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A God at the Door
“We are homesick everywhere,” writes Tishani Doshi, “even when we’re home.” With aching empathy, righteous anger, and rebellious humor, A God at the Door calls on the extraordinary minutiae of nature and humanity to redefine belonging and unveil injustice. In an era of pandemic lockdown and brutal politics, these poems make vital space for what must come next—the return of wonder and free movement, and a profound sense of connection to what matters most. From a microscopic cell to flightless birds, to a sumo wrestler and the tree of life, Doshi interrupts the news cycle to pause in grief or delight, to restore power to language. A God at the Doorinvites the reader on a pilgrimage—one that leads us back to the sacred temple of ourselves. This is an exquisite, generous collection from a poet at the peak of her powers.
145 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 22, 2021
26 people are currently reading
371 people want to read
About the author
Tishani Doshi
16 books177 followersTishani Doshi (born 1975) is an Indian poet, journalist and dancer based in Chennai. Born in Madras, India, to a Welsh mother and Gujarati father, she received an Eric Gregory Award in 2001. Her first poetry collection, Countries of the Body, won the 2006 Forward Poetry Prize for best first collection.[1] She has been invited to the poetry galas of the Guardian-sponsored Hay Festival of 2006 and the Cartagena Hay Festival of 2007. Her first novel, The Pleasure Seekers, was published by Bloomsbury in 2010 and was long-listed for the Orange Prize in 2011,[2] and shortlisted for The Hindu Best Fiction Award in 2010.
She writes a blog titled "Hit or Miss" on Cricinfo,[3] a cricket-related website. In the blog which she started writing in April 2009, Tishani Doshi makes observations and commentaries as a television viewer of the second season of the Indian Premier League. She is also collaborating with cricketer Muttiah Muralitharan on his biography, to be published when he retires.[4]
She works as a freelance writer and worked with choreographer Chandralekha until the latter's death in December 2006.[5] She graduated with a Masters degree in creative writing from the Johns Hopkins University.
Countries of the Body was launched in 2006 at the Hay-on-Wye festival on a platform with Seamus Heaney, Margaret Atwood, and others. The opening poem, The Day we went to the Sea, won the 2005 British Council supported All India Poetry Competition; she was also a finalist in the Outlook-Picador Non-Fiction Competition.
Her short story Lady Cassandra, Spartacus and the dancing man was published in its entirety in the journal The Drawbridge in 2007.[6]
Her most recent book of poetry, Everything Begins Elsewhere[7] was published by Copper Canyon Press in 2013.
Her newest book, The Adulterous Citizen – poems stories essays (2015) was launched at the 13th annual St. Martin Book Fair by House of Nehesi Publishers, making Tishani Doshi the first important author from India to be published in the Caribbean.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tishani_...
She writes a blog titled "Hit or Miss" on Cricinfo,[3] a cricket-related website. In the blog which she started writing in April 2009, Tishani Doshi makes observations and commentaries as a television viewer of the second season of the Indian Premier League. She is also collaborating with cricketer Muttiah Muralitharan on his biography, to be published when he retires.[4]
She works as a freelance writer and worked with choreographer Chandralekha until the latter's death in December 2006.[5] She graduated with a Masters degree in creative writing from the Johns Hopkins University.
Countries of the Body was launched in 2006 at the Hay-on-Wye festival on a platform with Seamus Heaney, Margaret Atwood, and others. The opening poem, The Day we went to the Sea, won the 2005 British Council supported All India Poetry Competition; she was also a finalist in the Outlook-Picador Non-Fiction Competition.
Her short story Lady Cassandra, Spartacus and the dancing man was published in its entirety in the journal The Drawbridge in 2007.[6]
Her most recent book of poetry, Everything Begins Elsewhere[7] was published by Copper Canyon Press in 2013.
Her newest book, The Adulterous Citizen – poems stories essays (2015) was launched at the 13th annual St. Martin Book Fair by House of Nehesi Publishers, making Tishani Doshi the first important author from India to be published in the Caribbean.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tishani_...
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March 4, 2022
‘The point of hunger
is to remind you to live.’
Anyone even remotely aware knows the daily news cycle has been a maelstrom of suffering, violence, confusion and struggles around the world. As William Carlos Williams once wrote ‘it is difficult/to get the news from poems/though men die miserably every day/for lack/of what is found there,’ but luckily the reading world has Tishani Doshi to respond to the news of the world in poetry that is both astute and accessible as she responds to many happenings in our recent years. 'It was as though in order to draw inward to write a poem, I needed a prod from the news cycle,' she writes about her newest collection of poetry, A God at the Door, a collection that covers topics from the collective grief during the COVID crisis ( The Coronapocalypse Will be Televised ), the drought in Southern India, violence against women ( We Will Not Kill You We’ll Just Shoot You in the Vagina in response to an actual order from Filipino president Duterte to shoot women communist rebels in 2018), criticisms of the Bharatiya Janata Party, and even humorous responses to articles about the return of the speedo. This poems raise a voice against injustices and a serve as a proud call-to-arms with direct prose that dances across the page, often formatted to imply curves and actual movement inspired by Doshi’s own career as dancer as well as a writer. Powerful, profound and in-touch with life as we live in a present of turmoil, A God at the Door is an outstanding collection with as much hope as there is grief.
