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35 Female from Orlando       852
         

[Kul, A Spell Cast With the Entire Mouth]

[Kul by Fatimah Asghar]

Allah, you gave us a language
where yesterday and tomorrow
are the same word. Kul

A spell cast with the entire
mouth. Back of the throat
to teeth. What day am I promised?

Tomorrow means I might have her forever.
Yesterday means I say goodbye, again.
Kul means they are the same.

I know you can bend time
I'm merely asking for what
is mine. Give me my mother for no

other reason than I deserve her.
If yesterday & tomorrow are the same,
Bring back the grave. pluck the flower

of my mother's body from the soil
Kul means I'm in the crib eyelashes
wet the first time they open. Kul means

my sister is crawling away from her
on the bed as my father comes home
From work. Kul means she's dancing

at my wedding not-yet-come
kul means she's oiling my hair
before the first day of school. Kul

means I wake to her strange voice in the kitchen
Kul means she's holding my baby
in her arms, helping me pick a name

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[Black Mother c.1927–1931 by Ernst Neuschul
https://artuk.org/discover/stories/breastfeeding-in-art-ernst-neuschuls-black-mother#]
paganpoetry
paganpoetry: On the poem: [this is a beautifully sad one, from Fatimah Asghar, who writes about the loss of her mother in, Kul. It's from her book If They Come For Us. Asghar says part of the inspiration for this poem came from realizing the possibilities that open up in different languages: "Sometimes when we think or read or write in one language, it actually can be these weird limitations on our imagination because there's all these words in other languages that show us different possibilities of meaning."]

https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2019/04/28/700903340/a-bouquet-of-poets-for-national-poetry-month

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On the painting: [But Neuschul’s picture brought a tantalising new dimension to this old concept, which immeasurably strengthened its challenge to Nazi ideology, and raised the importance of its message to the world today, already significant, to an epic level. In 1931, the year the 'Black Mother' was painted, Louis Leakey found one of the world’s oldest manmade tools in the Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, and presented it to the British Museum. We may never know if Neuschul had this in mind when he painted Black Mother, his fundamental anthem to motherhood, but this 1.8 million-year-old object proved that modern humanity did not arise from a supreme Aryan race, but began in Africa. This sensational discovery made headline news, and the world knew for the first time that Africa was indeed the mother of all nations.]

https://artuk.org/discover/stories/breastfeeding-in-art-ernst-neuschuls-black-mother#
4 years ago Report
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Mr_Mindblank
Mr_Mindblank: Is "kul" a made-up word or did she borrow it from another language? Google Translate detects Swedish for "fun." The poet herself is Pakistani and "kul" in Urdu means "a lot."
4 years ago Report
1
paganpoetry
paganpoetry: I do not know about the word itself, I rely on the speaker's use of it. And maybe, there lies some of the "limit" on language she mentions...... Maybe how it is translated to us, "means" differently to her, individually.... And how words can change and mean many things to us all...individually... Idk.
4 years ago Report
0
Mr_Mindblank
Mr_Mindblank: That is what she seems to suggest in the quote. A "private language" - which Wittgenstein would not approve of.
4 years ago Report
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paganpoetry
paganpoetry: Oh, I don't know him.
4 years ago Report
0