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Mehfil

By Adeeba Shahid Talukder

Tonight,
the beloved ascends
the rungs of stars;

seated on a mirrored
cushion, she is both spectacle
and witness,

both of the mehfil
and its all-seeing god. She knows
the dark blue

waters of human
existence and the grief of parting—
she draws out the long note like an
abyss—

but only from memory.

The shutters—small,
wooden, let in the night,
jasmine-

scented, & our eyes
sparkle as the hours grow
& the pain of separation grows

& the beauty of the beloved flowers
into the night’s dome

 


 

 

Listen as Adeeba Shahid Talukder readsMehfil.”

Added: Thursday, January 11, 2024  /  Used with permission.
Adeeba Shahid Talukder
Photo by Christopher Lucka.

Adeeba Shahid Talukder is a poet, vocalist, and translator of Urdu and Persian poetry. She is the author of What Is Not Beautiful (Glass Poetry Press, 2018) and her debut collection, Shahr-e-jaanaan: The City of the Beloved (Tupelo Press, 2020), is a winner of the Kundiman Poetry Prize. Her poetry has appeared in Poem-A-Day, Poetry Daily, Aleph Review, and The Margins, and her translations in PBS Frontline and Words Without Borders. Adeeba has received fellowships from Kundiman and Poets House, and holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Michigan. She is currently training in Hindustani classical music under Ustad Salamat Ali, and is a New York State Council on the Arts grant recipient.

Image Description: Adeeba Shahid Talukder faces slightly towards the left. She has long black hair and wears a red and gold scarf, black shirt, and earrings. She appears against a white, overexposed background, leaving highlights around her silhouette.

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