there;s nothing, nothing quite as... (Arka Mukhopadhyay)

/there's nothing, nothing quite as...
saddening as that first morning when
winter whispers into the city, and
all day, all day a wind is blowing through your mind
and through the streets of that other, secret
city whose jagged edges are remembering; for you
are an image of its trees, and like the trees
the wind picks you up in its dance and you
sway through the strange nights when something
speaks from beyond the voices of our fathers, something
sleeping in the heavy, turbid depths of the river, and
whirls us about, through the centuries,
shattering us against the silence of the stars.

/Arka's poem starts out quite strongly - somewhere around 'you are an
image of its trees' it turned to stock phrases and the wind lost its
way, and died down. 'City's jagged edges' sounds fine, but 'jagged
edges remembering' is a confusing image.

Remembering You (Ityaadi)

Every night as it passes by
Dreams of you fade away
And I grope in the dark
To keep my fears allay

I get up in the morning
With a clutching pain in the chest
Has the time come so soon?
To lay your memories to rest

When the sun rises in the sky
The birds begin to chirp and fly
I do remember of you my son
You who never let my spirits die

/The grief is crushing. I think it was 'my fears at bay' or 'my fears
allayed'.
'You who never let my spirits die' was a beautiful one-line eulogy.
/

Poem read at the Peace mela (Billi)

doodhwala, paperwala,
gaadi saaf karne wala,
istreewala, kachrawalaa,
raddiwala, baniya, and a neighbour
who wanted to borrow a hammer,
have all insistently pressed the doorbell.

tv is on at full volume
for a partially deaf mother in law
prone to switching wildly
between breaking news and tv yogis
preaching hellfire and damnation.
the never ending banging beating,
remodelling next door has started too.

a wannabe mahinder singh
has shattered another windowpane,
you cannot escape the honking of cars,
and buses and trucks and taxis,
the hawkers who want to be heard
over 'do saada dosa ek chai ek filter coffee'
shouts from the neighbourhood udipi restaurant,
you can even hear the trains
come and go two streets away,

/the rest on Caferati...
/ <http://www.ryze.com/posttopic.php?topicid=894993&confid=1199>
--------
/It sounds like a chant, the urban mantra we live to...

/

Passage (Arka Mukhopadhyay)

You settle in your window-seat,
Dior-coated, burgundy-streaked.

And if I am not wrong, the tag
Says 'Hidesign' on your bag.

The other details also say
'Here is a woman of today.'

Perhaps a fraction too loudly,
With determined effort, proudly.

And yet as the aeroplane slips
Down the tarmac, a finger grips

The locket with its pendant saint,
Your knuckles whitely intent.

--- (the rest on Caferati) ---


Would a woman wear Hidesign with Dior? Why not. Not everyone is dressed in head-to-toe designer. But perhaps that's too real - when you are making a point about what kind of woman she is.
Aside from that (and whether she would wear a pendant saint, which is again an odd choice, of jewellery), the poem's intent is pretty clear, and strongly worded.

Commitment phobic (Sandhya Menon-Koottunkal)

We'll keep deluding ourselves
With birthday and anniversary dinners
Collecting crystal, making love,
Buying pleasure in music and vacations.

And we'll laugh at each others' jokes
Sometimes only because we don't want
Minute-broken hearts or complaints of how
Someone else always "laughs at my jokes".

We'll have children, maybe,
If you're not too old and I, not too fat
And we'll give up smoking and frivilous shopping
So that they can have that
Pony
Holiday
Trip to the moon.

.. (the rest on Caferati on Ryze )
<http://www.ryze.com/posttopic.php?topicid=899527&confid=1199>

Multiple opinions that the title doesn't do justice to what follows, but
I rather prefer it this way. The future of an uneasy union in all its
moments, forcing itself upon a present still undecided. I say undecided
only because the picture of domesticity is still so clear, it obviously
pleases some corner of the mind that dwells on its images, and prefers
not to paint any vision of the alternative at all. It might, after all,
be these images that set out to become real, for they have a plan, they
can see a future, whereas the alternative has no clothes to present
itself in; the alternative is still nothing in itself but a No to the
other.

Back from OZ

No posts for over a month, I was touristing in Australia.

Back and finding a deluge of posts to read...

The Pencil (Transcreation, Vijay Nair)

Confined inside its box,
to an impish sharpener,
the pencil extolled its virtue.
“I am like Saddam. The one,
who faced the noose with a roar.”
Soon arrived Maalu,
the owner of the box.
Into the mouth of the sharpener,
she thrust the pencil, and

Click…!!

Allah-o-Akbar!!
A poem in Malayalam by Abhirami
Translation by Vijay © 23rd July, 2007 on Caferati

Made me smile.

Writerly sites (Rajiv Mudgal)

Good Word processors...

ZOHO WRITER:
AjaxWrite:
ThinkFree:
Liquid Story Binder XE:
PageFour:
Book Writer:
Rough Draft:
Celtx: (the second best after Rough draft)
ClicheFinder:
Dictionary.com:
Rhyming Dictionary:
Roget's Thesaurus:
The Slot:  (Dedicated to the correct usage of words, phrases and grammar in the English language.)

AND HOW (darknite)

AND HOW

And how will you
feel then, when the joy
sets back in
and you're no longer left
to wonder what to do
with what was?
O how you will feel then!

- darknite on Caferati.

I wish I could say how much the size of this poem appeals to me. A single clear thought in just as many words as needed.

In many poems, the words run on long after the thought is over. In my cartoon-obsessed brain, its like Tom chasing Jerry over a cliff and past the edge, continuing to run impossibly on, until mid-air, he looks down and realizes he's run out of ground.

