POETRY OF EXILE …. DR NAZAND BEGIKHANI

                                                                                       

POETRY OF EXILE …. DR NAZAND BEGIKHANI ( BORN 1964 ).

" I am happy to be alive, my friend…
There is a thin line between life and death, my friend
There is a thin line between life and death"

(Dr Nazand Begikhani )
.

Dr.Nazand Begikhani ( Born 1964 ) was born in Koysinjaq, Iraqi Kurdistan . Driven out in 1987, currently She lives as an exile in UK . She is a survivor of Anfal, the Iraqi genocide against Kurdistan in 1987, in which she lost many family members and friends. She may never return to her native country.

                                                                

Begikhani has done her Doctorate in comparative literature at the Sorbonne France . She is a writer , Poet , Translator and a well known voice against Honour Killings of women world over.

Her poems have been translated into French , Arabic , English , Persian and many more languages. She has also translated Baudelaire and Eliot into Kurdish. Her works in English and French have been published by the Poetry Magazine, Ambit magazine, Poetry Salzburg Review, Modern Poetry in Translation, Exiled Writers' Ink, Action Poétique, etc.She has published five poetry collections in Kurdish and Bells of Speech is her first collection in English.

As a founding member of KWAHK ( Kurdish Women’s Action Against Honour Killings ) ,She addressed many conferences world over..She has provided expert advice and training on gender equality to government bodies, UN agencies, and international organisations, including the Swedish government, the UN Assistance Mission to Iraq, UN Women in Iraq, the UK Metropolitan Police and Amnesty International.

Lately She has joined UNICEF’s campaign to reunite Refugee Children with their Families . She informs :

“Children are drowning at sea and suffocating in the back of lorries because they are so desperate to reach their families in the UK. By reuniting children safely and legally with their families, we can protect them from making dangerous journeys or being forced into the hands of traffickers and smugglers “

World over , Every exile has to grapple with minimum two languages emerging from two cultures . One that is close to his soul and keeps him tied to his roots and soil ; The other he is constrained to pick up to keep his bones and flesh together in the New Environment .A split runs deep down his inner self by this dilemma . Only an Exile knows where it pinches him. And Nazand Begikhani has conveyed this fact beautifully in her poem “Two tongues in Fight “ , A Poem she dedicates Sujata Bhatt..

The poem goes as under …

(Two Tongues in Fight)

After Sujata Bhatt (4)

I grew up with two tongues

in perpetual fight

My mother tongue was a butterfly

in turquoise flight

over a valley of light

singing a melody for life

I still remember the song:

(Wara bo lam bfra ba bal)

(Mn u to dabina haval) …… ( 1)

My alien tongue was a snake

invading me

slithering into my body

and roaring:

(Umma Arabiyah wahidah)

(Dhatu risala khalida)…… (2)

My mother tongue was too high to fall

too vibrant to be silenced

My alien tongue

moved into my days

my school books

It devoured my alphabets

and occupied the white space of my childhood

A chilly wind started to blow

My mother tongue was uppermost

too vibrant to be silenced

it flew to the Zagroz (3 ) mountains

gathered an army of butterflies

and besieged the snaky tongue

The tongues went into perpetual battle

A battle that became

the history of a nation

striving for a voice

(Nazand Begikhani)

One more poem of Dr Nazand Begikhani for Mothers who lost their Children In War , terror and Religious extremism.

( God is Not Dead For My Mother )

‘Truth is an illusion’

said Nietzsche

For my mother who has never been to school

truth is standing up calmly

after a deluge

planting a garden

with serene hands

speaking the language of trees

and understanding the alphabet of rain

For my mother truth is

reading the silence of my brothers’ faces

as they lie in stone

and seeing in the blueness of the sky

a plume of light tracing a path

which stretches deep

beyond the cloud and the stars

When you can trace the white wings of your dead children

flying over the path of light in the azure of the sky,

You need God to survive 

you don’t need God to die .

(Nazand Begikhani)

So Long so much on Dr Nazand Begikhani

( Autar Mota )

PS

1 

From a Kurdish children song: “Come and fly towards me, You and I will become friends.” 

2 

A pan-Arab slogan of the Ba’sth patry that ruled Iraq from 1963 up to 2003: “There is one Arab nation, it has an eternal message”

3

A chain of high mountains across Kurdistan.

(4)

Sujata Bhatt is a noted poet and translator from Ahemdabad . She has translated Gujarati poetry into English for the Penguin Anthology of Contemporary Indian Women Poets. Her poems have appeared in various journals in the United Kingdom, Ireland, the United States, and Canada. She has been recognized as a distinctive voice in contemporary poetry and declared, "one of the finest poets alive".  She lives in Germany .

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