Ajgi: Music to Name the Divine

This essay argues that music and sound are as significant in Aigi's poetic world as are visual forms and images, with important implications for the poet's distinctive theology. His poetry responds to and itself resounds as music. The essay describes his strong personal connections to musicians and composers, and argues that his distinctive rhythms come from musical forms, not traditional poetic meters. For Aigi, meter is constraining but rhythm is expressive and inspiring. The essay treats a small number of poems, concentrating on ‘Motsart: “Kassatsiia I‴ (‘Mozart: “Cassation I‴ (1977), with its unusual rhetorical features and crucial use of repetition. The poem strives to create something like a musical chord and to layer its words in a way that reaches for unearthly, divine revelations. In showing the poem's theological implications, particularly its negative theology, and its use of musical forms, the essay draws on theoretical writings by Albright, Adorno, and Derrida.