A banker’s life, in verse
Poetry is a record of the experiences of relationships, with the world as well as with the self. While for some poets, relationships expand beyond the self and the world to encompass the metaphysical realm, but for others, the relationship with poetry itself, and with the language of poetry also become significant relationships.
Poetry, hence, expresses the totality of human experience of all these diverse relations. However, to do so with vigour and vitality, the poet needs to bridge the gap between experience and expression so that the immediacy and intensity of the experience may be retained in the expression. When we read poetry, we are not just reading verses but living a life.
Sirajuddin Aziz’s collection of poetry In Quest of Mirage is a record of the wide range of the poet’s relationships: with self in terms of self-critique; with people, both close and distant, in a variety of contexts ranging from the personal to the political; and with God in terms of love as well as guilt and betrayal. All these associations are intensely felt and movingly rendered by him.
The self is seen in light of the relation with God, people, and the world, and is laid bare in notes of regret, repentance, and reparation — guilt that is not without hope. The collection opens with “Thanksgiving”, a hymn to God, in the tradition of many Urdu poets whose collections open with similar tributes to God’s mercifulness and generosity.
This divine benevolence is contrasted, again in the tradition of religious poetry, with the self’s betrayal and disloyalty to God. However, this sense of guilt leads Aziz to express remorse and repentance and hope of salvation. This can be seen in the poem “A Prayer.”
Quite a few poems in the collection are love poems. Love relations are, again, described in the traditional “love triangle” — lover, beloved, rival — a characteristic scheme of Urdu poetry. Aziz expresses intense admiration for the beauty of the beloved, but his love remains largely unrequitted as the rival seems to win the affections or at least the possession of the beloved. Aziz, however, gracefully accepts his place in the triangle and does not blame the beloved of unfairness or betrayal.
Some of the most intense poems in the collection are those which describe the poet’s relation (or absence thereof) with his mother. Since Aziz’s mother passed away early in his life, this loss is the theme of many poems expressing anguish and remorse. His longing to be united with his mother is most poignantly expressed in an early poem in the collection, pertinently entitled “Mother”.
The poem opens with a strange confession, that Aziz misses his mother more in his adulthood than he ever did in his infant years. It is when the consciousness of the gap in his life became more vivid that he realised his loss with increasing intensity. It’s only in adulthood that he could realise the pain of separation, intensified by every experience of watching infants cuddle up to their mothers.
While to others, mothers are warm, flesh and blood figures. But for Aziz, a mother is only known as the “swollen ground” of her grave. The poem ends with his wish to be united with his mother “this time, forever”.
Apart from these personal relations of affection, love for the wider Muslim community as well as the poet’s compatriots is also expressed in some of the poems. In “Expectations”, the humanitarian feelings of Aziz are aroused by the sufferings of people facing war and genocide, and he advocates waging a humanitarian war against these atrocities.
Wage a war we must
Of conviction and persuasion
To stop and end
Senseless killing fields of
Bosnia, Kashmir, Afghanistan and Algeria
And this anti-war war is only to spread a message of peace: “We owe an obligation/For history and posterity/to practice and honour/Our message of peace.”
The inability and the unwillingness of the world to intervene on behalf the oppressed is made a target of the Aziz searing critique in “To the People of Kosovo.”
Unashamedly we watch
The nine O’clock news
Whilst having dinner
Unmoved by the picture
Of the hunger-stricken infant
Clinging to his mother’s chest
Aziz also expresses sympathy for his fellow countrymen. In “Broken Pledge” the poet gives voice to his patriotic feelings and deplores the condition of the people of Pakistan betrayed by their self-proclaimed leaders:
The silent masses, yoked
By the plundering politicians
The beguiling Mullahs
Still hope for a miracle!
In “The Nation Yearns” he defines the qualities of the leader that the nation needs. It needs no less than a “messiah” to lead the people out of the dire situation they have ended up in due to the lack of leadership.
