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All One's Blue
Kazim Ali is a traveller both in time and in space taking us into worlds that seem far apart--the omnipresent pastness of Cairo contemporary Albany the music of Alice Coltrane--but which in fact are bound together by his breath the ways he breathes are the ways he writes. The result far from being insubstantial is as real as the sky forever changing above us without our knowledge but which achingly asks us to follow the poet as he dares its embrace. This is a beautiful haunting book. 39 --Adil Jussawalla 39 Age-old stories made of rain and skin and flowering into wild bush fires are born out of Kazim Ali 39 s poetry. The then and the now become blurred as he relives with a new urgency the interrogations of our time through the prism of Sufi lore and song. Myths forming the skeleton of men are seized and burst apart. Between endless time and ephemeral instant the poet 39 s words draw us into a dancing net where we shake with untold uncertainties quot Illusion is the sheet and the thing lying under it. quot The secrecy of desire lies deep at the heart of this collection of poetry--immensely seductive. 39 --Ananda Devi About the Author KAZIM ALI 39 S books include four volumes of poetry The Far Mosque The Fortieth Day Bright Felon Autobiography and Cities and Sky Ward three novels Quinn 39 s Passage The Disappearance of Seth and Wind Instrument and three collections of essays Orange Alert Essays on Poe
- GenresPoetry
170 pages, Paperback
Published December 1, 2015
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About the author
Kazim Ali
62 books103 followersKazim Ali was born in the United Kingdom and has lived transnationally in the United States, Canada, India, France, and the Middle East. His books encompass multiple genres, includingthe volumes of poetry 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 texts Bright Felon and Wind Instrument. His novels include the recently published The Secret Room: A String Quartet and among his books of essays are the hybrid memoir Silver Road: Essays, Maps & Calligraphies and Fasting for Ramadan: Notes from a Spiritual Practice. He is also an accomplished translator (of Marguerite Duras, Sohrab Sepehri, Ananda Devi, Mahmoud Chokrollahi and others) and an editor of several anthologies and books of criticism. After a career in public policy and organizing, Ali taught at various colleges and universities, including Oberlin College, Davidson College, St. Mary's College of California, and Naropa University. He is currently a Professor of Literature at the University of California, San Diego. His newest books are a volume of three long poems entitled The Voice of Sheila Chandra and a memoir of his Canadian childhood, Northern Light.
Author photo by Tanya Rosen-Jones from Kazim Ali's press kit.
Author photo by Tanya Rosen-Jones from Kazim Ali's press kit.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 30, 2022
On white, the wishes, the whispered accounts,
a little autobiography, littered on the surface.
Where we listen. Were we here.
***
In this book, the sky is sometimes lavender. In this book are colours you have never seen before.
In this book is the taste of white peach.
...
In the year of summer you came south into a city of yellow and white, and what was told in the city was told in trees, and then in leaves, and then in light.
***
Orange, the trees are aflame.
Scarlet. Called here, you came.
...
The valley wends the way the music went.
The sapphire sky, unbelievable, but there.
These moments against the years you cannot believe.
This hover of music winging down from the mountains you cannot believe.
But here in the trees, here above the river, here as the season
Turns to fog then frost, you will.
***
all the failed echoes don't matter
the painted over murals don't matter
you can find your way to me
by the faint star-lamp
we are a fleet now
our prows zeroing in
praying in the wind
to spin like haywire compasses
toward whichever direction
will have us
***
Wondered as I walked on the pier, the sea lions sleeping below, waking up with shouts in the early morning sun.
What is the edge of the universe, I wanted to know. What is the difference between I and I and what can I know when I know what I know.
...
Eternal sound of the universe who are you and what do you sound like.
***
His azimuth splendour maps the city twice in time and he feels the drag of the tide pulling him along through millennia into other cities each of which existed here in this same place.
***
I would paint this place in savage wide strokes of yellow and white - the glistening water, the sky that's almost nothing, the constant breeze that flows through, a caress, a flaque, pooling and dissipating, veils of sand, of air and light...
a little autobiography, littered on the surface.
Where we listen. Were we here.
***
In this book, the sky is sometimes lavender. In this book are colours you have never seen before.
In this book is the taste of white peach.
...
In the year of summer you came south into a city of yellow and white, and what was told in the city was told in trees, and then in leaves, and then in light.
***
Orange, the trees are aflame.
Scarlet. Called here, you came.
...
The valley wends the way the music went.
The sapphire sky, unbelievable, but there.
These moments against the years you cannot believe.
This hover of music winging down from the mountains you cannot believe.
But here in the trees, here above the river, here as the season
Turns to fog then frost, you will.
***
all the failed echoes don't matter
the painted over murals don't matter
you can find your way to me
by the faint star-lamp
we are a fleet now
our prows zeroing in
praying in the wind
to spin like haywire compasses
toward whichever direction
will have us
***
Wondered as I walked on the pier, the sea lions sleeping below, waking up with shouts in the early morning sun.
What is the edge of the universe, I wanted to know. What is the difference between I and I and what can I know when I know what I know.
...
Eternal sound of the universe who are you and what do you sound like.
***
His azimuth splendour maps the city twice in time and he feels the drag of the tide pulling him along through millennia into other cities each of which existed here in this same place.
***
I would paint this place in savage wide strokes of yellow and white - the glistening water, the sky that's almost nothing, the constant breeze that flows through, a caress, a flaque, pooling and dissipating, veils of sand, of air and light...
July 3, 2021
Okay. So I wanted to read some reviews here but couldn't find a single. I can safely conclude that it wasn't only me that could hardly understand three fourth of the book. What I could comprehend was very beautiful, hence the three stars. Why should poetry be so twisted, abstract and incomprehensible? Is it worth writing if it can't be understood easily?? Isn't poetry supposed to go straight to the heart? This went over my head. I tried to find explanations online but nothing came up. Even the prose somehow lost me. This book is not suitable for simple minded people like me. 😏
June 6, 2022
Kazim Ali is a traveller and chronicler of both time and space. His poems transcend the realms of reality and challenge the notions of imagination.
To describe this particular magical book of his poems, I'm quoting his own words
"In this book, the sky is sometimes lavender. In this book are colours you have never seen before."
To describe this particular magical book of his poems, I'm quoting his own words
"In this book, the sky is sometimes lavender. In this book are colours you have never seen before."
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews