Issa's Untidy Hut: ghazal

Sunday, May 11, 2014

Kabir: The Inner Lover (Sunday Serenade)

18

I talk to my inner lover, and I say, why such rush?
We sense that there is some sort of spirit that loves
birds and animals and the ants--
perhaps the same one who gave a radiance to you in
your mother’s womb.
Is it logical you would be walking around entirely
orphaned now?
The truth is you turned away yourself,
and decided to go into the dark alone.
Now you are tangled up in others, and have forgotten
what you once knew,
and that’s why everything you do has some weird
failure in it.

Kabir
Version by Robert Bly

I've spent the last couple of months reading mystic poets - Hafiz, Kabir, Mirabai, and Rumi, among others - and have been overtaken by the form known as the ghazal, specifically a variant of Robert Bly's conjuring, 6 stanzas of 3 lines each.

Yes, I know that a lot that is being translated or written in English isn't the ghazal of Middle Eastern origin, but a modern English variant whose roots, one hopes, are sunk deep in the tradition of another culture.

Many would disagree.

But, there you are. This is some of what I've been up to. In fact, there will most probably be a collection forthcoming, after Yield to the Willow finally sees the light of day later this month. Never knew I had it in me.

It would seem, however, that Kabir knew.

Photo by Ted Kropiewnicki

just coming out
the earthworm dragged off
by ants

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

PS Click to learn how to contribute to Wednesday Haiku.

Sunday, February 16, 2014

Robert Bly: Growing Wings (a ghazal)

GROWING WINGS - Robert Bly

It's all right if Cezanne goes on painting the same picture.
It's all right if juice tastes bitter in our mouths.
It's all right if the old man drags one useless foot.

The apple on the Tree of Paradise hangs there for months.
We wait for years and years on the lip of the falls;
The blue-gray mountain keeps rising behind the black trees.

It's all right if I feel this same pain until I die.
A pain that we have earned gives more nourishment
Than the joy we won at the lottery last night.

It's all right if the partridge's nest fills with snow.
Why should the hunter complain if his bag is empty
At dusk? It only means the bird will live another night.

It's all right if we turn in all our keys tonight.
It's all right if we give up our longing for the spiral.
It's all right if the boat I love never reaches shore.

If we're already so close to death, why should we complain?
Robert, you've climbed so many trees to reach the nests.
It's all right if you grow your wings on the way down.

from My Sentence Was a Thousand Years of Joy

Robert Bly has been working for quite some time in the ghazal form in English and this particular volume, My Sentence Was a Thousand Years of Joy, is groundbreaking, transformative, and a pure thrill to read.

The history of the form in English is not a long one. An informative article, though with no mention of Bly, may be found here (another interesting series of articles may be found at the aha poetry site). I believe Bly is helping to literally transform the ghazal itself in its English incarnation.

For those who are unaware, ghazal in English is pronounced "guzzle" (with the g enunciated from the back of the throat) or haazal, if my ear is getting it right. You can hear it pronounced here.

As with non-Japanese haiku, ghazal can become something different in another language (for example, Bly's renditions, which have something of the spirit and some of the conventions but also somthing all their own), related, perhaps running a parallel course. In any case, this interesting form certainly enriches English language poetry and can expand the palette for English language poets.

For those who find the idea of these 'bastard ghazals', as Wikipedia describes them, unappealing, work that sticks a bit closer to the form may be found in the 1st English language anthology of ghazals, Ravishing DisUnities: Real Ghazals in English, edited by Aga Shahid Ali is an alternative (though, ironically, Wikipedia noted that only 1 in 10 of the poems in the anthology "observe the constraints of the form.")

All that being said, least I stray too far, My Sentence is a Thousand Years of Joy is a Bly volume to cherish. It is well worth space on any poetry reader's shelf.

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