is called the makhta. Should poets writing in English incorporate the signature couplet? A signature sometimes seems precious to me, although it can also effectively conclude the poem.
Since writing the previous paragraph, I have found the signature couplet much more useful. It adds a completion to the ghazal that is very satisfactory. I've revised a few earlier ghazals by adding a makhta to them.
What about theme? Should English ghazals be limited to the traditional themes of wine, sexual love, and mystical love? While my own poems deal a lot with love and mysticism, I think the ghazal as an English form should have as wide a range of themes as possible.
I first read about ghazals in Lynx, in a short note which presented them as having "jumps" between couplets. I found the idea provocative; it lead me to write a number of poems which I have called ghazals. Perhaps that is not the best term for these poems, but it does indicate something about their intention. Another poet recognized a poem I read publicly as a ghazal (even though it lacked radif/refrain), which indicates that there is something already recognizable about the ghazal as an English form.
The German Romantics were interested in ghazals. Schlegel and Goethe wrote them. August, Graf Von Platen (1796-1835), published a collection, Ghaselen in 1821. Here is a couplet (matla) from one of his ghazels, with an English translation by Edwin Morgan.
Du bist der wahre Weise mir,
Dein Auge lispelt's leise mir;
Truest of sages are you to me,
Your eye speaks softly true to me;
Graf von Platen used both both monorhyme/qafia and refrain/radif, and the translator has replicated them in English.
In a recent collection of poems, The Country Without a Post Office, Agha Shahid Ali includes three ghazals. Two of these are original in English. Both use the radif/refrain and one of those, a qafia. Metrically, they are longish (six to seven feet) iambic lines. Both poems are good examples of what a traditional ghazal in English can be.
Hemant Kulkarni, M. D., from Nagpur in Central India, has also shown an interest in ghazals in English and a concern that English ghazals observe the form properly. His essay in Lynx, "The Philosophy of Ghazals," de-emphasizes the Discontinuity between couplets, stressing that there is "some thread of connection" between successive couplets. A study of the connections between links in traditional renga can suggest some of the ways couplets in a ghazal can connect. Dr. Kulkarni's essay hasvaluable information and insights.
Dr. Kulkarni's English ghazals show how the form can look in English. Here are the opening (matla) and closing (makhta) couplets of one of his ghazals:
I hate to think of the day that gives me pain at night
But I still recall the Sun that used to rain at night.
. . . . .
Not only have but live all your dreams dear 'Friend'
Did Kekule not observe the snakes in chain at night?
blockquote
Lynx publishes ghazals by several poets, notably William Dennis and Bruce Williams, among others exploring the form in productive ways. Jane and Werner Reichhold are also working with ghazals, as well as encouraging the form in Lynx.
Several well-known poets, including Adrienne Rich, Jim Harrison, and Denise Levertov, have worked at least briefly with ghazals. It seems to me, though, that the more recent poets working with ghazals are engaging the form more seriously than the earlier efforts in English.
The issue of Lynx with Dr. Kulkarni's essay and ghazals also has an essay by Harsangeet Kaur Bhullar which describes the place of ghazals in Indian and Pakistani popular culture, as well as describing the form.
Having read these various pieces on ghazals, I want to make the following suggestions about ghazals written in English:
Poets unfamiliar with traditional ghazals should learn as much as they can about the form in its original cultures and the poets who produced ghazals. I would like to see translations accompanied by literal versions with notes that would help those who don't know the original language to grasp the form better.
Let's refrain from establishing the definitive ghazal form in English prematurely. As poets writing in English learn more about the form in Persian, Urdu, Hindi, etc., let us experiment with as many possibilities as we can.
I would like to see a variety of English ghazals, using the monorhyme/qafia and refrain/radif, using other rhyme schemes, no rhyme schemes, using strict meters, loose meters, "free verse," and so on. Let's see what the form can do and become in English.
Placing the monorhyme/qafia directly before the refrain/radif can easily overload the line in English. Some poets writing English ghazals have experimented with other placements of the monorhyme. I suggest that we have a choice—using either the monorhyme or the refrain. In English, either will carry the ghazal form well. Also, the monorhyme can be placed in midline when there is a refrain, although this placement tends to obscure the monorhyme (which might not always be a bad thing). Translators tend to use monorhyme rather than refrain, which often isn't even mentioned in discussions of the form.
We should maintain the independence of each couplet. It seems to me that the "DisUnities" (Ali's term) define the stance of a ghazal as opposed to its form. Omit that jump from couplet to couplet and, however well the poet used the radif/refrain, the qafia/monorhyme, and the makhta/signature, I do not think the result would be a ghazal in any sense.