Poems like “Mis-Judgement” show the poet’s concern not for just one nation but for the whole of humanity which, in pursuit of “fame and glory”, chooses to follow the path of extremism. This pursuit ends only in the bitter realisation that “no noble end/ever justifies demonic means”.
Two of the politically charged poems are directly related to the ongoing war and bloodshed in Palestine. “A Father’s Cry” is the monologue of a father who has lost five young daughters apparently in a bombing raid. While devastated by the loss, the father is courageously convinced that his daughters’ sacrifice will not go in vain but bring an end to the oppression. Sadly, it would resonate with the present-day genocide in Gaza.
Feeble now, but my spirit
And resolve is alive
Freedom from tyranny and
Ruthless oppression
May seem distant and illusive
But, with certitude
The cry of this father
Will usher it, any day!
The second poem is written in the voice of a child whose picture (printed alongside the poem) apparently shows a child shaken by fear. The child denies that he is afraid. He is only mournful for his three cousins who went to sleep with him but never woke up after a missile attack destroyed the entire vicinity. The child pours scorn over “The 55 odd nations/Of different shades of grey” that “Have become impotent/Physically, mentally and emotionally”. The poem ends with a warning given by the child to the addressees that if they don’t act, it may soon be their turn to face the loss: “Or else the frame would remain/But only my picture/Will be replaced and God forbid/It could be your child!”.
One of the best poems in the collection is “Deprived” which depicts an ‘ordinary’ scene in the life of a Pakistani citizen: the sight of a beggar boy asking for alms at a busy road. The irony is that people in luxury cars do throw a few coins to the boy but only to “enjoy/the spirit of giving”. This suggests that there is no genuine concern for the boy’s life and for finding a solution to poverty. The alms-giving is an act of generosity that reassures the rich people’s belief in their own goodness.
As a sensitive and observant individual, while human relations in various forms remain the Aziz’s main occupation throughout the collection, there are a few poems which express his frustration at being caught in the web of relations from which he desires to break free. In “Pain” he complains of being held captive in “artificial relationships/confined within the web of morals and traditions”. The poem ends with the poet resolving “to defeat, conquer and enslave/customs, culture and norms”.
The eponymous poem in the collection “In Quest of Mirage” also expresses the same frustration with the oppressive nature of relationships, customs and norms as they stand in the way of Aziz’s communion with his beloved. In a poignant image, he describes his beloved as a “mirage/in the desert of life”, while the “truthful reality” is “strengthened by/norms customs and traditions”.
Relationships thus constitute the frame within which Aziz finds both fulfilment and frustration. At a personal level, his relationship with God, the self, the family and the beloved are fulfilling relations for him while in abstract terms moral values and cultural norms exert an oppressive force upon the poet.
In a delightful twist of irony, Aziz, a banker immersed in the presumably dry world of finance, unveils a hidden facet as a remarkably sensitive and passionate writer and poet, transforming numbers into verses and transactions into tales. With a background deeply rooted in banking, Aziz brings a wealth of experience shaped by his interactions with diverse cultures and societies. His extensive exposure adds profound depth to his expressions. Aziz is not only a seasoned banker but also a voracious reader and a fervent writer, contributing regularly to both national and international daily journals and magazines, addressing a spectrum of issues.
Finally, a few words about the art and craft of poetry as manifested in the collection. All the poems are written in free verse with occasional use of rhymes in some poems. The analogies —metaphors and similes — and the imagery used to describe emotional states have been crafted effectively. However, there seems to be a prosaic flatness in the poetry, albeit there are some poetically intense compositions in the collection.
Aziz has yet again showed his ability to face the challenge of expressing feelings provoked by a personal, social and political context largely strange to the English language. Writing poetry in English is a bigger challenge than writing prose, because of the differences between his native language and culture and his poetic one. This is a formidable feat and Aziz has performed it in an admirable way.
Faisal Nazir is Assistant Professor at the Department of English, University of Karachi, and the author of Orientalism Post 9/11: Pakistani Anglophone Fiction in an Age of Terror
All facts and information are the sole responsibility of the writer