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Tributaries: Farzana Doctor + You Still Look the Same
In You Still Look the Same (Freehand Books), Farzana Doctor explores the transformations of midlife and the quiet moments that shape us. Written during a time of profound personal change, the collection captures the raw, unfiltered emotions of waking up to a new version of oneself.
Farzana revisits her debut collection written several years ago and talks to us about her evolving relationship with the form, and the power of embracing vulnerability on the page.
Read “Forty-three”
from You Still Look the Same (Freehand Books)
Forty-three
By the age of forty
you’re supposed to have stopped caring
what people think—
that’s what Vogue says.
Late bloomer, I guess,
at forty-two I step into my wardrobe,
inhale dust motes, switch on light
avoid full-length mirror.
Toss every wire hanger
to floor, separate
garments too snug
for a Ladies Size Twelve body.
One bag garbage,
one bag charity,
nothing sparks joy.
On weighted down ten-speed
pedal hard to Lansdowne Value Village
drop my load, linger long at automatic doors
leaking musty air.
I wish transformation were so easy—
who doesn’t want to keep
that polka-dotted halter top
from when you were nine,
the striped skirt Auntie
said was slimming?
I dart inside,
purchase a beret too tight
for an adult head,
yank it over unruly hair.
I wear it for three days,
Hat whispers: shrink some more.
I go Vegan-Keto-Paleo,
do the 7 Minute Workout forty-two times,
squeeze myself into exercise bras
short-shorts,
one-size-too-small pumps.
My head aches,
blisters bubble at heels,
waistband digs a trench around belly.
New date says: you look sexy.
I blush and swoon.
I grow bored with cottage cheese.
One day, naked under hot shower
I expand, rebound,
flop onto double bed,
starfish,
take all the space.
My date topples off,
bewildered, stomps feet, yells: Crazy! Irrational woman!
Door slams
and I nap.
The tiny hat takes flight,
as do the tight shoes, little shorts,
giving chase, mewling: please don’t go.
When I finally awake,
I am forty-three.
All that remains:
a pair of scuffed sneakers,
forgotten size-twelve dress.
I don this armour, step outside.
An interview with Farzana Doctor
All Lit Up: Can you tell us a bit about your book and how it came to be? How did you
come to write “Forty-three” and how is it representative of your collection?
Farzana Doctor: I wrote or rewrote You Still Look The Same‘s poems in my forties, a time of big change. During that decade I ended a long-term relationship, tried online dating for the first time, travelled back to India twice, worked through some repressed trauma, and fell in love. It was like that decade was saying, “You’ve been asleep for a bit. Time to wake up.” And then imagine someone shaking you awake while screaming in your ear for a few years.
I just re-read “Forty-three” (I’m currently in Goa, on a DIY writing retreat without my bookshelf, so thank you Libby!) and I think that I was trying to speak to this need to wake up, and all the (unsuccessful) things we might do to create distraction and resist deeper change (“tidy” our wardrobes, engage with diet culture, find new partners). In the end, the superficial strategies don’t work as much as we need and we must allow ourselves to just be. Of course this is me analyzing a poem years after I wrote it, and my process during the writing is much more emotional, free-flowing and un-analytical!
ALU: Has your idea of poetry changed since you began writing?
FD: While I’ve written poetry since I was a child, I felt shy to put out this collection. I felt very much like a newbie, a beginner, full of self-doubt about whether what I was writing was really a poem (and if so, was it good?). Which was a weird feeling because I’d already published four novels and didn’t feel that way about writing novels. I wasn’t yet at ease with my more vulnerable and raw poetic voice.
I think differently about poetry (and writing in general) now. We are always learning and developing our craft, so we are always beginners.
These days, on most mornings, I listen to a guided meditation with my notebook open and will draft an ugly first draft of a poem. I have more faith that my ideas are sacred, and these embryonic poems may or may not get edited or published, but I do treat each and every one with care.
ALU: If your collection had a theme song, what would it be?
FD: What immediately came to mind is “Closer to Fine” by Indigo Girls.
Incidentally, since my early forties, this has become the sing-a-long choice at my birthday parties. It’s pretty amazing to watch a bunch of middle-aged people belting out this song (most know it by heart).
Farzana recommends…
“Sunrise with Sea Monsters” from Manahil Bandukwala’s
Heliotropia (Brick Books)
ALU: Why did you choose Manahil Bandukwala’s poem “Love Language” from her collection Heliotropia? What do you love most about this particular poem?
FD: There is so much to love about this book, and when I re-read it for this interview (again, thank you Libby), I found myself slowing down, feeling aglow. What I think she communicates in this poem is that love is imperfect and how we view the world (with love or not) matters. I also enjoy the way some of the lines start almost romantically, and end with something surprising:
“Every day/ I practice being alive. Try to fall/ in love with something new. Gold paint flecks/ on the popcorn ceiling. Hogweed. I too / am poisonous to touch”
Love Language
Even at its most difficult
love is worth loving.
I am falling in love with
the change from crown molding to creeping
plants. With improperly pressed irises
rotting purple ink in my sketchbook.
Every rock becomes heart-shaped
when I squint. Clay pots wash up
on the riverbank, fully intact. I am falling like
falling is really flying is really swimming
across the water blackened with night. Every day
I practice being alive. Try to fall
in love with something new. Gold paint flecks
on the popcorn ceiling. Hogweed. I too
am poisonous to touch. Gujarati is not a love
language, but I fall in love with how home
is not home without it. Fairy lights
strung across balcony windows
though half the bulbs are fused. That empty
stretch of riverbank, now that the tide
has crawled away, but something else
will hold that space. Sun to air,
ducklings to the rocks; me, leaning into love.
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Farzana Doctor is the Tkaronto-based author of four novels for adults (Stealing Nasreen, Six Metres of Pavement, All Inclusive, and Seven), a community workbook for caregivers (52 Weeks to a Sweeter Life), and a YA novel (The Beauty of Us). You Still Look the Same is her debut poetry collection. She is also an activist and part-time psychotherapist.
* * *
Thanks to Farzana for answering our questions, and to Freehand Books for the text of “Forty-three” from You Still Look the Same, which is available to order now (and get 15% off with the code TRIBUTARIES until April 30!). Thanks also to Brick Books for the text of “Love Language” from Manahil Bandukwala’s Heliotropia.
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