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Distributed for Seagull Books

Naming the Dawn

The poems in this new volume by Abdourahman A. Waberi are introspective and inquisitive, reflecting a deep spiritual bond—with words, with the history of Islam and its great poets, with the landscapes those poets walked, among which Waberi grew up. The sage yearns here for the simplicity of each individual moment to somehow become eternal, for the histories and people that are part of him—his mother, his wife, his unborn child, the sacred texts that ground his being—to come together harmoniously within him, and to emerge through his words. Lyrical and personal, but with powerful historical and cultural resonances, these poems are the work of a master at the height of his powers.
 

96 pages | 5 x 8 1/2 | © 2018

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Poetry


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Reviews

“With Naming the Dawn, Abdourahman A. Waberi delivers a magnificent poetic art, where the deciphering of the poem—the patient rhythm of reading, listening to signs—is a discovery of self and sacred texts, and ultimately, of the religious spirit . . . Mingling indiscriminately poetic writing and reading of the sacred texts—of the Quran—the author proposes here a formidable plea in favor of tolerance and openness.”

Elera Bertho, Diacritick, on the French edition

Table of Contents

Foreword
 
Living Soul
O Men
May My Right Hand Forget Me
Slantwise
Touchstones
Juvenescence
Of a Salvo in Its Shrine
At the Botanical Garden
 
Seemingly No Big Deal
Chasing after Death
Bottle
Yes, but What Do You Say about This, My Daughter?
Language of Birds
Daily Awakening
Reader
O Mother
Absence
Sepia
Vanity
It’s a Girl
Yesterdaze
 
Spiritual Exercises
Access
Aura
Anchor
Turn Away from the Cramped Attentional Tunnel
Ascension
Asceticism
Pavement Struggle
A Shroud for All Time
Wager
Bees
Wedding
In a Naked Voice
Détente
O Rising Sun
Sitting
Axis
Advent
Not a Day Will Pass
Faerie
The Hoopoe
 
Translator’s Notes
 
Acknowledgements
 

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