Nali’s poetic oeuvre, or diwan, is one of the most significant works of Kurdish literature but has not previously been translated into English. In terms of matter and manner, his adaptations of the Classical Perso-Arabic ghazal emphasize sustained correspondence of sounds, usually as end-rhymes, in lines of consistent, equal length; each ghazal addresses a lover of unspecified, indeterminate gender, and closes with a parting signature by Nali’s poetic persona, signaling the poem’s end and reflecting upon the nature of the poem and its addressee. More than mere couplets, his paired lines constitute discrete poetic expressions in their own right, yet remain interdependent in relation to the ghazal as a whole. Every couplet sets up images in tension, emotions straining toward an articulation that seems always to elude reductive treatment. Our translations approximate the Kurdish rhymes with English assonance and half-rhymes, which, in English-language poetry, achieve a less heavy-handed, more palatable effect. We also endeavored to balance the feminine and masculine traits of the addressee, never explicitly indicating whether the Beloved is male or female, to preserve Nali’s deliberate ambiguity on this point. In keeping with this indeterminacy, the ghazal invites supple interpretations, capable of adapting the poem’s sequence of surprising imagery to apply to a human lover, a deity, a homeland.
- Haidar Khezri and Tyler Fisher
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