‘No one forgets there’s a war going on,
but there are moments you could be forgiven
for believing the city is still an orchard,
a place where you could make a thing grow.’
Tishani Doshi is a fascinating woman. Born in Madras, India, she studied writing at John Hopkins in London and worked in advertising before returning to India in 2001. After meeting choreographer Chandralekha, she embarked on a very successful career as a dancer while also publishing several volumes of poetry. Doshi combines her love of words with the movement of the body quite effectively through her verse, using them as a duel commentary:
Her love of motion and dance comes alive in the rhythm of her poetry, often full of internal rhyme and a natural cadence that beg for being read aloud while still being equally effective on the page. Many of her poems are published center-justified in order to represent the poems on the page with curves and motion, such as shown below:
The body makes it’s way into many of these poems, particularly with regard to violence done upon the body or the emphasis on physical appearance under the male gaze (I Carry My Uterus in a Small Suitcase is formatted as an inverted triangle and the poem about speedos is comically formatted similarly written to look like a speedo). But there is also the connection between the body and our natural world, with line like ‘the body of the earth is the body of us,’ as she writes in the poem Roots which includes as line from Frida Kahlo’s diary: ‘the vegetable miracle of my body’s landscape.’ The earth becomes a reflection of womanhood and motherhood, and vice versa, another common theme throughout her collection. ‘At sixteen we are a rare species,’ she writes in a poem for her mother, ‘rocks share our secrets. The gap between who we are and who we want to be is epic.’
‘...Our vaginas
Have learned to shoot. They laugh and talk back (rapacious
beasts). Our daughters feed them poems, Mr. Duterte!’
The political is ever present here as well, directly addressing tragedies such as the shooting at a maternity clinic in Kabul in 2020, women being removed from the voting records and denied a vote (I Found a Village and in it Were All Our Missing Women) or a clever acrostic poem from A to Z in response to the Indian education minister demanding Darwin be removed from schools (Creation Abecedarian). A particularly moving poem, The Stromtroopers of My Country addresses anti-Muslim bills by the BJP government and the 2020 Delhi riots. The poem begins as such:
‘The stormtroopers of my country love
their wives but are okay to burn
what needs to burned for the good
of the republic often doing so in brown
pleated shorts and cute black hats with sticks.’
Through her poetry, Doshi seeks to take the power back for the people, to remove the coldness of newstories and insert the beating human hearts that are being struck down. She wants to reunite us with the holy, and with humanity. She write:
It is an important undertaking, and Doshi succeeds through her ability to remain charming with wry wit in the face of tragedy, easily inserting her verse directly into the hearts of the readers to educate and inspire. These are poems to unite us.
‘My loneliness is not the same
as your loneliness, although they send
each other postcards and when they meet
they relax enough to nap
on each other’s sofas.’
All in all, A God at the Door is a delightful collection that I highly recommend to anyone. Doshi says it best when she writes ‘ I wanted my poems to have all the intensity of the lyric form but framed in the political now. Essentially, I kept coming back to the body as a site of renewal, the idea that any pilgrimage must lead back to ourselves, our bodies.’ The body, the land, you and me, she wants to unite us all in the struggle against oppression and violence. These are very political poems with specific intent, yet the message is universal. Poems like this are necessary and fulfilling and we are blessed to have Tishani Doshi putting the news into her poems for the betterment of all.
4/5
This May Reach You Either as a Bird or Flower
For Varavara Rao
Sooner or later we must return
to the rooms from which we emerged.
The earth of your childhood is the earth
of mine, even though it may seem we live in
two different countries. You are a dangerous
poet in yours. I am trying to be one. In every
republic there will be some who walk down to
the water with life vests and bread, while others
lead soldiers to trapdoors in the cellar. You stand
at the edge, beating a drum. They say you’ve been
standing there sixty years, drumming, drumming.
Sir—are you warm? Are the crows bringing you the
latest terrible news? The mobs haul bodies from beyond
the campfires with leaves tacked to their eyes and throats
filled with dust. You should know there’s been a breach. The
curtain is not made of iron. The offspring of your arrests have
formed their own political party in prison and are spreading
rebellious thoughts like a virus refreshed after a summer rest.
We must consolidate while there’s oxygen left. A day will
come when we are gathered in a courtyard for a historic
photo, and asked to denounce the pawns, the black and
white squares, the horses and rooks. Everyone but
the crooks. It will no longer be possible to say
your homeland is not my homeland
because it doesn’t speak English.
The languages we love will be
thrown in a ditch. A country
forgets how many countries
it’s been. Nothing is gentle
about memory. The sky
speaks in howl, grass
whispers back. We
are already on
our knees.
