Heretic, Sufi, counter-cultural icon, Persian nationalist, brigand, court jester, alcoholic, catamite, sodomite, ritual clown, justified sinner, voice piece of transgressive sacrality, pleasure junkie—these are a few of the identities that have been given to Abū Nuwās, arguably the greatest poet of the Arabic language and a larger-than-life figure even among his contemporaries. In the newly released volume A Demon Spirit, award-winning poet-translator James E. Montgomery collects this literary giant’s hunting poetry, or ṭardiyyāt. We’re quite excited about this book—the third in a stunning hunting poetry series whose first volume was called “essential reading for anyone who loves poetry” (Alice Oswald)—and so we’ve excerpted a few poems to share with you. We hope you enjoy them as much as we have!
At the Falconer’s Tally
Night, in stygian mood, was torn
and turned red, rousing the birds.
I crossed the dark in search of game
with a hawk in a needle-sewn tunic
of pure silk or fine cloth, her arms bare
to the waist, train feathers stretching
past her feet, sitting on a glove
that covered my elbow. A suhradāz gos;
no, a samand, her cheek a blaze of white,
given the sweetest form by our Maker,
Abū Nuwās, in a 1916 drawing by Khalil Gibran, via Wikimedia Commons
unchanged by the hunt. If you saw her white face,
you’d pledge her your life! Before flight, she stares
at the prey she sights from afar, tracking it down
with eyes inflamed red against the white
of her coat. Releasing the jess, we cast her
from the glove. In a circuit, at great speed,
she cut up the terrain and brought the quarry
round, trying to outrun her. When they saw
how determined she was, they flocked together
like Khusro’s kin on the day of the dastaband.
She hunted fifty, at the falconer’s tally,
and had more than half her energy to spare.
We depend on her grace and favor as a family
depends on the father who feeds them—
whatever good they have derives from his labors.
What a fine gos! One of a kind!
Luxuriating in His Web
A description of the hunting skills of the spider:
The hunter—this mean and despicable trifle,
the color of dark, muddy water, with its tiny
back and chest, and its mouth and nose smaller
than the support of a mīm or the dot
under the loop of a jīm. Neither a coward
nor a hothead, this thing embraces deceit
in pursuit of gain, ever awake, luxuriating in his web,
surrounded by the offspring of Ethiopians
and Romans in those shady corners
where ants and frogs thrive. Faster than a wink
or waking with a jolt, this thing scurries about
like a heady wine spouting from an amphora
when broached. Braver than the ravenous, thick-
maned lion, this thing dominates the uplands
of the Tamīm. What a vicious thing, this hunter!
I wish it didn’t exist!
Eyes Like Moonstones
Dawn lifted her veil and night slunk home.
The hunter muzzled his dog and departed.
The collar, tight when he pulled, loose
when he let up, kept the dog from tugging.
His smile revealed teeth as sharp
as arrowheads or assegais, his eyes stared
like moonstones, his brisket sat low
at the neck, his feet broke the face
of the earth. The hunter scoured the dunes
and spotted Old Bull up ahead in a meadow,
proud among his herds. He sicced
the dog, an arrow shot high from a bow,
scorching the flatlands faster than the eye
can see, nearly leaving his skin behind,
a lightning bolt exploding from a rain cloud.
He’s nearly there; now he’s on him!
The hunter shouted, “Whoa, too far!”
rebuking him for a double lunge.
The bull was felled. The hunter hallooed
and the dog jumped at his call.
Abū Nuwās was a prominent Abbasid poet of the Modernist style. He was born in what is now Ahvaz, Iran, ca. 139–40/756–58, before moving to Basra and later Baghdad, where he became the court companion of caliph al-Amīn. He died sometime between 198/813 and 200/815 in Baghdad.
James E. Montgomery is Sir Thomas Adams’s Professor of Arabic at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Trinity Hall. His latest publications are In Deadly Embrace: Arabic Hunting Poems, Fate the Hunter: Early Arabic Hunting Poems, and Kalīlah and Dimnah: Fables of Virtue and Vice, with Michael Fishbein. In 2024 he was elected Fellow of the British Academy.
More hunting poetry from the Library of Arabic Literature:
