And after I said it After I fell from the window After I turned down the bed of history Turned down the ocean road Far enough down the ocean road To dune-grasses, seagulls In these other days In another life I did not say it And in a different life […]
The bridge of birches stretches down to the horizon. A ridge of wings descending into the leaves. Turn now in a note sent thither. Thither around and the wind strikes. Orange, the trees are aflame. Scarlet. Called here, you came. Light carving shadows into tree bark. You translate this into other languages, […]
You came to the desert, illiterate, spirit-ridden, intending to starve The sun hand of the violin carving through space the endless landscape Acres of ochre, the dust-blue sky, or the strange young man beside you peering into “The Man Who Taught William Blake Painting in His Dreams” You’re thinking: I am ready to be touched […]
How struck I was by the face, years ago, in the church mural: Eve, being led by Christ through the broken gates of Hell. She’s been nominated for the position of Featured Saint On the Icon of Belief, up against the dark horse candidate— Me: fever-ridden and delirious, a child in Vellore, unfolding […]
We lay down in the graveyard, hinged there. Emerald moss growing thickly in the chiseled letters. You’re explaining how trees actually breathe. Green in the names and trees went up to join gray in the sky. Then the gray-green sky came down in […]
Kazim Ali talks about how he became a poet.
Kazim Ali, author of the forthcoming poetry collection The Far Mosque (Alice James Books, October 2005), talks about formal structure and the form of his poem, July.