What else
can we
do but
resist?
is to remind you to live.’
Anyone even remotely aware knows the daily news cycle has been a maelstrom of suffering, violence, confusion and struggles around the world. As William Carlos Williams once wrote ‘it is difficult/to get the news from poems/though men die miserably every day/for lack/of what is found there,’ but luckily the reading world has Tishani Doshi to respond to the news of the world in poetry that is both astute and accessible as she responds to many happenings in our recent years. 'It was as though in order to draw inward to write a poem, I needed a prod from the news cycle,' she writes about her newest collection of poetry, A God at the Door, a collection that covers topics from the collective grief during the COVID crisis ( The Coronapocalypse Will be Televised ), the drought in Southern India, violence against women ( We Will Not Kill You We’ll Just Shoot You in the Vagina in response to an actual order from Filipino president Duterte to shoot women communist rebels in 2018), criticisms of the Bharatiya Janata Party, and even humorous responses to articles about the return of the speedo. This poems raise a voice against injustices and a serve as a proud call-to-arms with direct prose that dances across the page, often formatted to imply curves and actual movement inspired by Doshi’s own career as dancer as well as a writer. Powerful, profound and in-touch with life as we live in a present of turmoil, A God at the Door is an outstanding collection with as much hope as there is grief.
‘No one forgets there’s a war going on,
but there are moments you could be forgiven
for believing the city is still an orchard,
a place where you could make a thing grow.’
Tishani Doshi is a fascinating woman. Born in Madras, India, she studied writing at John Hopkins in London and worked in advertising before returning to India in 2001. After meeting choreographer Chandralekha, she embarked on a very successful career as a dancer while also publishing several volumes of poetry. Doshi combines her love of words with the movement of the body quite effectively through her verse, using them as a duel commentary:
‘As a poet I was looking to hold all this breaking, but also looking for areas of restoration, transformation and hope. I found two touchstones, and they were old ones: body and language.’
Her love of motion and dance comes alive in the rhythm of her poetry, often full of internal rhyme and a natural cadence that beg for being read aloud while still being equally effective on the page. Many of her poems are published center-justified in order to represent the poems on the page with curves and motion, such as shown below:
The body makes it’s way into many of these poems, particularly with regard to violence done upon the body or the emphasis on physical appearance under the male gaze (I Carry My Uterus in a Small Suitcase is formatted as an inverted triangle and the poem about speedos is comically formatted similarly written to look like a speedo). But there is also the connection between the body and our natural world, with line like ‘the body of the earth is the body of us,’ as she writes in the poem Roots which includes as line from Frida Kahlo’s diary: ‘the vegetable miracle of my body’s landscape.’ The earth becomes a reflection of womanhood and motherhood, and vice versa, another common theme throughout her collection. ‘At sixteen we are a rare species,’ she writes in a poem for her mother, ‘rocks share our secrets. The gap between who we are and who we want to be is epic.’
‘...Our vaginas
Have learned to shoot. They laugh and talk back (rapacious
beasts). Our daughters feed them poems, Mr. Duterte!’
The political is ever present here as well, directly addressing tragedies such as the shooting at a maternity clinic in Kabul in 2020, women being removed from the voting records and denied a vote (I Found a Village and in it Were All Our Missing Women) or a clever acrostic poem from A to Z in response to the Indian education minister demanding Darwin be removed from schools (Creation Abecedarian). A particularly moving poem, The Stromtroopers of My Country addresses anti-Muslim bills by the BJP government and the 2020 Delhi riots. The poem begins as such:
‘The stormtroopers of my country love
their wives but are okay to burn
what needs to burned for the good
of the republic often doing so in brown
pleated shorts and cute black hats with sticks.’
Through her poetry, Doshi seeks to take the power back for the people, to remove the coldness of newstories and insert the beating human hearts that are being struck down. She wants to reunite us with the holy, and with humanity. She write:
‘The language of newspeak is the opposite of the language of poetry — it bombards and jolts, then deadens and desensitizes. I see poems as a way to speak back to these headlines, to restore power to language and to offer an alternative space and time zone from the relentlessness of the news cycle. The question I kept asking was where is hope in all of this, and what is holy anymore?’
It is an important undertaking, and Doshi succeeds through her ability to remain charming with wry wit in the face of tragedy, easily inserting her verse directly into the hearts of the readers to educate and inspire. These are poems to unite us.
‘My loneliness is not the same
as your loneliness, although they send
each other postcards and when they meet
they relax enough to nap
on each other’s sofas.’
All in all, A God at the Door is a delightful collection that I highly recommend to anyone. Doshi says it best when she writes ‘ I wanted my poems to have all the intensity of the lyric form but framed in the political now. Essentially, I kept coming back to the body as a site of renewal, the idea that any pilgrimage must lead back to ourselves, our bodies.’ The body, the land, you and me, she wants to unite us all in the struggle against oppression and violence. These are very political poems with specific intent, yet the message is universal. Poems like this are necessary and fulfilling and we are blessed to have Tishani Doshi putting the news into her poems for the betterment of all.