Apparently ghazals are not titled. Should English ghazals be titled? Untitled poems in English seem to bother some editors and readers. There is, however, the precedent of haiku and tanka.
Since writing the paragraph above, I hade decided on the following practice: identifying ghazals with a radif by the radif, much as untitled poems in English are identified by the first line; giving ghazals without a radif a fitting title. (In The Country Without a Post Office, the ghazals are identified only as "Ghazal" in the table of contents and by the first words of the first line in the acknowledgements.) I feel that some kind of title is merited because of the length and density of the ghazal, as opposed to haiku and tanka which are quite brief and have a much different perspective.
If it turns out that the English ghazal requires the radif/refrain, the qafia/monorhyme, and the makhta/signature, then perhaps we can devise another term for poems that have a sequence of independent couplets but lack those forms. (Avachat cites the Hindi term for such ghazals: "'gair-muraddaf Ghazel'"). Free ghazal is a possible term for ghazals without radif or qafia.
I would hate to see the English ghazal so confined by formal restrictions that it would be a minor form, used only for poets to demonstrate their technical cleverness (rather like sestinas or villanelles). I believe the ghazal promises to be a major form in English poetry if given room to sink its roots.
I have been experimenting with the form in a strict sense. I'm finding that selection of the radif/refrain sets an important tone/direction for the poem and helps engage my imagination.
AHA Books Online has just published a collection of 30 of my ghazals. Both free and traditional ghazals are included. There are also what I call "parasyntactic" ghazals, one or two with qafia and radif. The parasyntactic ghazals are composed of individual words selected for sound, rhythm, and connotation, but arranged so that no syntactical structures arise. These ghazals are intended to suggest, to supply the reader's imagination almost-meaningful (referential) patterns.
Hard hearted and straightened
All my longing for Your presence is not enough, My heart is straightened.
Until I can offer more than I do and I give all I have, My heart is straightened.
Will I always remain here in unfeeling pain, wandering and weak.
Like wind on a rock my mind whines and whistles, rough. My heart is straightened.
Rest on my head as pure spirit and transform my hard heart.
The wonder of your presence flutters like the sound of dove. My heart is straightened.
The brusque way I see the world makes my dull mind flinch.
I wish you would awaken my heart with a Divine shove. My heart is straightened.
Hamidah's will lies between the rocks and the hills and the stars.
Now feel life's choices evolve as a gift of Your love. My heart is straightened.
Until I can offer more than I do and I give all I have, My heart is straightened.
Will I always remain here in unfeeling pain, wandering and weak.
Like wind on a rock my mind whines and whistles, rough. My heart is straightened.
Rest on my head as pure spirit and transform my hard heart.
The wonder of your presence flutters like the sound of dove. My heart is straightened.
The brusque way I see the world makes my dull mind flinch.
I wish you would awaken my heart with a Divine shove. My heart is straightened.
Hamidah's will lies between the rocks and the hills and the stars.
Now feel life's choices evolve as a gift of Your love. My heart is straightened.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
summer snow in the High Sierras
Driving down I80 at two o'clock
my mother looks out the window and comment
the snow on the mountains in summer
is beautiful isn't it.
Her poetic voice returns like a retinal image
flashing up like a sun spot
she says she received a rejection in the mail
my small stingy mind meditates without a stop.
listening to my mother is like bathing
it cleanses you from accumulated self-hating
rejection, trouble, the thin grimy layer of dirt
from touching railings and the grime from work
When I walk by the snow again
to notice 5 o'clock sun like an umbrella
yellow flowers on rabbit ears and robins in the sun
I hear her again and see the magic unravel
she creates with her words. I can
think again of the miracle of life
the microcosm of progress, where I build from
my mistakes and and scale the walls
of acceptability, success, and conformity.
all my bitterness subsides ebbing briefly
and I can breathe easily and watch
the snow shine in the summer sun.
my mother looks out the window and comment
the snow on the mountains in summer
is beautiful isn't it.
Her poetic voice returns like a retinal image
flashing up like a sun spot
she says she received a rejection in the mail
my small stingy mind meditates without a stop.
listening to my mother is like bathing
it cleanses you from accumulated self-hating
rejection, trouble, the thin grimy layer of dirt
from touching railings and the grime from work
When I walk by the snow again
to notice 5 o'clock sun like an umbrella
yellow flowers on rabbit ears and robins in the sun
I hear her again and see the magic unravel
she creates with her words. I can
think again of the miracle of life
the microcosm of progress, where I build from
my mistakes and and scale the walls
of acceptability, success, and conformity.
all my bitterness subsides ebbing briefly
and I can breathe easily and watch
the snow shine in the summer sun.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)