SUBMIT TO THE SPECIAL GHAZAL ISSUE OF PRATIK

 

SUBMIT TO 

THE SPECIAL GHAZAL ISSUE OF PRATIK

Edited by Yuyutsu Sharma & Tony Barnstone

Pratik, one of the premier international poetry journals, will feature a special Ghazal Issue in Fall 2025. This landmark issue will explore the rich tradition of the ghazal, its modern interpretations, and its evolution across cultures. We invite poets, translators, and scholars to contribute their work and be part of this exciting literary endeavor.

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

We seek:

• Original ghazals written in English
• Translations of ghazals from various languages into English (with permission from the original poet, if applicable)
• Prose pieces on ghazal writing: its history, evolution, influence, or personal reflections
• Essays or columns on singular ghazal poets like Mir, Ghalib, or recent masters from your country

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

• Submit five ghazals or one prose piece (up to 3,000 words).
• All submissions should be in a Word document format.
• Include a short bio (max 150 words) of the poet, translator, or both, where applicable.
• Translations must be accompanied by the original text and relevant permissions.
• Please use a standard font (Times New Roman, 12pt) and double-spacing for prose.
• Submissions must be previously unpublished (online journals, blogs, and self-published books included).

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: [30 September, 2025]
EMAIL FOR SUBMISSIONS: [pratikmagsubmissions@gmail.com]

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WHAT IS A GHAZAL?

A ghazal is a poetic form originating in Persian and Arabic traditions, later flourishing in Urdu, Hindi, Turkish, and other languages. It has a rich history, particularly in Sufi, romantic, and philosophical poetry. The form is characterized by:

1. A series of independent couplets (two-line stanzas).
2. A rhyme and refrain in the first couplet, repeated in the second line of each subsequent couplet.
3. The final couplet (maqta) traditionally includes the poet’s signature (name or pseudonym).
4. Themes often explore love, loss, spirituality, and the passage of time.

TIPS FOR WRITING A STRONG GHAZAL

• Ghazals can be a series of standalone couplets or have a common theme.
• Each couplet should be self-contained yet contribute to the overall tone.
• The first line sets up, and the second line delivers impact—whether emotional, ironic, or humorous.
• Traditional ghazals follow strict rhyme and refrain patterns, but modern variations allow more flexibility.
• The best ghazals feel organic, not forced; use homonyms, homographs, and wordplay to make the repetition natural.

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ABOUT THE EDITORS

Yuyutsu Sharma is one of the few poets in the world who make their living through poetry. Called "The world-renowned Himalayan poet" (The Guardian), "One-Man Academy" (The Kathmandu Post), and "Himalayan Neruda" (Michael Graves, Brand Called You ), Yuyutsu is an internationally recognized voice in contemporary poetry.

He has received fellowships from The Rockefeller Foundation, Ireland Literature Exchange, Trubar Foundation, and The Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature. Yuyutsu is the author of eleven poetry collections, including Lost Horoscope. His readings and workshops have taken place at Heidelberg University, University of Ottawa, Columbia University, Seamus Heaney Centre, Queens University Belfast, and the Irish Writers’ Centre, Dublin.

Yuyutsu represented Nepal and India at the Poetry Parnassus Festival (London Olympics 2012), and his work was exhibited at Royal Kew Gardens (2020). His memoir, Not of Flesh and Bones, is forthcoming in 2026.More: www.yuyutsusharma.com

Tony Barnstone teaches at Whittier College and is the author of 23 books. His latest works include Apocryphal Poems (Nirala Press, 2024), Faces Hidden in the Dust: Selected Ghazals of Ghalib (co-translation from Urdu), and The Radiant Tarot: Pathway to Creativity. His forthcoming critical book, Cyborg Modernism: William Carlos Williams, Technoscience, and the Arts, examines the relationship between poetry and technological innovation.

Barnstone is currently working on a libretto for an opera, further extending his artistic and literary influence.

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SUBMIT NOW AND JOIN THIS GLOBAL GHAZAL CELEBRATION!

Be part of a distinguished literary tradition and contribute to the worldwide appreciation of the ghazal. Whether you're a poet, translator, or scholar, this issue will serve as an important platform for contemporary voices engaging with this timeless form.

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: [30 September, 2025]
EMAIL FOR SUBMISSIONS: [pratikmagsubmissions@gmail.com]
WEBSITE: [https://whitelotusbookshop.com/product-category/pratik-series/]

Blog: [https://pratikmagazine.blogspot.com/]

We look forward to reading your work!