4/5
This May Reach You Either as a Bird or Flower
For Varavara Rao
Sooner or later we must return
to the rooms from which we emerged.
The earth of your childhood is the earth
of mine, even though it may seem we live in
two different countries. You are a dangerous
poet in yours. I am trying to be one. In every
republic there will be some who walk down to
the water with life vests and bread, while others
lead soldiers to trapdoors in the cellar. You stand
at the edge, beating a drum. They say you’ve been
standing there sixty years, drumming, drumming.
Sir—are you warm? Are the crows bringing you the
latest terrible news? The mobs haul bodies from beyond
the campfires with leaves tacked to their eyes and throats
filled with dust. You should know there’s been a breach. The
curtain is not made of iron. The offspring of your arrests have
formed their own political party in prison and are spreading
rebellious thoughts like a virus refreshed after a summer rest.
We must consolidate while there’s oxygen left. A day will
come when we are gathered in a courtyard for a historic
photo, and asked to denounce the pawns, the black and
white squares, the horses and rooks. Everyone but
the crooks. It will no longer be possible to say
your homeland is not my homeland
because it doesn’t speak English.
The languages we love will be
thrown in a ditch. A country
forgets how many countries
it’s been. Nothing is gentle
about memory. The sky
speaks in howl, grass
whispers back. We
are already on
our knees.
What else
can we
do but
resist?
September 16, 2021
My first book by Tishani Doshi, and I must say she reminds me of Lang Leav. I can easily say she is a tough competition amongst poets and I absolutely loved this author's latest release 'A God At The Door'.
There's so much that this book had to offer that I am failing to put all of those thoughts into words. The book has a proper structure of poetry which I feel many Indian poets lack even today. It's an exquisite style of poetry and not just thought dumb.
The poetry is definitely complex, but filled with rage and societal issues of racism, sexism, politics and many more. Few other poems mentioned are soothing and very beautiful which brings voice to the marginalized.
I am more than halfway through the Book and I am going to savor it by reading one poetry a day. I absolutely loved her work and would definitely be checking out previous work pretty soon. A poetry book which is going to be your peace and rage at the same time.
There's so much that this book had to offer that I am failing to put all of those thoughts into words. The book has a proper structure of poetry which I feel many Indian poets lack even today. It's an exquisite style of poetry and not just thought dumb.
The poetry is definitely complex, but filled with rage and societal issues of racism, sexism, politics and many more. Few other poems mentioned are soothing and very beautiful which brings voice to the marginalized.
I am more than halfway through the Book and I am going to savor it by reading one poetry a day. I absolutely loved her work and would definitely be checking out previous work pretty soon. A poetry book which is going to be your peace and rage at the same time.
April 23, 2021
"History too has a hard time remembering
the black waters they crossed, the small
mountain villages emptied of men.
Death was different then. History is always
reinventing itself. Say what you will,
but clouds have remained more or less
the same, and leaving home is still leaving
home, whether it's on a jet plane or climbing
the steep path behind the house with a roll
of bedding on your back. But to die in a faraway
place whose name you can't pronounce,
for a king who isn't really yours, is a sadness
history still hasn't figured out... "
// Many Good & Wonderful Things
If you are familiar with Doshi's work, you will immediately mark a departure from her previous collections when you start this. The poems are complex and conversational, just shy of being called verbose. Doshi also seems to be careful about how they look on the page: long blocks of text/short stanzas/variously aligned/shaped. She remains irreverent and many poems are very political. But underneath shock value, there is a deep engagement with aesthetics as well as ideas. Overall, one can chart a very interesting evolution.
Being and Bo(dies), especially with aging, is an important theme here. Decline and the ways to combat it, or perhaps come to terms with it, understand it. She is not interested in glossing over realities and yet handles all her subjects with great care. She has a way of flitting from one unconnected thought to the next. There is momentary disorientation yet, in the project of the larger poem, they strangely fit. Her imagery is alluring, no matter grim/pleasant, a fragile beauty, a meeting of the quotidian and the extraordinary. Her subtle mid-line rhymes, the inherent lilting rhythm, make it an absolute treat to read.
(I received a finished copy from the author in exchange for an honest review.)
the black waters they crossed, the small
mountain villages emptied of men.
Death was different then. History is always
reinventing itself. Say what you will,
but clouds have remained more or less
the same, and leaving home is still leaving
home, whether it's on a jet plane or climbing
the steep path behind the house with a roll
of bedding on your back. But to die in a faraway
place whose name you can't pronounce,
for a king who isn't really yours, is a sadness
history still hasn't figured out... "
// Many Good & Wonderful Things
If you are familiar with Doshi's work, you will immediately mark a departure from her previous collections when you start this. The poems are complex and conversational, just shy of being called verbose. Doshi also seems to be careful about how they look on the page: long blocks of text/short stanzas/variously aligned/shaped. She remains irreverent and many poems are very political. But underneath shock value, there is a deep engagement with aesthetics as well as ideas. Overall, one can chart a very interesting evolution.
