Episode 9 - Imtiaz Dharker
This Week in Poetry
| Ramanujam Nedumaran | Rating 5 (3) (0) |
| thisweekinpoetry.com | Launched: Oct 22, 2023 |
| shansifellow@gmail.com | Season: 1 Episode: 9 |
Hello there, Poetry Lovers,
Welcome to this This Week in Poetry with Professor Nedumaran. We are back with episode nine and in this installment, we're about to embark on a poetic journey with one of the most compelling voices of our time, Imtiaz Dharker. Born in Pakistan, and raised in Scotland, Imtiaz Dharker's life unfolds as a mosaic of diverse cultures and experiences. She divides her time between the bustling streets of London and the vibrant city of Mumbai, India. This intersection of mixed heritage and an itinerant lifestyle lies at the very heart of her poetry. Imtiaz Dharker's verses are a profound exploration of themes that span geographical and cultural displacement, the complexities of conflict, and the nuances of gender politics. Her words have a remarkable ability to challenge preconceived notions about home, freedom, and faith. Join us as we embark on this poetic journey with Imtiaz Dharker, an artist who fearlessly embraces unsettlement, as a form of settlement and offers us an exhilarating glimpse into life at the interstices. This is an episode that promises to touch your soul and expand your horizons. Welcome to This Week in Poetry - Episode Nine, featuring the poems of Imtiaz Dharker.
SUBSCRIBE
Hello there, Poetry Lovers,
Welcome to this This Week in Poetry with Professor Nedumaran. We are back with episode nine and in this installment, we're about to embark on a poetic journey with one of the most compelling voices of our time, Imtiaz Dharker. Born in Pakistan, and raised in Scotland, Imtiaz Dharker's life unfolds as a mosaic of diverse cultures and experiences. She divides her time between the bustling streets of London and the vibrant city of Mumbai, India. This intersection of mixed heritage and an itinerant lifestyle lies at the very heart of her poetry. Imtiaz Dharker's verses are a profound exploration of themes that span geographical and cultural displacement, the complexities of conflict, and the nuances of gender politics. Her words have a remarkable ability to challenge preconceived notions about home, freedom, and faith. Join us as we embark on this poetic journey with Imtiaz Dharker, an artist who fearlessly embraces unsettlement, as a form of settlement and offers us an exhilarating glimpse into life at the interstices. This is an episode that promises to touch your soul and expand your horizons. Welcome to This Week in Poetry - Episode Nine, featuring the poems of Imtiaz Dharker.
Poem #1: They'll say - she must be from another country
When I can’t comprehend
why they’re burning books
or slashing paintings,
when they can’t bear to look
at god’s own nakedness,
when they ban the film
and gut the seats to stop the play
and I ask why
they just smile and say,
‘She must be
from another country.’
When I speak on the phone
and the vowel sounds are off
when the consonants are hard
and they should be soft,
they’ll catch on at once
they’ll pin it down
they’ll explain it right away
to their own satisfaction,
they’ll cluck their tongues
and say,
‘She must be
from another country.’
When my mouth goes up
instead of down,
when I wear a tablecloth
to go to town,
when they suspect I’m black
or hear I’m gay
they won’t be surprised,
they’ll purse their lips
and say,
‘She must be
from another country.’
When I eat up the olives
and spit out the pits
when I yawn at the opera
in the tragic bits
when I pee in the vineyard
as if it were Bombay,
flaunting my bare ass
covering my face
laughing through my hands
they’ll turn away,
shake their heads quite sadly,
‘She doesn’t know any better,’
they’ll say,
‘She must be
from another country.’
Maybe there is a country
where all of us live,
all of us freaks
who aren’t able to give
our loyalty to fat old fools,
the crooks and thugs
who wear the uniform
that gives them the right
to wave a flag,
puff out their chests,
put their feet on our necks,
and break their own rules.
But from where we are
it doesn’t look like a country,
it’s more like the cracks
that grow between borders
behind their backs.
That’s where I live.
And I’ll be happy to say,
‘I never learned your customs.
I don’t remember your language
or know your ways.
I must be
from another country.’
From: I Speak for the Devil
Publisher: Penguin Books India,
Poem #2: The Right Word
Outside the door,
lurking in the shadows,
is a terrorist.
Is that the wrong description?
Outside that door,
taking shelter in the shadows,
is a freedom-fighter.
I haven't got this right.
Outside, waiting in the shadows
is a hostile militant.
Are words no more
than waving, wavering flags?
Outside your door,
watchful in the shadows,
is a guerrilla warrior.
God help me.
Outside, defying every shadow,
stands a martyr.
I saw his face.
No words can help me now.
Just outside the door,
lost in shadows,
is a child who looks like mine.
© Imtiaz Dharker, from The terrorist at my table (Bloodaxe Books, 2006)
Poem #3: Blessing
The skin cracks like a pod.
There never is enough water.
Imagine the drip of it,
the small splash, echo
in a tin mug,
the voice of a kindly god.
Sometimes, the sudden rush
of fortune. The municipal pipe bursts,
silver crashes to the ground
and the flow has found
a roar of tongues. From the huts,
a congregation: every man woman
child for streets around
butts in, with pots,
brass, copper, aluminium,
plastic buckets,
frantic hands,
and naked children
screaming in the liquid sun,
their highlights polished to perfection,
flashing light,
as the blessing sings
over their small bones.
Poem #4 - A Century Later
The school bell is a call to battle,
every step to class, a step into the firing line.
Here is the target, fine skin at the temple,
cheek still rounded from being fifteen.
Surrendered, surrounded, she
takes the bullet in the head
and walks on. The missile cuts
a pathway in her mind, to an orchard
in full bloom, a field humming under the sun,
It's lap open and full of poppies.
This girl has won
the right to be ordinary,
wear bangles to a wedding, paint her fingernails,
go to school. Bullet, she says, you are stupid.
You have failed. You cannot kill a book
or the buzzing in it.
A murmur, a swarm. Behind her, one by one,
the schoolgirls are standing up
to take their places on the front line.
-----
That's all we have in this episode of this week in poetry by Professor Nedumaran. I hope you enjoyed this rendition of a selection of poems by Imtiaz Dharker. Do share and subscribe to this podcast on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Your feedback is much appreciated. We will meet you in the next one with more wonderful poems for your listening pleasure. Till then take care.