This is where the poem becomes very unique, as it changes from the English language to Gujarati. This shows that the dream is unexpected and uncontrollable. It also gives us, the reader, a chance to see what she really means as it alienates us from this foreign text, and we are put in her shoes. We find that the Gujarati text is actually the translation of the English text below it.
Once the poem changes back to English the poet uses more positive statements using present tense verbs and the repeated use of the word ‘grows’.
“It grows back, a stump of a shoot”
This first line after the translation to Gujarati shows us that the poem is poignant towards an emotionally rich conclusion, in relation to fertility and re-growth like spring after a barren winter. Next the tongue seems to take a life of its own,
“grows longer, grows moist, grows strong veins,
it ties the other tongue in knots,”
the unmitigated metaphor of growth reverses the sentiment of decay in the first half of the poem, lines thirteen to fifteen. The poem ends with the lines,
“Everytime I think I’ve forgotten,
I think I’ve lost the mother tongue,
It blossoms out of my mouth.
This gives the image of a flower, and the word blossoms exemplifies that growth is healthy.
This poem is about the first person view of sense, identity and language. It is a contrast between the argument of the practical use of a language, tongue, and the poignant pull of language as part of your identity.
Another woman named Moniza Alvi writes the second poem ‘Presents from my aunts in Pakistan’. Moniza Alvi was born in Pakistan in nineteen fifty four, but has spent most of her life living and working in England.
‘Presents from my aunts in Pakistan’ is a poem about two cultures, the one she lives in now and the one she left behind as a child. The poem is very descriptive and shows great comparisons between life in the east and life in the west. This poem has a strong autobiographical content and there are some specific personal references in it. It is constructed on the thoughts of a teenage girl who is trapped between two cultures
The first two paragraphs refer strongly to the idea of the difference of fashion between the two cultures and basically a teenage girl has been given some clothes as presents from her aunts in Pakistan.
The first paragraph contains many descriptive words, including onomatopoeias,
“glistening”
“snapped”
and also similes,
“like an orange split open,”
colours, shapes and comparisons with fruit are used as well.
For most teenagers clothes are a sign of identity but her identity seems to be lost due to her mixture of culture in Pakistan and England,
“like at school, fashions changed
in Pakistan
the salwar bottoms were broad and stiff
the narrow.”
The next paragraph shows how she is uncomfortable wearing her Pakistani clothes in England, but also how she admires them but doesn’t feel she belongs to them.
“I tried each satin-silken top –
was alien in the sitting-room.
I could never be as lovely
as those clothes”
She feels that she is alienated from both cultures.
Now the poet tells us how, although she feels western clothes are dull and dreary, they do not make her stand out from the crowd.
“I longed
for denim and corduroy.
My costume clung to me
and I was aflame,”
She creates emphasis by using the word ‘aflame’ in a metaphorical sense, she cannot rise above he feelings of discomfort. The image of the mythical phoenix rising from the ashes, she wants to be born again, but knows it will not happen.
Now the attention is drawn to the fact that although this girl finds her families possessions outlandish, she also knows that they are beautiful and captivating.
“I wanted my parents’ camel skin lamp -
switching it on in my bedroom,
to consider the cruelty
and the transformation
from camel to shade,
marvel at the colours
like stained glass.”
The words ‘cruelty’ and ‘transformation’ are a union of the cruelty and the beauty. Transformation is a theme of the poem, of how clothes can transform from one culture to another. The word marvel creates a sense of wonder at the rich colours followed by ‘like stained glass” which is an example of a simile. Next is a series of short sentences, condensed almost to note form, which reflect both cultures.
“My mother cherished her jewellery –
Indian gold, dangling, filigree.”
This basically means that her mother cherished her Indian heritage.
Now the poem tells of how her school friends think the clothes are strange, and how they do not impress them.
“My salwar kameez
didn’t impress the school friend
who sat on my bed, asked to see
my weekend clothes.”
Now the poem moves away from the clothes to the mirrors on them. It is like the real mirrors become metaphorical mirrors in which she can see the past of her aunts life.
“ But often I admired the mirror-work,
tried to glimpse myself”
The words ‘glimpse myself’ shows she is looking to find who she really is. The mirrors are important as the narrator tries to ‘glimpse’ herself and parts of her life.
“In the miniature
glass circles, recall the story
how the three of us
sailed to England.”
Next she tells of how the journey was painful not just mentally but physically as well.
“Prickly heat had me screaming on the way.
I ended up in a cot
in my English grandmother’s dining-room,
found myself alone,”
She feels isolated and alone.
“Playing with a tin boat.”
This is like the boat that shipped her from Pakistan to England.
The next stanza is still on the theme of how she is seeing her life through the mirrors.
“I pictured my birthplace
from fifties’ photographs.”
She is aware of the political disorder and feels conflict and fractures within herself.
“When I was older
there was conflict, a fractured land
throbbing through news print.
She tries to imagine the family home in Lahore and the kind of life her aunts lived there.
“Sometimes I saw Lahore –
my aunts in shaded rooms,
screened from male visitors,
sorting presents,
wrapping them in tissue.”
This tells us how her aunts’ life was comfortable and protected, this is given emphasis by the use of alliteration: sometimes, shaded, screened and sorting. ‘Wrapping them in tissue’ refers back to the presents and preparing them.
The last section of the poem is about the poverty in Pakistan.
“Or there were beggars, sweeper-girls
and I was there –
of no fixed nationality,
staring through fret work
at the Shalimar Gardens.”
She feels neither English nor Pakistani ‘of no fixed nationality’.
This is a series of comments, reflections and memories rather than a sequence or argument. The poem is written in free verse as to represent her struggle to define her cultures and to find out who she is. It is shown in altering line length. The poem draws us into it as if we were the ones who do not know who we really are or where we really belong. It ends without a clear view. She is still an outsider looking in and never being a part of it.
Both of these poems discuss the struggle of being part of two cultures and both poets have had to deal with this in there own life, so they are both autobiographical poems. ‘Search for my Tongue’ starts off very negative, but as the poem goes on it becomes more positive, like a seed emerging into a flower. ‘Presents from my Aunts in Pakistan’ starts off more positively but as it goes on it gets quite glum and negative.
My personal view of these poems is that they are both very fascinating in a very dull, boring way. It made me think closer about the struggle people deal with everyday over changing cultures. My favourite poem was ‘Search for my Tongue, as it was shorter and easier to digest.