Being and Bo(dies), especially with aging, is an important theme here. Decline and the ways to combat it, or perhaps come to terms with it, understand it. She is not interested in glossing over realities and yet handles all her subjects with great care. She has a way of flitting from one unconnected thought to the next. There is momentary disorientation yet, in the project of the larger poem, they strangely fit. Her imagery is alluring, no matter grim/pleasant, a fragile beauty, a meeting of the quotidian and the extraordinary. Her subtle mid-line rhymes, the inherent lilting rhythm, make it an absolute treat to read.
(I received a finished copy from the author in exchange for an honest review.)
March 28, 2025
I discovered Doshi through the phenomenal Girls Are Coming out of the Woods, which I reviewed for Wasafiri literary magazine. Her fourth collection is just as rich in long, forthright feminist and political poems. Violence against women is a theme that crops up again and again in her work, as in “Every Unbearable Thing”: “this is not / a poem against longing / but against the kind of one-way / desire that herds you into a / dead-end alley”. The arresting title of the sestina “We Will Not Kill You. We’ll Just Shoot You in the Vagina” is something the former Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte said in 2018 in reference to female communist rebels. Doshi links femicide and ecocide with “A Possible Explanation as to Why We Mutilate Women & Trees, which Tries to End on a Note of Hope”. Her poem titles are often striking and tell stories in and of themselves. Several made me laugh, such as “Advice for Pliny the Elder, Big Daddy of Mansplainers,” which is shaped like a menstrual cup.
In defiance of those who would destroy it, Doshi affirms the primacy of the body. The joyfully absurd “In a Dream I Give Birth to a Sumo Wrestler” ends with the lines “How easy to forget / that all we have are these bodies. That all of this, all of this is holy.” Poems are inspired by Emily Dickinson and Frida Kahlo as well as by real events that provoke outrage. The clever folktale-like pair “Microeconomics” and “Macroeconomics” contrasts a woman dutifully growing peas and trying to get ahead with exploitative situations: “One man sits on another if he can. … One man goes / into the mines for another man to sparkle.” I also found many wise words on grief. Doshi is a treasure.
Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.
In defiance of those who would destroy it, Doshi affirms the primacy of the body. The joyfully absurd “In a Dream I Give Birth to a Sumo Wrestler” ends with the lines “How easy to forget / that all we have are these bodies. That all of this, all of this is holy.” Poems are inspired by Emily Dickinson and Frida Kahlo as well as by real events that provoke outrage. The clever folktale-like pair “Microeconomics” and “Macroeconomics” contrasts a woman dutifully growing peas and trying to get ahead with exploitative situations: “One man sits on another if he can. … One man goes / into the mines for another man to sparkle.” I also found many wise words on grief. Doshi is a treasure.
Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.
March 19, 2022
The only poems I grew up reading were written by Robert Frost or P.B Shelley, and to be honest, I don't think I'd even sit through the agony of one entire book filled with words on the level 3 difficulty scale of Oxford dictionary about what a woe life is, even if someone paid me to do it.
So why did I even bother reading this? Unexpectedly a blogger's review on a certain book with the most gorgeous cover popped up on my Google feed. I was a tiny bit disappointed after scanning through the blog and realising that it's a book on poetry but my vain side won & for the sake of that beautiful cover, I started on Tishani Doshi's “A God at the Door”.
What I loved?
› 〉
The informal structure. Efforts were put into placing the sentences in such a way that they ended up making some sort of a shape which was relevant to the specific poem. Sometimes all curves, other times very concrete.
› 〉
Thankfully it wasn't stressful, nor was it an exposition on best perspectives to view life from. Rather, the poems were diverse in all aspects that count. The poet conjures poems based on real news, be it devastatingly harsh realities of humanity or even something silly and humorous. Her travels, and all the little anecdotes of her life serve to be an inspiration too.
My favourite excerpts?
❝ My loneliness is not the same as your loneliness,
although they send each other postcards ❞
❝ The point of hunger
is to remind you to live. ❞
I don't think I got the opportunity to give all the love that this book deserves right now, but I'll be sure to revisit it again in the future, but with a dictionary! :p
So why did I even bother reading this? Unexpectedly a blogger's review on a certain book with the most gorgeous cover popped up on my Google feed. I was a tiny bit disappointed after scanning through the blog and realising that it's a book on poetry but my vain side won & for the sake of that beautiful cover, I started on Tishani Doshi's “A God at the Door”.
What I loved?
› 〉
The informal structure. Efforts were put into placing the sentences in such a way that they ended up making some sort of a shape which was relevant to the specific poem. Sometimes all curves, other times very concrete.
› 〉
Thankfully it wasn't stressful, nor was it an exposition on best perspectives to view life from. Rather, the poems were diverse in all aspects that count. The poet conjures poems based on real news, be it devastatingly harsh realities of humanity or even something silly and humorous. Her travels, and all the little anecdotes of her life serve to be an inspiration too.
My favourite excerpts?
❝ My loneliness is not the same as your loneliness,
although they send each other postcards ❞
❝ The point of hunger
is to remind you to live. ❞
I don't think I got the opportunity to give all the love that this book deserves right now, but I'll be sure to revisit it again in the future, but with a dictionary! :p
March 19, 2022
My favourite poetry collection of the year, containing so many standout poems – vibrant, dynamic, relevant, full of colour and rage. I keep going back to them and marvelling, and finding something new, love sharing them in workshops. Should win prizes.
August 11, 2021
Most of the poems are fine I guess, many are even very good, but the collection has no real identity, or maybe too many identities. The speaker seems to act as witness—of many, many things—but their judgment of what there is to be witnessed is toothless. They saw the world and it was bad. Okay, now what? The collection doesn’t offer anything beyond recognition and verdict. Poets are not journalists. We don’t simply report the facts, identify the trees as we see them. We must also provide a path through the forest.
April 25, 2022
❝bridges are burning
and towers have collapsed
and some will say the witches
are returning but really it is the
world asking to be made again
so let us bring flowers let us
bow down let us worship
and reveal our scars let us ❞
Tishani Doshi's writing is unparalleled in many ways than one and 'A God at the Door' once again claims it.
With soul-piercing dialogue and metaphors that linger like the sweet smell of autumn, Doshi's poetry feels like the first step of a revolution.
'A God at the Door' : a collection of poems brings unravels a chroma of emotions within you : which makes you vulnerable and feeling cosmic at the same time.
If you are planning to read this : be prepared to inhale the radicalism!
❝No matter how many nights you spend in exile,
remember, pilgrim, you come home to this skin.❞
September 12, 2021
"One man sits on another if he can.
One man's heart beats stronger. One man goes
Into the mines for another man to sparkle.
One man dies so the family living at the top of the hill
Can eat sandwiches on the lawn.."
- Macroeconomics, A God at the Door
A God at the Door is a collection of poetry where Tishani Doshi has again surprised me with her sharp writing.
Doshi has covered issues about society, politics, sexism, racism, and whatnot in a conversational tone.
Tbh, I was expecting an eloquent piece of work from her and I'm not disappointed.
But one thing I loved a lot is the structure! She doesn't only write down her thoughts and views but she curves them!
But, it can not be everyone's cup of tea. Some works are complex.
One man's heart beats stronger. One man goes
Into the mines for another man to sparkle.
One man dies so the family living at the top of the hill
Can eat sandwiches on the lawn.."
- Macroeconomics, A God at the Door
A God at the Door is a collection of poetry where Tishani Doshi has again surprised me with her sharp writing.
Doshi has covered issues about society, politics, sexism, racism, and whatnot in a conversational tone.
Tbh, I was expecting an eloquent piece of work from her and I'm not disappointed.
But one thing I loved a lot is the structure! She doesn't only write down her thoughts and views but she curves them!
But, it can not be everyone's cup of tea. Some works are complex.
October 6, 2021
Review to come.
October 21, 2021
This is Tishani Doshi's fourth collection of poems and it feels like poetry written by someone who is comfortable with both their art and craft. In "This May Reach You Either as a Bird or Flower (for Varavara Rao)" she says:
"...You are a dangerous poet in yours. I am trying to be one in mine."
And I think that this thought is at the core of this collection, which isn't all political but contains a lot of politics. Sometimes that is direct and angry, sometimes it is more subtle. And ranged against the horrors of the modern world is hope - "Hope is the noose around my neck." (Survival, p109). I think this is a collection looking for hope.
It's also, intentional or not, a collection that pokes at the conscience of its readers. Or, at least this reader:
"...In every
republic there will be some who walk down to
the water with life vests and bread, while others
lead soldiers to trapdoors in the cellar..."
"This May Reach You Either as a Bird or Flower (for Varavara Rao)" (p92)
The poems pick up on current events, especially the modern politics of India. There are poems anchored in COVID and the response to it; to politician's statements; to murders and to immigration and flight from violence.
Women are also at the centre of the poems and some of Doshi's most angry poetry is focused on this topic. I'm thinking particularly of "We Will Not Kill You. We'll Just Shoot You in the Vagina", which takes an actual statement by Filipino President Rodorigo Duterte and turns it into a rightfully angry poem. It's one of my favourites in the collection.
But this is full of great poetry. Sometimes she uses the topography of the page too. My favourite example being "The Comeback of Speedos". This makes it seem like this collections is without humour, but that's not the case. Doshi wields sarcasm - or if I want to be more literary irony - like a scalpel.
It's a fine collection and it makes you want to read everything she has written.
"...You are a dangerous poet in yours. I am trying to be one in mine."
And I think that this thought is at the core of this collection, which isn't all political but contains a lot of politics. Sometimes that is direct and angry, sometimes it is more subtle. And ranged against the horrors of the modern world is hope - "Hope is the noose around my neck." (Survival, p109). I think this is a collection looking for hope.
