Contemporary Kashmiri Poetry
The diverse nature of contemporary Kashmiri poetry, arising from both tradition and conflict, needs to be acknowledged, says Shafi Shauq.
Kashmiri Poetry,in the last twenty five years, may be identified as contemporary in character for more than one reason: i) milieu of unprecedented violent politics, ii) fear of repercussions, iii) simultaneity of multiple voices, and iv) divergence from attempts by modernists to impregnate language with personal meaning.The poetry within the ambit is so copious and the number of poets so large that selection of the representative poetry is extremely difficult; a lag of at least a decade is necessary for an impartial appraisal of the poetry of a period. Poets of the older generation like Amin Kamil (1924-2014), Ghulam Nabi Firaq (1922-), Arjan Dev Majboor (1923-2010), Rahman Rahi (1925-), Ghulam Nabi Khayal(1936-), Muzaffar Azim (1934-), Naji Munawar (1934-), Ghulam Nabi Nazir (1933-), Rashid Nazki (1933-), Moti Lal Saqi (1936-1999), Ghulam Mohammad Shad (1936-), Mishal Sultanpuri (1936-), Qazi Ghulam Mohammad (1945-1999), Farooq Nazki (1940-) and Zareef Ahmad Zareef (1943-) continued writing in their individual styles with the occasional expression of horror over the spate of killings, indiscriminate firings, mayhems, pogroms, dislocation, rupture in social coherence, and cultural subversion.
I see my window ajar,
a nest-less swallow is watching it.
Nettles have covered my garden,
every stalk of my compound turf wails.
Behind the gate, two waiting eyes:
the air has forgotten children’s hubbub.
All the birds are dumbfounded.
The tete-a-tete inside the pantry,
“What shall we cook for tonight?”
That delightful hee-haw
of innocent kids,
knew no religion.
(Arjan Dev Majboor :janivaarahasihaa / I were a bird 2002)
a nest-less swallow is watching it.
Nettles have covered my garden,
every stalk of my compound turf wails.
Behind the gate, two waiting eyes:
the air has forgotten children’s hubbub.
All the birds are dumbfounded.
The tete-a-tete inside the pantry,
“What shall we cook for tonight?”
That delightful hee-haw
of innocent kids,
knew no religion.
(Arjan Dev Majboor :janivaarahasihaa / I were a bird 2002)
Poets of a relatively younger generation like Rafiq Raz, Gulshan Majeed, Syed Razi, Ali Shaida, Fayaz Dilber, Naseem Shafai, Shahnaz Rashid, Ranjoor Tilgami, Ismail Ashna, Bashir Athar, Satish Vimal, Muneebur Rahman, Mohammad Ramzan and Suneeta Raina, on the one hand, show their individual talent in remaining faithful to the principles of form, and on the other, eschew hackneyed expressions so that their poetry is liberated from excessive romanticism. The bulk of their poetry, however, continues to be in the closed genre of lyrical poetry namely, the ghazal (a lyric comprising five or more alternately rhymed couplets following the canons of Persio-Arabic prosody). Rafiq Raz emerged as the most influential poet in this classical form.
Understanding the limitations of the ghazal in giving shape to a well-constructed image of an experience, with a distinct speaker having a spaced out ‘Self’, the ‘short poem’ free from traditional prosody and decorum is felt to be the most viable form of poetry. The poem is no more a superficial statement on an experience, but consciously created simulacrum specific to an individual experience.
The representative character of Kashmiri poetry lies in its potential for synchronicity with the unique milieu and the moment, with regard to the world outside the poet that determines his approach to the dialect of the time and his experience. Keeping this hallmark of being ‘representative’ in mind, I keep aside (not throw overboard) all poetry that endlessly emulates the mystical, devotional and sentimental lyricism of the 19th century, or rephrases the flat statements of dread and hypochondria that constituted the style of the 1970s’ and 1980s’ poets. I simply throw overboard all those texts, proliferating in attractive get-ups but oblivious to the basic standards of poetry: precision, freedom from paraphrasing expressions, excessive use of adjectives, and surface ambiguity produced through stock expressions and formulae. Our poetry has to be the expression of responsible living and must be truthful to the concrete experience of the thinking self. A poem that creates a consistent image of the loneliness and dread experienced by an aged couple, tyelyitiaz is a silent lament on cultural subversion:
“Now will you put out the lamp, and sleep?
Why don’t you sleep? ___ Why keep waking,
it is already 10.30 at night.”
Why don’t you sleep? ___ Why keep waking,
it is already 10.30 at night.”
“You remember people used to keep
their lights on for the whole night,
why are you irked by this lamp?”
their lights on for the whole night,
why are you irked by this lamp?”
“Oh, then we were afraid of darkness
that it might devour us,
and now it is light
that really devours ...”
(Naji Munawar: tyelyitiaz / Then and Now, 1994)
that it might devour us,
and now it is light
that really devours ...”
(Naji Munawar: tyelyitiaz / Then and Now, 1994)
The feature of the individual’s position in the web of responsibilities and identifiable self as a journey from innocence to experience ___ indispensable to poetry ___ are found in many poems. Mere technical virtuosity, decorum of diction, and stereotyped mysticism cannot be alternative to writing with response to conditions of our time. A poet exists only in relation to others around him.
Whistles are a prelude
to the restiveness of motionless actors,
of the commotion created by enactment of dialogues.
Let’s whistle, and whistle,
spread this contagion,
in the deaf and dumbfounded dwellings.
(Satish Vimal: shurnyi / Whistles, 2014)
to the restiveness of motionless actors,
of the commotion created by enactment of dialogues.
Let’s whistle, and whistle,
spread this contagion,
in the deaf and dumbfounded dwellings.
(Satish Vimal: shurnyi / Whistles, 2014)
The emerging differences in voices need to be recognised and appreciated rather than suppressed in favour of a mind-numbing conformity.
Shafi Shauq was born in 1950 in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. He completed his PhD in English and is an acclaimed poet, fiction writer, linguist and critic. After serving for thirty three years in the University of Kashmir, Prof. Shauq retired as Dean Faculty of Arts in 2010. Prof. Shauq is associated with several national academic projects like Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature, Medieval Indian Literature, and Oxford Companion to Indian Theatre. He has written scripts and screen-plays for over fifty-five television films and serials.
Prof. Shafi Shauq, 2015
