GHAZAL

    The term, which is pronounced guz'-zel, has other spellings (ghazel, gazel, gasal, ghasel, etc.). For a change, let's open with a few examples. The definition follows.

An Angel

Lonesome in the black of night, I think of you, an angel,

there in a river of moonlight. Oh, to view an angel!

 A cameo against the dark, face seen just in profile,

its texture gossamer; I'd gasp, then pursue an angel.

 Would you come if I hung in the balance of life and death?

Come to me like those of whom there are so few, an angel!

 I dream of you; a shelter you would be, to take me in.

You alone could lift me, dispel my gloom, you, an angel.

 Here I am, mere Earth Girl, rooted by rationality,

longing for one glimpse of what I never knew - an angel.

                                                              Debbie Guzzi

In Silence

Let them be, the battles you fought, in silence.
Bury your shame, the worst you thought, in silence.

At last my Beloved has haggled with death.
‘One more day’ was the pearl she bought in silence.

At night she heard the blacksmith hammering chains,
at dawn the saw, the fretwork wrought in silence.

‘The only wrong I’ve done is to live too long,'
my Beloved’s eyes tell the court in silence.

She’s as young as the month of Ordibehesht,
month of my birth, spring’s mid-leap caught in silence.

My Beloved, under the shade of a palm,
was the girl, the mother I sought in silence.

Loneliness is innumerate. Days slip by,
suns rise that daylight moons distort in silence.

The bell on her wrist was silent, her fingers
ice cold as the julep she brought in silence.

'Mimijune! Mimijune!' My Beloved’s voice
climbs three steep notes for tears to thwart in silence.

Three syllables of equal weight, equal stress,
dropped in a well, keep falling short in silence.

                                                   Mimi Khalvati

    The ghazal is a Persian poetic form and has a long history. Originally it contained 5 to 15 couplets using the same rhyme, and the poet's name was inserted in the final stanza.  The themes were usually love or wine drinking, but we are not limited to those themes today, and the poet is no longer required to insert his/her name.

     Ideally, each couplet should be able to stand alone (like the individual stanzas in a cinquain sequence).  Here's the rhyme scheme to follow: a-a, then b-a, then c-a, and so on through the final couplet, depending on how many you include.  You should have at least 5 (e-a), but no more than 15 (o-a). Incorporate a short refrain at the end of each couplet.  This can be one word or a phrase, as shown in the examples above.

      Lots of examples are available on the internet.  Some are translations from other languages;  others are by English writers.