It's also, intentional or not, a collection that pokes at the conscience of its readers. Or, at least this reader:
"...In every
republic there will be some who walk down to
the water with life vests and bread, while others
lead soldiers to trapdoors in the cellar..."
"This May Reach You Either as a Bird or Flower (for Varavara Rao)" (p92)
The poems pick up on current events, especially the modern politics of India. There are poems anchored in COVID and the response to it; to politician's statements; to murders and to immigration and flight from violence.
Women are also at the centre of the poems and some of Doshi's most angry poetry is focused on this topic. I'm thinking particularly of "We Will Not Kill You. We'll Just Shoot You in the Vagina", which takes an actual statement by Filipino President Rodorigo Duterte and turns it into a rightfully angry poem. It's one of my favourites in the collection.
But this is full of great poetry. Sometimes she uses the topography of the page too. My favourite example being "The Comeback of Speedos". This makes it seem like this collections is without humour, but that's not the case. Doshi wields sarcasm - or if I want to be more literary irony - like a scalpel.
It's a fine collection and it makes you want to read everything she has written.
Read
December 23, 2022In one of this book’s lush, thoughtful, sometimes necessarily jarring poems, Tishani Doshi writes, “the body of earth is the body of us.” Perhaps we care for our own and each other’s bodies with just as much, and just as little reverence as we care for the earth. Throughout A God at the Door, Doshi demonstrates where the divine is at work in the mundane, and places where the world severs the living from the divine. No, she is more specific than that. Doshi writes how humans destroy life, killing the divine inside others. This book’s gaze is global and copious. It moves from lost species to lost coasts to lives lost to gunfire in a maternity clinic in Kabul. But, the witness accompanies a fierce will toward survival. The language in A God at the Door is fiery and mesmerizing, as if sparked by something we might call the divine.
Review published originally with Orion Magazine: https://orionmagazine.org/2022/03/17-...
Review published originally with Orion Magazine: https://orionmagazine.org/2022/03/17-...
January 4, 2022
October Fugue
The year is laying down its leaves
like an oil spill along the coast of Kamchatka.
A sweep of toxic yellow, dead seals, starfish—
a whole darkening orchard. Persimmon, quince.
This morning I fell over while trying to straighten
the curtains. Perhaps I saw reflections of trees
in the windows and got confused, the way birds
often do. Perhaps I wanted to understand
what it means to slam into buildings of glass
and fall from the sky in large numbers.
This is the roof of the world. Out there,
flares of a burning taiga. Didn’t they promise
respite from the air strikes? Who promised
a life, golden? Take this pillow from under
my head. We’re running out of provisions.
How far can we flee with headscarves
and slippers? In all this mist it’s easy to forget
how a season of dying can still be flamboyant.
We risk breaking our necks. But we should
make a go of it. Shouldn’t it be now?
The year is laying down its leaves
like an oil spill along the coast of Kamchatka.
A sweep of toxic yellow, dead seals, starfish—
a whole darkening orchard. Persimmon, quince.
This morning I fell over while trying to straighten
the curtains. Perhaps I saw reflections of trees
in the windows and got confused, the way birds
often do. Perhaps I wanted to understand
what it means to slam into buildings of glass
and fall from the sky in large numbers.
This is the roof of the world. Out there,
flares of a burning taiga. Didn’t they promise
respite from the air strikes? Who promised
a life, golden? Take this pillow from under
my head. We’re running out of provisions.
How far can we flee with headscarves
and slippers? In all this mist it’s easy to forget
how a season of dying can still be flamboyant.
We risk breaking our necks. But we should
make a go of it. Shouldn’t it be now?
January 5, 2022
4.5 stars.
The only thing that stops this incredible collection from being - for my money - a genuine modern classic is some of the overly familiar and slightly predictable imagery. That's a rarity though, and for the most part I'm convinced that there are very few contemporary poets who are smarter, more culturally aware, more righteous and funnier than Tishani Doshi. She's also an incredible storyteller; the musicality of her references, syntactical presentation and metaphors is unlike almost anything I've read since some of W.H. Auden's best work. 'Rotten Grief' speaks volumes to me personally, but so zealous is her dedication to fighting the good fight that it's impossible not to feel empowered by so many of the poems here.
A must-read collection.
The only thing that stops this incredible collection from being - for my money - a genuine modern classic is some of the overly familiar and slightly predictable imagery. That's a rarity though, and for the most part I'm convinced that there are very few contemporary poets who are smarter, more culturally aware, more righteous and funnier than Tishani Doshi. She's also an incredible storyteller; the musicality of her references, syntactical presentation and metaphors is unlike almost anything I've read since some of W.H. Auden's best work. 'Rotten Grief' speaks volumes to me personally, but so zealous is her dedication to fighting the good fight that it's impossible not to feel empowered by so many of the poems here.
A must-read collection.
