The Immigrant Experience
At the forefront of the poetry here is the conveyance to the reader of the immigrant experience. The bulk of the verse by this poet trends toward the narrative and the stories that are told are specifically from the perspective of the ethnic outsider. Not all are from the perspective of the outsider looking in, however. Collectively speaking, the thematic arc here is fuller and broader than merely that of juxtaposing the dominant authority with the oppressed minority.
Intergenerational Relationships
One notable aspect of Nagra’s poems about the immigrant experience is that they are not limited to such juxtapositions between the native culture and the immigrant arrivals. The focus tends to shift toward the second-generation immigrants who have not arrived with their own native culture intact, but down a generation toward the hyphenated immigrant. This shift produces a change in context. Along with a highlighting the interests of younger narratives, there is also now a doubling of tension as the second generation immigrant is illustrated as being in conflict not just between native and adopted cultures, but through domestic tension with older first-generation immigrants and the pressure they also put the next generation within the dispute over whether or to what degree assimilation should be pursued.
Blended Language
The tension between assimilation and holding fast to native cultures is realized most effectively through the use of language. The immigrant narrators and character populating his poems speak a combination of English and their native Indian language. The result is a dialect speech that can perhaps be difficult for some readers, but which nevertheless provide a more honest and representative portrait of the experience of being an immigrant, especially a second or third generation. The difficulty is also part of the thematic application because it has an unsettling effect on readers that helps to situate them into the role of those for whom language barriers present problems with social interaction.
