Mekyle Ali Qadir is a
Pakistani poet currently pursuing his Master’s degree at Carleton University in
Ottawa. His writing explores the negotiation of culture and ethnicity he enacts
in his life as an immigrant from Pakistan. Writing in both English and Urdu,
his emerging work explores South Asian cultural traditions, migrant identity,
mysticism, and intertextual art.
1 - How did
your first book change your life? How does your most recent work compare to
your previous? How does it feel different?
This is my first published book so
I can’t compare it to anything other than not having a published book, which
feels pretty different! For that reason, it’s too soon to say how it’s changed
my life. But the decision to compile my poetry into a coherent collection and
the work I’ve done to achieve that has shifted my attitude towards writing as
an occupation. I now think about my creative work as pieces of larger wholes
rather than just impulsive projects.
2 - How did
you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
I’ve been writing fiction and
poetry concurrently for many years. I enjoy both but poetry has a way of
expressing spiritual truths that other forms of writing just don’t. I think
being from Pakistan, especially being Punjabi, inclines me towards poetry naturally.
I’ve grown up hearing poems recited to me, in English, Urdu, and Punjabi,
especially by my grandparents, which is something I’ve taken for granted and
I’m now starting to become aware of its impact on me.
3 - How long
does it take to start any particular writing project? Does your writing
initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first drafts appear looking
close to their final shape, or does your work come out of copious notes?
It starts almost instantly, the
weird idea comes from nowhere and usually when I’m occupied with something
else. But that doesn’t go very far until I start the slow process of putting it
down and looking at it and getting frustrated at why it looks like that on a
page and sounds different in my head. As for drafting, I’m terrible at it. I
usually edit as I go which I know is not recommended. Mostly, I revise and
rewrite a line before moving onto the next. I have notes scattered here and
there but these are more like ‘verbal moodboards’ than coherent research.
4 - Where does
a poem or work of prose usually begin for you? Are you an author of short
pieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a
"book" from the very beginning?
I haven’t thought about long
projects yet. That doesn’t mean I haven’t fantasized about becoming the author
of a great novel, but I’m grateful for being taught early on to be realistic
and not jump into ambitious projects. I’ve had many successful people guide me
through the realities of writing. One of the most important was: work from
small to large. Start with flash fiction, small poems, maybe polished journal
entries, put your energy into those first, then move onto longer forms. I’ve
barely begun a ‘career’ in writing so I have to trust this process and see
where it goes.
5 - Are public
readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of
writer who enjoys doing readings?
My poems don’t lend themselves to
spoken word performance. I write them to be read and don’t put much thought
into how they’ll sound. So when I do readings, they don’t sound good as they’re
being performed. I’m trying to get better at writing more performance-ready
poems, especially by drawing inspiration from Urdu sha’iri which has a
very strong spoken word component.
6 - Do you
have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are
you trying to answer with your work? What do you even think the current
questions are?
My writing is probably too
theoretical. I’m very occupied with intercultural knowledges, negotiating my
home traditions with Western modernity. My writing interrogates the assumptions
that come with intercultural dialogues, especially in a place like Canada with
all its performative multiculturalism rhetoric. I draw much of my inspiration
from postcolonial thinkers who challenge hegemonic and Imperialist
epistemologies, especially Edward Said, Fanon, Cesaire, Iqbal, and Shariati.
I’m just regurgitating their words and adding personal anecdotes along the way.
Aside from that, though I don’t count it as a “theoretical concern,” my writing
is steeped in mystical thought and teachings. As I repeat throughout my
answers, the Sufi traditions give me inspiration beyond these great thinkers.
Mystical inspiration doesn’t work in the question-answer structure because it’s
beyond language so it’s hard to say what questions I answer when I write
through this inspiration. But a tangible result of it is a keen sense of empathy
that pushes beyond personal and cultural barriers and lets me capture intense
personal and social experiences.
7 – What do
you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Do they even
have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
I think there’s more creative
writers operating at multiple levels of culture than we tend to acknowledge
because they don’t call their work ‘creative’ even though it is. I think
writers always find themselves in strange ‘moments’ in history, but now especially
their work has been threatened by AI and slowly, their value is starting to be
remembered in the wake of AI’s disappointing capabilities. I also think writers
should see their work beyond its political impact. It’s a result of Eurocentric
reductionism that writers are encouraged to think only in terms of political,
material ends. I don’t think all writing is or should be political, though you
can stretch definitions to fit your argument as much as you want. There are
truths that transcend that, which all writing, but especially poetry, can
uncover. I guess that’s what writers should be chasing after, to unveil Maya
and reach the Gha’ib.
8 - Do you
find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or
both)?
I haven’t consulted a professional
editor before, but I’ve had the opportunity to share my work with incredibly
talented people, who are my friends and also my mentors and have dedicated a
lot of their time to editing my writing. I think that’s the best place to
start, if you’re lucky, and unless a large project demands professional
editing, leave your work in the hands of friends and family who aren’t thinking
of marketability or industry practices.