May 19, 2024
“baby imagine a country a house on fire”
It’s not an easy, simple collection. It’s a difficult one, but one that could be necessary for numerous ideological stances. It’s political, of course, and from what I understand and what I believe, it is not supposed to “easy” or “simple”. It focusses on what is progressively going wrong with the great nation that is India, and finds anecdotes in numerous unlearned and tone-deaf statements of the leading party’s members—sometimes, it uses historical statements, myths, stories and legends to illustrate the same.
It’s not an easy, simple collection. It’s a difficult one, but one that could be necessary for numerous ideological stances. It’s political, of course, and from what I understand and what I believe, it is not supposed to “easy” or “simple”. It focusses on what is progressively going wrong with the great nation that is India, and finds anecdotes in numerous unlearned and tone-deaf statements of the leading party’s members—sometimes, it uses historical statements, myths, stories and legends to illustrate the same.
August 4, 2024
I really liked the prose-y style of a lot of the poems. They really catch you up in the momentum of the lines.
Something that also impressed me was how much emotion she was able to convey at times without falling off the cliff into corny-ness. Lots of cool unexpected ideas and phrases woven between each other while managing to stay connected somehow.
Something that also impressed me was how much emotion she was able to convey at times without falling off the cliff into corny-ness. Lots of cool unexpected ideas and phrases woven between each other while managing to stay connected somehow.
July 19, 2021
This is a demonstration of why I do not read poetry often. While I could grasp the events to which the poems were a reaction, and I appreciate the viewpoint, the metaphors surrounding them were simply too much to process for my simple mind.
January 16, 2022
CN: death, r*p*
This is my first book by Tishani Doshi, and it's one of those that makes you immediately add everything else they've ever written to your TBR.
There are poems here that will: nourish you, enrage you, inspire you, break your heart, and bring you peace.
This is my first book by Tishani Doshi, and it's one of those that makes you immediately add everything else they've ever written to your TBR.
There are poems here that will: nourish you, enrage you, inspire you, break your heart, and bring you peace.
April 7, 2022
I would kneel first at the hillocks
of my breasts and pay obeisance.
Praise the dainty bud of squirrel’s tail
that made them. In the miniature painting
of me, the background tree meant to symbolise
my beauty would not be laden with pomegranates.
Kumquats perhaps, or plums.
of my breasts and pay obeisance.
Praise the dainty bud of squirrel’s tail
that made them. In the miniature painting
of me, the background tree meant to symbolise
my beauty would not be laden with pomegranates.
Kumquats perhaps, or plums.
August 1, 2025
I read this hoping to find poems I could teach in my India course, and there are a couple, but in this collection she's exploring more universal issues. There are some Covid poems that brought back that terrible time, and several that just sort of baffled me, but in a good way.
July 7, 2022
Not as illuminating as her other collections but some prizes in here.
August 22, 2022
Some favorites from the collection: “Self,” “Cosmos,” “A Dress is Like a Field,” “Rotten Grief,” “End-of-the-Year Epiphany at the Holiday Inn,” and “Hope is the Thing.”
November 1, 2022
First of all, I have the biggest crush on Tishani Doshi. Second of all, how could I not?
November 4, 2022
Lo descriverò in tre parole: potente, scorretto, femminista
November 10, 2022
“ (…) someone
told me if I carried a piece of raw onion
into battle, the bullets would not find me.”
told me if I carried a piece of raw onion
into battle, the bullets would not find me.”
November 10, 2022
read for class. i liked it, very relevant. sad. woman power!
May 23, 2023
Hauntingly beautiful!
April 13, 2025
Why are you not astonished?
June 30, 2022
It was after a long time that I devoted so much time and energy to a poetry collection, for this deserves that attention. A God at the Door by Tishani Doshi is a superb collection; a collection that tackles topics from current political events to that of women's bodies, sexism, racism and general news articles. Yes, the last part was new for me to read in any poetry collection. The best thing is the explanation of almost every poem, or the inspiration behind it, given at the end of the book. If it were not for that, half of the poems would have gone straight above my head.
The poems are politically charged. Through her perfect wit and sarcasm, Doshi has performed her rage at sexism. There is no hidden agenda or to set back in saying the right thing. She is unapologetically true to herself in saying the politically correct thing.
The poems cover quite a huge ground - cover a lot of different topics- and yet they sit brilliantly together. She questions everything and everyone, in the light of truth. She doesn’t hold back. The poems are bold and her narrative shows it.
A wonderful collection that deserves to be savoured slowly- one poem at a time! Looking forward to reading more from Tishani Doshi.
The poems are politically charged. Through her perfect wit and sarcasm, Doshi has performed her rage at sexism. There is no hidden agenda or to set back in saying the right thing. She is unapologetically true to herself in saying the politically correct thing.
The poems cover quite a huge ground - cover a lot of different topics- and yet they sit brilliantly together. She questions everything and everyone, in the light of truth. She doesn’t hold back. The poems are bold and her narrative shows it.
A wonderful collection that deserves to be savoured slowly- one poem at a time! Looking forward to reading more from Tishani Doshi.
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