PRATIK's HLF/NYWW ISSUE HIGHLIGHT : JAMI PROCTOR XU's long poem, "Kali ~ Kathamndu"

JAMI PROCTOR XU

Kali ~ Kathamndu

        

 

                                           1

 

your name appears for weeks     in the signature line

of all her letters    name auto-corrected    to become you     

2 3 4   Kali, coming again, why are you coming again

   timedestroyerhealerprotectormother

      fire on the tongue     divine divine

 

               Om Klim Kalika Yei Namaha

 

      the fire within rises as the plane lifts

from the Chengdu greens of the trees and the Jin River

 into the turbulent fog until the sky opens  

   blue into the Himalayas    喜马拉雅 Ximalaya

   veined in browns   the twisting rivers   one begins

a translucent turquoise    before taking on yellow-brown

    silttheyellow that becomes its namesake   below this flight path

    just south of highlands, deserts, and riverbanks where she has been

    on the ground and in this same sky     the lotus hand healing

    Denis telling her these mountain formations make you feel

    as if you are seeing the divine mind itself   all its jagged formations

sandstone singing  a poet's square the sacred lake not far north of here

if you stick your tongue out far enough into into the sky you'll taste its salt

and feel, again, yak hair between your fingers, soft, as you pet the white yak

whose owner tells you it feeds the whole family with the money made

from photographs at the lakeside  a single yak hair in the mind draws a line

as you cross the unseen border   sandstone trees roads rivers   thousands

upon millions of years enter each breath grown purer as you reenter

clouds and a sudden expanse of snow on Sagarmatha    if you reach your hand

out far enough you'll touch its snow with your fingertips, just as the stars have   

to feel the texture of the lives and deaths of those who've ascended and gazed out

you rest your forehead against the cold window      all lives enter as

the third eye breathes in    the descent back into browns greens streets and paths

 

                                                          2

 

on the bus from the plane to the terminal on the tarmac in Kathmandu

a Nepali woman looks exactly like Anne but with darker skin

          beautiful how that happens   black hair flowing wild in the wind

                                divine feminine energy

              She devours Time. Naked Time. Naked Kali.

              She is an open system. She eats energy and manifests energy.

              No concept need apply. She is the flickering tongue of Agni.

              fire. She is the mother of language and mantra... *

Kali calling again appearing and reappearing in language as language

as my name as my friend whose face is on another woman she is this woman

she is every woman protector destroyer healer time hibiscus in the mind

                            

                                                          3

 

remember the thirty-three year old woman wearing a gray t-shirt that read:

              stay wild, prove you exist

remember her burning holes in desk drawers to make space for sunflowers

               to bloom inside to be seen

remember her carrying her teacher's burned body to the riverbanks, scooping mud

              to soothe the burns and scars

remember her sitting still while eight artists sketched her face, saying:

              let yourself be held here

 

in Kathmandu, she walks barefoot in the rain among fallen flowers

 

                                                          4

 

Jacaranda   the wind whistles   a purple flower

to become her name    Lucie says she loves

the name in Chinese as well   蓝花楹  Lanhuaying

       a pillar     full flowering, shedding

 

      as she stands at her aunt's bedside

 

the doctor asks  Do you know who this is 

and her aunt says Bertie   the nickname of her own aunt

not the name of her niece standing at her bedside

elevated calcium induced delirium makes her aunt forget even her own name

as the nurses bathe her aunt   she chants the Gayatri mantra  so the sound

can hold her in her fears and the excruciating pain in her hip broken and replaced

she feels her grandmother holding her aunt's hand as she holds her hand

and her aunt asks   Am I going to die?

No   she says   they say you are going to be okay

just as the doctor repeats again three days before she dies

He says  Your aunt will likely live another ten years

She's quite a person   he says

Yes  she says   She taught first and second grade for over thirty years

 

in one tree a whole spring of flowers

in one flower the name of a whole tree

in three days she becomes her aunt's mother,

aunt, niece, daughter, sister

in her aunt's face every stage of her life

this scattering of purple all along

the wet gray pavement in this sister city of Chengdu

 

                                                          5

 

moon showing us the path   the students write

in their group poem in a classroom at the international school in Kathmandu

blue butterfly just outside the window   flies into the poem

 

Do you like to sing, Madam  the students ask after the poetry workshop ends

and they offer to sing her a Nepali folk song

      a chorus of girls' voices fills the room

      a silk thread flying in the sky

      the principal enters the room and starts dancing

      his arms the wings of a bird

    

in this city once sometimes called Kantipur

       City of Light

 

moonlight showing us the path    sunlight showing us the path

                             students showing us the path

 

                                                          6

 

On the banks of the Bagmati River   she stands   watching monkeys

dive into the water   climb stone steps   swing from wires

            inhaling smoke from the cremation pyres

            exhaling prayers for the dead and the living

 

Come, Mam, I want to bless you   a woman says

I don't have any money, she says to the woman, I'm sorry

Come, Mam, the woman says again  I want to bless you

I just came from teaching poetry at a school, she says,

and I don't have any money on me   otherwise I would

I don't want money, the woman says  I just want to bless you

Come   Come    the woman motions again    so she walks over

 

the woman blesses her

              with holy water     a red tilaka   red and yellow kalava thread

the woman chants   and she lets herself open  and relax all the way

     to be held in the woman's voice

healerprotector    love of the divine mother   in the woman's voice

 

