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Kaleem Hawa

Kaleem Hawa has written about art, film, and literature for the New York Review of Books, The Nation, and Artforum, among others.



Articles Available Online


Hating it Lush: On Tel Aviv

Essay

May 2023

Kaleem Hawa

Essay

May 2023

I   They made the desert bloom, tall sparkling towers and clean Bauhaus lines, and apple-ring acacias, and teal blue shuttle buses, and stock...

Poetry

Issue No. 28

Three poems from issue 28

Sarah Barnsley

Valzhyna Mort

Kaleem Hawa

Poetry

Issue No. 28

Valzhyna Mort, ‘Music for Girl’s Voice and Bison’   Sarah Barnsley, ‘Virginia Woolf Has Fallen Over’   Kaleem Hawa,...

[To be read aloud]   I want to begin – and I hope I don’t come across as autistic or anything like that (and I know I’m not supposed to say autistic, I know, I realised that as it was coming out, but I couldn’t stop it and I can’t unsay it so let’s just ignore it, can we?) – I want to begin by saying – and I don’t want to get bogged down with trying to find a way in (which is harder than you might imagine), we’ve got a lot to get through, so, but I want to begin by saying simply I want to begin by saying I want to begin   New paragraph Fresh start On   What I wanted to begin by saying was this: that I have always liked it best when you touch me by accident When you fall into me or brush past me or roll onto me in your sleep, to name but a few examples Motiveless contact Which is not of course to say I’ve never liked it when you’ve touched me on purpose That has its place But there’s a realm of experience – a realm of ecstasy – to which intentional contact allows, for me, no access I have always found a certain kind of intentionlessness – an intentionless act which nevertheless produces the desired outcome – extremely pleasurable Which is an admittedly unromantic way of putting it I’ve always liked it best when I’ve known there’s been no ulterior motive for physical conjunction Two unbidden bodies bound together in space: coming together, making contact, coming apart, unstained   Does this make sense? Would a concrete example help? Here’s a concrete example: imagine the scene: you’re going to put your hand to my cheek affectionately and, walking towards me, you trip over the cat – a cat who is at my feet, our cat – you stumble, your arm flies forwards and your hand, groping for support, it lands cupped on my cheek That your hand touches my

Contributor

November 2019

Kaleem Hawa

Contributor

November 2019

Kaleem Hawa has written about art, film, and literature for the New York Review of Books, The Nation, and...

after Mahmoud Darwish    Why is a boy an exclamation,  and why are his dead a period?,  why do his sinews tighten when he sees  a Palestinian body? Does his vision narrow  because of their flight,  or because their world is raining with salt?  Why is a boy with a gun different  from a boy with a jail cell?,  if the tools of rupture are our arms for  repurposing the body, and the arms of  the state are our means of repurposing the male,  are we finally useful and breathing and nervous…?  Does the white mean Night’s arrival?,  or does night signal the white’s escape?,  and when that white city boy becomes  a White City man,  does the hate in his heart subside?,  or does it become an ellipses,  a Bauhaus history of stories started  and left unfinished 
You Arrive at A White Checkpoint and Emerge Unscathed

Prize Entry

November 2019

Kaleem Hawa


READ NEXT

feature

November 2016

Hot Rocks

Izabella Scott

feature

November 2016

‘We have received around 150 of them,’ Massimo Osanna tells me, as we peer into four small crates stuffed...

poetry

Issue No. 8

Thank You For Your Email

Jack Underwood

poetry

Issue No. 8

Two years ago I was walking up a mountain path having been told of excellent views from the summit....

poetry

April 2017

The Village

Mona Arshi

poetry

April 2017

                                 When I pronounce...

 

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