- 96 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub
About this book
A chilling poetic reflection on the world we have inherited and the destructions that made it.
To confront time, pre-modern Arabic poems often began with the poet standing before the ruins, real and imagined, of a beloved's home. In Postcards from the Underworld, Sinan Antoon works in that tradition, observing the detritus of his home city, Baghdad, where he survived two wars—the Iran-Iraq War of 1980 and the First Gulf War of 1991—and which, after he left, he watched from afar being attacked during the US invasion in 2003. Antoon's poems confront violence and force us not to look away as he traces death's haunting presence in the world. Nature offers consolation, and flowers and butterflies are the poet's interlocutors, but they too cannot escape ruin. Composed in Arabic and translated into English by the poet himself, Postcards from the Underworld is a searing meditation on the destruction of humans, habitats, and homes.
To confront time, pre-modern Arabic poems often began with the poet standing before the ruins, real and imagined, of a beloved's home. In Postcards from the Underworld, Sinan Antoon works in that tradition, observing the detritus of his home city, Baghdad, where he survived two wars—the Iran-Iraq War of 1980 and the First Gulf War of 1991—and which, after he left, he watched from afar being attacked during the US invasion in 2003. Antoon's poems confront violence and force us not to look away as he traces death's haunting presence in the world. Nature offers consolation, and flowers and butterflies are the poet's interlocutors, but they too cannot escape ruin. Composed in Arabic and translated into English by the poet himself, Postcards from the Underworld is a searing meditation on the destruction of humans, habitats, and homes.
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Yes, you can access Postcards from the Underworld by Sinan Antoon in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Literature & Middle Eastern Poetry. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.
Information
Table of contents
- Antoon’s Copyright page
- Postcards from the Underworld
- Prayer
- Psalm
- The Day
- The New God
- From the Lost Gospels
- From Eve’s Confessions
- Divine Failure
- I Hear It
- Blind Song
- The Saz Player
- Garment
- A Heavy Heart
- Visitation
- In My Next Life
- A Feather
- Autumn in Heaven
- Train of the Dead
- Interval
- Murmur
- Black Butterfly
- Birth Certificate
- Another Day
- Rest Your Horns
- The Poet
- Slow Mail
- Days Like This
- Dismemberment
- A Head
- Afterwords
- An Ordinary Day
- Letter to al-Mutanabbi
- A Photograph
- One Night; In Many Cities
- Heard on New Year’s Eve
- A Handbag in China Town
- A Butterfly in New York
- Winesong
- I Don’t Visit My Mother
- Angels on My Ceiling
- Angelus Novus
- An Alternative History
- Crossing
- Phosphorus
- Crazy Horse
- Anamorphosis / Iraq
- We Shall Wait
- Letter to My Ancestor
- The Angel’s Trumpet
- The Day’s Catch
- This Was Not Written
- A Postcard from the Underworld
- Nostalgia for Light
- A New Sun
- Psalm
- Scene
- Wars
- A Prisoner’s Song
- To an Iraqi Infant
- A Prism; Wet with Wars
- Delving
- Phantasmagoria I
- Phantasmagoria II
- Sifting
- The Milky Way
- Wrinkles on the Wind’s Forehead
- Strings
- A Sign
- From the Diary of a Ghost
- Just Another Evening (in black & you)
- Absence
- Afterword
- Sources