: About Me

Note: This is an essay I wrote about six months ago, entitled "A Bridge to the Void," about the late Agha Shahid Ali's outstanding book of poetry, The Country Without A Post Office. I was not thinking about the power of poetry when I wrote it, but in retrospect, Shahid's book remains the most convincing evidence I've seen from a contemporary poet that poetry and language-beyond having lasting aesthetic value-have the power to shape and change our world. "Here the waters rise; our each word in the fog awaits a sentence . . ." -Agha Shahid Ali, "The Floating Post Office" Agha Shahid Ali's pr...