Meet Nidhi Zak/Aria Eipe

The Heaney-Miłosz Residency celebrates the friendship of two Nobel laureates, Seamus Heaney and Czesław Miłosz.

The Residency – a partnership between the Estate of Seamus Heaney, the Krakow Festival Office (KBF), and the Irish Embassy in Poland – provides writers with the space and time to develop their work in the beautiful surroundings of Kraków city.

This year, we are pleased to welcome Irish poet Nidhi Zak/Aria Eipe.

Nidhi is a poet, pacifist and fabulist. Born in India, she grew up across the Middle East, Europe and North America, before calling Ireland home.

Speaking of Nidhi, Michael Heaney, of the Estate of Seamus Heaney, told us: “In both her poetry and life experience, Nidhi embodies the values of openness, creativity and integrity that were so important to our father Seamus Heaney.

We hope her stay in Krakow enriches her poetic imagination, as well as further fostering cultural exchanges between Ireland, Poland and beyond.”

As Nidhi arrives in Poland to begin her residency, we wanted to learn a bit more about her story, and her hopes for her time in Krakow.

Welcome to Poland! What do you hope to get from your time here during the Residency?

“Thank you so much, dziękuję bardzo! While in Kraków, I intend to work on completing my second collection of poetry, exploring the relationship between poetry and craft, specifically the craft of blacksmithing and farriery. The blacksmith as craftsman symbolised an important figure for Seamus Heaney and Czesław Miłosz, who admired and dedicated poems to the work of these artisans.

For both poets, there was something magically transformative — almost alchemical — in the endeavour. Celtic culture extols the idea of poetry as craft, as requiring an apprenticeship, akin to the initiation period of a smith or a shaman. Working in darkness — for both the poet and the blacksmith — by the light only of lamps and fire, was considered to be crucial to the sacred and fecund nature of the creative process.

I will write these poems, using solely ink and paper, by the light of a flame in the night, in the dark half of the year. It feels like this endeavour would need a sort of conjuring, a kind of enchantment. The gift of this residency affords that opportunity: balanced on the edge of twilight, with the singular attention, focus and fidelity that is demanded by the nature of the work.

Heaney alluded to this when he wrote: “Certainly, the secret of being a poet … lies in summoning the energies of words.” I would like to use this time to summon those energies and to write, as close to the bone of what I know to be true, in tribute to the spirit of these wonderful poets who lit the way before me and to whom I owe so much.”

What motivated you to apply for the Heaney-Milosz Residency?

“I love that this residency is a celebration of friendship. I have always been enamoured of the bonds that form between poets, writers, artists and translators. Romantic relationships in these situations are historically better known, explored and exalted, but friendship has often been, for me, the deeper, more sustained and uninterrupted movement of the mind and soul towards another.

It means the world to me to remember these two beings who have been so influential in my own life in this way, as I navigate what they embodied so entirely: how to write and live with an irreducible integrity of self.

To enter into this conversation between cultures, to interrogate the place of the poet in the polis, to understand better what it means to live between and away from home(s). To look more closely, with love, at love; an act which Miłosz reminds us involves ‘learn[ing] to look at yourself the way one looks at distant things / for you are only one thing among many.’”

Did you always want to be a writer?

“Truth be known, when I was growing up, being a writer did not feature anywhere on my list of professions! I only imagined being three or four things: a conservation biologist, a professional figure skater, a voiceover actor for animated films – or most anything to do with horses. Though I was always a reader; most of my childhood was spent reading – indiscriminately, obsessively.

I think the spark of writing was likely kindled in my early 20s when I moved to New Mexico to work with a monk-turned-baker. In the half-light before the dawn, by the warmth of the kiln, in a bone-cold winter, I experienced the rare magic of making something. A thing that was not there before, suddenly was. A tiny miracle of existence.

Miłosz’s poem ‘Ars Poetica’ is vey close to my heart in this respect, as it has always articulated this mystery most clearly for me: ‘In the very essence of poetry there is something indecent: a thing is brought forth which we didn’t know we had in us,’, he writes, ‘so we blink our eyes, as if a tiger had sprung out and stood in the light, lashing his tail.’

This poem also inspired my decision to split my middle name Zakaria, as a constant reminder of the many different selves that we all inhabit and inherit over a lifetime.

These lines live eternal in my mind:

‘The purpose of poetry is to remind us
how difficult it is to remain just one person,
for our house is open, there are no keys in the doors, and invisible guests come in and out at will.’”

What do you know about Poland? Is there anything you think you simply must do, or must see?

“I lived outside Warsaw for a little while a few years ago, and have travelled around the country a bit before but there are lots of places on my growing list to visit this time!

I’m inordinately fascinated by cryptozoology so am looking forward to visiting the rumoured bones of the Wawel dragon, and Kraków’s newest dragon trail!

Exploring the Mounds in Kraków and their possible connections with Celtic culture. Stopping by the Locksmithing Museum in Świątniki Górne and learning from working blacksmiths in the area. Taking the ‘clearest way into the Universe’ through trips to Niepołomicka Forest and Białowieża Forest.

I have 32 sweet teeth, so I will also be on the hunt for the best pączki in the city (all recommendations welcome)! In Warsaw, this custom accolade was previously held by MOD Donuts so I may have to make a day trip over at some stage (with a detour to Słodky Słowny!) to verify that this is still the case!”