Pluck Me and Hum

By Kazim Ali

Kazim Ali has become known for his careful attention to the architecture of a poem, his restless intellect and his musically driven line. In these eight poems and two diary entries, Ali draws on deep literary and cultural tradition to explore history, devotion, both spiritual and physical, and loss and loneliness in fractured lyrics, surreal narratives and prose poems.  In addition to a ghazal, 'Rain', and a poem drawn from his study of yoga, 'The Art of Breathing', he includes an imagined correspondence between the Sufi teacher Rumi and his friend Shams, a poem and diary entries from his experiences of fasting, and the persona poems 'Fairy Tale', 'The Wrestler' and 'The Astronomer'. Taken together, these poems demonstrate once more Ali's profound belief in sound and breath as the measure of an ever-shifting and deeply felt interior life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Collins India
• Release date: Aug 5, 2015
• ISBN: 9789351368038

Kazim Ali

Kazim Ali's books include several volumes of poetry, including Inquisition, Sky Ward, winner of the Ohioana Book Award in Poetry; The Far Mosque, winner of Alice James Books' New England/New York Award; The Fortieth Day; All One's Blue; and the cross-genre text Bright Felon. His novels include the recently published The Secret Room: A String Quartet.

Book preview

abc

KAZIM ALI

Pluck Me and Hum

Selected Poems

abc

Table of Contents

Rain

Dear Rumi

The Art of Breathing

Fairy Tale

Ramzan

The Wrestler

Dear Shams

Fasting for Ramzan, Third Day

Fasting for Ramzan, Sixth Day

The Astronomer

About the Author

Copyright

Rain

With thick strokes of ink the sky fills with rain.

Pretending to run for cover I secretly pray for more rain.

Over the echo of the water, I hear a voice saying my name.

No one in the city moves under the quick sightless rain.

The pages of my notebook soak, then curl. I’ve written:

‘Yogis opened their mouths for hours to drink the rain.’

The sky is a bowl of dark water, rinsing your face.

The window trembles; liquid glass could shatter into rain.

I