{"id":14917,"date":"2017-08-09T15:00:29","date_gmt":"2017-08-09T15:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=14917"},"modified":"2020-12-09T15:15:08","modified_gmt":"2020-12-09T15:15:08","slug":"and-the-pick-of-the-month-for-july-2017-is-birds-by-rizwan-akhtar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/and-the-pick-of-the-month-for-july-2017-is-birds-by-rizwan-akhtar\/","title":{"rendered":"And the Pick of the Month for July 2017 is ‘Birds’ by Rizwan Akhtar"},"content":{"rendered":"

This one came right down to the wire and at one point we thought it might be a draw but Rizwan Akhtar’s ‘Birds’ just edged ahead to be Pick of the Month for July 2017.* What caught voters’ attention was the imagery, the allusions and the wonderful use of language. And, as one said, ‘Nature breathes in this poem.’<\/span><\/p>\n

Rizwan<\/strong> works as an Assistant Professor in the Department of English, Punjab University, Lahore, Pakistan. He completed his PhD in postcolonial literature from the University of Essex, UK in 2013. He has published poems in well-established poetry magazines in the UK, Wales, US, India, Canada, and New Zealand. He has also done a 5 weeks workshop on poetry with Derek Walcott at the University of Essex in 2010.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Birds<\/span><\/strong>
\nfor you<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

They scrape and bill for answers
\nI peck evenings for small words
\nfinches and robins temper tones<\/span><\/p>\n

They don\u2019t flutter against my desires
\nOr rise from foggy halos
\nlike sentences blurring intentions <\/span><\/p>\n

only stare my doubts with little eyes
\nover ponds of petaled flowers
\ncarrying conviction under feathers <\/span><\/p>\n

a stripped choir of town\u2019s winter
\nland on raven craggy earth
\nsank in scrimped necks<\/span><\/p>\n

a milky whiteness of nude bodies\u2014
\nclamp beaks against an urgent silence
\nof blue, red, and magenta quills<\/span><\/p>\n

These birds I see cloister you
\nhuddle like expressions
\nmuted by long flights<\/span><\/p>\n

They drop our histories
\ntied to footnotes, on vague wings.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

********<\/p>\n

Voters comments included:-<\/p>\n

[It] awakens the romantic and philosophic eye of any literalist who has so far been looking at birds as only biological beings. It’s a ‘love at first sight’ experience reading this poem. <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Imagery is from day to day examples, easy to understand yet impregnate with deeper contexts. <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Fascinating fabrication of words<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Because the words are so powerful they strike with intensity and the imagery is also very provocative! <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Good control of the language and line length. Surprising imagery.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Fascinating and marvellous piece of writing<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Language and style impressed me<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

The marvelous use of language to communicate the subject <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Loved the theme, the message. Wonderful<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

The poem resounds [with] an intimacy with nature, creatural…<\/em> <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

*It was such a close thing (one vote!), however, that special mention must go to Andrew Turner and his fine poem ‘The wolves were not invited’; its fairytale quality and unnerving ending appealed to many.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This one came right down to the wire and at one point we thought it might be a draw but Rizwan Akhtar’s ‘Birds’ just edged ahead to be Pick of the Month for July 2017.* What caught voters’ attention was the imagery, the allusions and the wonderful use of language. And, as one said, ‘Nature […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[136],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2017-poetry-picks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14917"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14917\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14927,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14917\/revisions\/14927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}