9 - What is
the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
One really talented writer told me
writing is an extroverted activity. People seem to think being a writer means
sitting in a dark room at a desk and being overly existential about everything
(all things I’ve associated with writing and romantically tried to imitate).
That’s just one very small part of it, the majority of the work involves
engaging with your communities, as many as possible, and sharing experiences
that may or may not make their way into your writing but that make you
sensitive to seeing the meaning in apparently mundane interactions. That stuck
with me because I think it’s an attitude shift that gives you more endurance
and a healthier approach to writing and art in general.
10 - What kind
of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a
typical day (for you) begin?
I’m a very poorly disciplined
writer. I’ve tried to write regularly, to keep a writing journal and all that.
I think I have four or five notebooks with just the first couple of pages of
regular ‘entries’ and nothing more. But I think a writing routine can involve a
lot more than hitting a daily or weekly word count, it may not even involve
writing any words at all. I consider hikes and listening to music and reading
as part of my writing process, when I do these things consciously and
presently. My body, including my mind, becomes primed to absorb and reflect
what my senses are telling me during these moments. Verbalizing that reflection
becomes easier after that.
11 - When your
writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better
word) inspiration?
The biggest influence in my writing
is mysticism. Specifically Sufism, which is the Islamic tradition of mysticism.
The overwhelming amount of writing produced by Sufis across the world for
thousands of years has been intertwined with poetic and artistic traditions in
the majority of Islamic cultures. I always draw on the words of the Sufis when
I don’t know what to write or how to process an idea. Because it always works.
12 - What
fragrance reminds you of home?
I’ve written about this a few times
in my first poetry book. I deal with nostalgia and home a lot in that book, and
the sense of home I keep coming back to is strongly connected to scent and
fragrance. I remember the smell of the living room in the house where I grew up
in Pakistan, something like varnished wood and old curtains, but also something
else I don’t know how to describe. It’s hard to find smells that remind me of
home in a different country so a lot of my writing about that is based on the memory
of the fragrance alongside the memory of the place itself.
13 - David W.
McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any other forms
that influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art?
I see what he means I guess, but I
don’t like to think of it that way. Writing for me is one form of art that has
to coexist with others. The creatives I admire most are creative in multiple
ways, it’s only now that we’re siloing ourselves into discrete ‘disciplines’. I
like to draw and play music, both of which make their way into my writing.
Poetry is a mathematical activity, sometimes a scientific one. Poetry for me is
tied to my religious expression concurrently with all of these other forms.
Defining poetry through delimitations leads to dead ends, I think.
14 - What
other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life
outside of your work?
I’m an English Lit grad student so
I study writing more than I write. My focus is on postcolonial literature,
theoretical and creative, so I read a lot of Global South literature and
colonial resistance fiction/poetry. I like theory and I have a lot of fun
translating theoretical concepts from my research into creative pieces. Aside
from these, as I say above, the most important writing I keep turning back to
belongs to the mystical traditions.
15 - What
would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
I want to travel and be able to
write about it. My academic focus, and creative interest, is postcolonial
literature and I would like to see more places with a colonial past and connect
with people there so I can write about it. And I want to meet more people on
the Sufi path, to learn more from them directly.
16 - If you
could pick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately,
what do you think you would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?
I don’t think I’m a writer yet, and
it’s definitely not my occupation, but I want it to be a bigger part of my
life. I am pursuing a career in academia, focused on literature, so my creative
writing will complement my academic writing. I don’t know if I’ve had any other
career ideas since I finished high school, and even then I knew I wanted to be
a writer.
17 - What made
you write, as opposed to doing something else?
I started seriously writing poetry
when I moved away from Pakistan. Since the beginning, my writing has been
occupied with migration, belonging, identity, all those diaspora buzzwords. My
poems became a way to understand that condition and respond to it as fully as
possible. Alongside that, visual art has always been an emotional outlet that
gives me the same way of reflecting on whatever is going on.
18 - What was
the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
Sea Without
Shore by Nuh
Ha Meem Keller. It’s a memoir and a manual by a Sufi, describing the great
mystic teachers, Sheikhs, he has met since he started out on the path, and
their most important teachings. The book is an amazing journey through the
mystical world and also provides a thematic guide for the major teachings. I
keep revisiting this book trying to incorporate its insights into my life and
my writing. The film scene is really sad nowadays, but I really enjoyed Dune Part 2. They got it right, and it’s a really tough book to get right on the
screen, as past adaptations have shown. The Dune books are heavily inspired by
Sufism, which most viewers don’t pick up on, but Villeneuve’s adaptation
handled that part really well.
19 - What are
you currently working on?
I’m writing some short stories
which I plan to turn into a publishable collection. I received a grant from the
OAC to work on them so that’s good motivation. I keep writing as often as I
can, but my master’s research takes up a lot of my time so it’s hard to stay
consistent with creative work.
12 or 20 (second series) questions;
