Tissue

• AO3:

  
  

  • Imtiaz Dharker (1954-) is a contemporary poet who was born in Pakistan and grew up in Scotland. She has written five collections of poetry and often deals with themes of identity, the role of women in contemporary society and the search for meaning.
  • In her other poems, Dharker has written about the way she values things which may seem to be trivial or easily lost or destroyed. This poem is about the possible power of something as thin and fragile as paper.
• Overview:

  The speaker in this poem uses paper as a metaphor for life. She considers how paper can 'alter things' and refers to the soft, thin paper of religious books, in particular, The Qur'an. There are also real life references to other lasting uses we have for paper in our lives, such as maps, receipts and architect drawings. Each of these items is connected to important aspects of life: journeys, money and home. In the final stages of the poem, she may be suggesting that the significance of human life will outlast the records we make of it on paper or in buildings.
• "Fine slips , "Luminous scripts".

  • Extended metaphor

  Paper acts as a metaphor for life and the way we live it. It shows how paper can be so fragile yet be enourmously powerful when it is used to convery information.
• "Might fly our lives like paper kites".

  • Simele

  The simele suggests that our lives are not always in our control, but more like the kites being blown by the wind. Connotations include a lack of control, but could be seen as a happy or childish image.
• "See how easily / they fall away on a sigh."

  • Enjambment

  The enjambment throughout the poem could show how time never stops and how it is impossible to properly keep track of things, with paper perhaps our best way of living on permanently. The fast pace could also create the effect of showing how difficult it is to keep track and organise our lives.
• Aspects of Power and Conflict:

  • Power of paper to change things and record our memories.
  • Instability - The paper is at the mercy of greater forces such as the weather.
  • Sense of fragility of human life and the fact that not everything can last.
• Poems that can be linked:

  • Ozymandias
  • War Photographer