Forever

By Agha Shahid Ali

This article appeared in the January 7, 2002 edition of The Nation.

December 20, 2001

for Donald Revell

Even Death won't hide the poor fugitive forever;
on Doomsday he will learn he must live forever.

Is that nectar the cry of the desert prophets?
See angels pour the Word through a sieve forever.

Subscriber Login

4 ISSUES FREE

Subscribe Now!

The only way to read this article and the full contents of each week's issue of The Nation online is by subscribing to the magazine. Subscribe now and read this article -- and every article published since for the past five years -- right now.

There's no obligation -- try The Nation for four weeks free.

.

About Agha ShahidAli

Agha Shahid Ali was born in New Delhi on February 4, 1949. He grew up Muslim in Kashmir, and was later educated at the University of Kashmir, Srinagar, and the University of Delhi. He earned a PhD in English from Pennsylvania State University in 1984, and an MFA from the University of Arizona in 1985. His volumes of poetry include Rooms Are Never Finished (W.W. Norton & Co., 2001), The Country Without a Post Office (1997), The Beloved Witness: Selected Poems (1992), A Nostalgist's Map of America (1991), A Walk Through the Yellow Pages (1987), The Half-Inch Himalayas (1987), In Memory of Begum Akhtar and Other Poems (1979), and Bone Sculpture (1972). He is also the author of T.S. Eliot as Editor (1986), translator of The Rebel's Silhouette: Selected Poems, by Faiz Ahmed Faiz (1992), and editor of Ravishing Disunities: Real Ghazals in English (2000). more...
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

Blogs

» The Beat

Sanders Won't Back Reform Bill That Lacks Public Option | “It is my intention to do everything I can to see that a strong bill is passed which provides universal coverage in a cost-effective way."
John Nichols
5 Comments
Posted at 8:53 ET

» Editor's Cut

Filibuster Follies | "The filibuster has become a cancer growing inside the world's greatest deliberative body."
Katrina vanden Heuvel
102 Comments

» The Notion

Bad Black Mothers | For African American women, reproduction has never been an entirely private matter.
Melissa Harris-Lacewell
95 Comments

» Act Now!

Coal Country | Stunning film reveals new dimensions to the cost of America's over-reliance on coal.
Peter Rothberg
116 Comments

» The Dreyfuss Report

A Kingdom of Bicycles No Longer | China's ambassador for climate change speaks on the eve of the Copenhagen summit meeting.
Robert Dreyfuss
59 Comments