During my first reading of Agha Shahid Ali’s “Ghazal”, I was perplexed about who the audience is and who is the speaker. This issue was primarily caused by the use of pronouns and nouns throughout the poem. When I first saw the title of the poem, “Ghazal”, I got excited thinking I would understand who the audience is – Allah (God). In Islamic school and traditional religious songs, ghazals are often poems or songs made up of couplets about one’s journey to finding love for Allah. Thus I assumed the speaker was someone who has found their love for God, and the audience was God himself. However, my assumption quickly fell apart.
Firstly, the initial two lines are from another poem and the subject is a “patient” (Ali line 1). This totally caught me off-guard. Thoughts like “why put this at the beginning?” started swarming my mind. As if I was not already confused, the next couplet introduces a refugee as the subject. Specifically, the line “A refugee I’ll be paroled in real time” disoriented me (4). Due to the use of the personal pronoun “I” after refugee, I started to question if the speaker was the refugee being referenced. Additionally, I wondered where the refugee was displaced from and why. Already by the second stanza, I was doubting my theory about the poem being about Allah.
As the poem continues, some clarity is given while more questions arise. Simultaneously, the poem discusses land & country while having religious connotations. One sentence will state “It’s hell in the city of gold in real time” whilst another states “God’s angels again are-for Satan!-forlorn” (10, 11). After every line, I ask myself again: who is the speaker?
About halfway through the poem, I had an aha moment. When the speaker asks, “And who is the terrorist, who the victim?”, I am almost 100% sure the poem is not about a religious journey (15). In no way in my mind could the relationship between a follower and God be synonymous with a victim and a terrorist – at least I believe it is unusual to phrase it in such a manner. Yet, the relationship between a citizen and their government or a refugee and their community can be compared to this analogy. From this point onward, I read the poem strictly from a refugee’s point of view; although I came back to the religious theory near the end for a moment.
Imagery started to fill my mind, with countries crumbling and people mourning. One specific line that truly sold me on the refugee perspective was “‘Behind a door marked DANGER’ are being unwound / the prayers my friend had enscrolled in real time” (19, 20). Although there is a mention of the religious action of praying, the image that came to my mind immediately convinced me that this poem is about refugees. The image was of a few Palestinian men praying inside a destroyed mosque. The “DANGER” in the poem is the mosque in shambles and the men are literally praying within its broken walls. It only makes sense for the speaker to be a kind of refugee/displaced person.
Now that I had decided who the speaker of the poem was, my question next was: who is the audience? I restarted reading from the top of the poem and conducted another deep dive, this time through the lens of a refugee. Unanswered questions started to have explanations as holes filled in my understanding.
The lines from the James Merrill poem almost seemed taunting now, as if the speaker was giving the audience false hope, or at least showing that hope was present. But who was the speaker giving hope to?
As the speaker’s voice starts to shine through, lines like “The one you would choose: Were you led then by him?” start to make sense. It is as if the speaker (who I now believe is a refugee) is trying to show the audience mistakes that should not be repeated. This line is particular, the speaker is displaying the importance of a leader and questioning the audience about their decision. The next line also gives insight into who the audience is. Ali chooses to use the Persian/Arabic/Hindi term “O Yaar” instead of the English word “friend”. By using another language, Ali narrows the possibilities of his audience’s identity. It almost seems like the speaker is directing his message to the Arab/South Asian community, or anyone who understands the language.
The next and last time the speaker addresses his audience is in the final couplet of the poem. Ali writes, “Now Friend, the Beloved has stolen your words– Read slowly: The plot will unfold in real time.” (27, 28). When I read this couplet out loud, it sounded ominous. Like a warning. This final couplet during my second deep dive was my second epiphany-like realization. The speaker is a refugee, as I have established, and the audience is citizens of other countries (mainly concentrated in the Arabic/South Asian region). The speaker is trying to warn them not to make the same mistake that his people did, not to allow their country to perish before their eyes. The last line in particular is an “ I told you so” equivalent.
Ultimately, there are still a few sentences throughout the poem I do not totally understand, however, I am able to grasp the underlying message of the poem. Breaking down the pronouns and understanding who the speaker is versus who the audience is enabled me to receive the meaning Agha Shahid Ali was trying to get at. The speaker is urging the audience to heed their warning about the destruction of their homes, or else the audience will see their prediction unfold in real time.