Thank you, she says to the woman once the blessing is complete

      a wave of peace passes through her body

I'm sorry I don't have any money, she says again

and the woman repeats, I don't want your money

I just wanted to bless you

    I'll write you a poem, she tells the woman

     in the smoky sunlight on the banks of the Bagmati River

 

                                           7

 

on the stone steps she watches from across the river

as family members wash the faces and feet of their loved ones

in preparation for cremation    so many loved ones  living and dead

each individual fire   all the fires   this shared ash

 

she thinks of her step-daughter, her aunts, her father-in-law,

her grandmothers and grandfathers when they were

washed in preparation for cremation or burial

   prayers in four languages, two continents and the present

as the living hold the dead    the dead hold the living

                

                              on and on

 

she remembers carrying her teacher's burned body

to the riverside to soothe the burns with cool mud

trying to help her heal in a dream   her beloved teacher

already having died in a fire lit with her own hands

 

              timedestroyerhealerprotectormother

             

                                           8

 

Shreejana says Kali's love is powerful

She tells her bahini   You are Kali

 

                     your name appears again

 

and all the false words of others fall away       

        all the misunderstandings fall away                 

        all the aggressions and anger fall away    

                      

                             love appears

 

Look, there's another sun right below the sun, D says

                             in this sky, it is so

 

               Om Klim Kalika Yei Namaha

 

*These lines are from Anne Waldman's "Alphabet of Mother Language," from

                  The Iivos Trilogy: Colors in the Mechanism of Concealment.

 

 

Jami Proctor Xu is an award-winning bilingual poet and translator who writes in Chinese and English. She has co-organized international poetry events in China, South Africa, Eswatini, Lesotho, and Ethiopia and frequently reads at poetry festivals worldwide.

 

Also Available on Amazon, Flipkart & Daraz

Amazon USA: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DWSPT5WP

Amazon India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0DWSPT5WP

Distributed in the United States by Itasca Book Distribution: https://itascabooks.com/ Distributed in South Asia by Nirala Publications, India: https://niralapublications.com/product-category/pratik-series/  In Nepal by White Lotus Book Shop, Kathmandu: https://whitelotusbookshop.com/product-category/pratik-series/

 

 

Pratik's HLF/NYWW Issue Special : JANE HOUNG's "Sleeping Vishnu"

 

JANE HOUNG

Sleeping Vishnu

 

 

Vishnu, at this moment, I hate you, lying in orange-petalled grey-marbled bliss with that serene look on your face.

Because there I was, standing at your feet, water gently lapping, blossoms sweet as milk and honey, jostled by the muttered mantras of worshippers saried in their best. But all I could see is my daughter sleeping in her wicker coffin, in stone stillness, inert, like you!

The gnarled old ladies rubbed your holy feet and threw you rice and nuts and fruit. I did too. But you know what? Then all I could see is that terrible night with my daughter screaming and sputtering and writhing.

While you were just reposing here, I suppose.

Vishnu, I’m not afraid of death. Kill me for my blasphemy, I don’t care. Because aren’t you supposed to be the Protector of Protectors? My deceased daughter served others, selflessly. Her killer killed, shamelessly. When righteousness wanes, shouldn't you rise up, come forth, defend the good?  And there I was at your shrine lowering my head to pay respects (my sentiment genuine at the time), while some tricksters stole my friend’s bag and your boy-monks were rude and abusive. No semblance of sacredness there!

Right now, if you were a tortoise, I’d squash your ugly poking head. If you were a fish, I’d fry you. If you were a swan, or even a dwarf, I’d shoot you.

Okay, let us strike a bargain. First, forgive my shocking disrespect. Next, flick those garlands from your ears and listen, please. I beg you! Wake up, soon, as Kalki! Armed with mace and bow and sword, leap on the back of your white horse and blow your conch with Annapurna majesty. Make us mortals shake. Make the whole world quake.

Then I might believe in you.

 

 

Jane Houng is primarily a children’s author. Commercial Press Hong Kong has published Bloodswell, Cat Soup, Pun Choi, Hong Kong Movers and Shakers, and Under Lion Rock, and she has self-published Asian Elephant Art, Houng’s Lantau Life. She has also written for Oxford University Press, Pearson Education Asia, and Sing Tao Publishing Corporation. Jane recently self-published a memoir, Beirut Is More Beautiful by Bike, and currently runs three charities on behalf of her late daughter, Rebecca Dykes, including Becky’s Button and Rebecca Dykes Writers. She also hosts a podcast called Mending Lives.

Also Available on Amazon, Flipkart & Daraz

Amazon USA: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DWSPT5WP

Amazon India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0DWSPT5WP

Distributed in the United States by Itasca Book Distribution: https://itascabooks.com/ Distributed in South Asia by Nirala Publications, India: https://niralapublications.com/product-category/pratik-series/  In Nepal by White Lotus Book Shop, Kathmandu: https://whitelotusbookshop.com/product-category/pratik-series/