What defines poetry (Caferati exercise)

We hear these often:
"What makes a piece of writing a poem?"
"Those are just prose sentences with weird line breaks."
"I don't know anything about poetry."
"That's really poetic!"
"It's all about self-expression. I write from within my heart."
"I never edit my original poem. That would destroy the sacred words that marked a divine moment."
And so on.

So let's hear it from you. What is poetry to you?

-------------
I have the same take on poetry as art. No one seems to be able to define what art is, nor what poetry is. So we must accept that everything is art - from your kid's crayon masterpiece to Van Gogh. Maybe it's the process that is art, not the end-point. Maybe that's the same with poetry.

But greatness, that is a different matter. I think most people are aware of the distinction between art and great art.
I'm obsessed with greatness. Great art or poetry is very dense in content, that much is for sure. What bothers me about some Caferati poetry is the unbearable lightness. Yet, it is so very very hard to create anything great, one cannot fault them for it.

RUINED (by ssT)

Don’t tell me
what you would have done
or what you’re going to do
It’s what you’re doing now
that holds my interest
I may not know everything about you
but I’ve learned the habits
that keep you occupied
I cross you out like a wrong word
I bang you just to make some noise
Let’s see you dance
to that beat sucker

Love goes on
never pretending to be anything else
Lord deliver us
from people with good intentions
doing things to us for our own good
When is the last time
you saw a strange person
glaring at you from a passing window
& then discovered
it was your own reflection?

Forget all that reflecting
Let’s open ourselves up on the highway
& see what kind of ground we cover
Nothing’s louder than silence
rushing in our ears
or hearing the ocean roar in a sea shell
Birds sing with their lives not their beaks
The less I say
the less trouble I get into
& still I keep talking

Acting in bad faith
is always self defeating
Is the world inhabited by poets
or infested with poetry?
If your love isn’t fast
it will run in the rain
& get ruined
Your love is a thunderstorm
that has ruined me
for any other

ssT (on Caferati)
-----------------------
I suppose "learned the habits that keep you occupied" was where I began to take interest. The interest peaked at "Let's open ourselves up on the highway and see what kind of ground we cover"
But the last para lost some ground. "Your love is a thunderstorm that has ruined me for any other", sounds  to me like a bad pickup line. And yet, someone could say that and really mean it. So, now what?

Caferati on Ryze is now members-only

Until further notice, you can no longer access the posts that I link to, unless you are a member of Ryze.
I am unsure if I can quote entire posts here without violating some Caferati or Ryze rule. So sorry about not being able to read these posts, but Ryze is free to join, and Caferati welcomes new members, so you don't have to miss reading them. You will also find some selected posts at Caferati's blog, which is accessible by all.

The Swansong (Villanelle) /Vyom Prashant

The Swansong...

Mother I hope you do not cry
Remember you said life is a war?
In every battle a few men die

I'd never turned to say goodbye
And in memory of the farewell hour
Mother I hope you do not cry.

continue reading..

What is a Villanelle?

This was a strongly worded one, probably will make you turn misty, as a foregone thing, and you don't even need to be a mother. The only line I felt out of place was "Remember you said life was a war?", It seems the sort of thing a father would say, not a mother. I'm going here by my own mother as reference, of course, and she is the sort of woman who would neither make declarative statements beginning with "Life is" (one-line summaries of life seem frivolous compared to her outlook), nor be in a position to compare anything to war, which she has not experienced. Vyom's reference may be different.

Aesthetics of Loneliness / Ashish Gorde

"...It is a very inspiring article on 'The Spectacles of American Isolation' written by Mark Feeney and was reprinted in the Gulf News' Weekend Review. It's not included in the Review's web edition, and I guess, it could be partly because it's a syndicated article from the New York Times News Service. The main focus of the article is an examination of Edward Hopper's paintings, and how he could be considered to be the Great American Artist. Fenney writes, 'the sources of his popular appeal are obvious enough: immediate accessibility; a subtle yet vivid colour sense; familiar, but not too familiar, subject matter; a fondness for picturesque settings such as New York, Maine and Cape Cod; even a whiff of prurience.' However, he goes on to describe what he feels to be a "Hopperesque" quality, and calls it loneliness. "

I missed reading this because of the recent flood of new posts on the board. But reading Ashish Gorde's essay, in relation to the original article by Mark Feeney at Boston Globe which triggered it, was interesting, because I've always thought the opposite about Hopper's creations, that it was about the healing power of solitude, rather than the pain of loneliness. I call it the elevator consciousness ( a post on this later) - it brings to me that moment when you surface for air from being submerged in a group of people, forced to breathe in their exhaled opinions, purposes and personalities. I'm an extrovert, no sociopath, but I feel no pathos in Hopper, only respite and relief. I feel the transience of the situation.The person reading in the train, or the lonely diner in the highway restaurant is alone, but only in passing. Tomorrow he will reach home and be inescapably among people again.

It could be entirely my take, maybe Hopper did intend for them to portray loneliness imposed, rather than solitude chanced upon, that I tend to read into it. Maybe I find solitude rarer than company, living in a crowded urban scene, and long for the spaces, so American as the article says, where one can breathe free. But I find his other attractive aspect, his matter-of-factness, revealing and supportive of my reading. He does not portray a permanent loneliness, he does not portray tragedy. The people are all placid in their aspect, inward looking, but not mourning. The loneliness seems more located in the space they are in, and the oddness of their position in it, rather than in the person himself, and the person seems acutely aware of his position, but chooses to accept it, because it is not permanent. In this acceptance, a loosening of norms of sociability, in this tendency to revel in the aloneness, rather than seek a superficial conversation with a stranger, a waiter in the restaurant or a fellow passenger, Hopper highlights a moment of self-sufficiency that I have admired all along.

Nursery of Words - Translation (Reshmi Warrier)

I like the Griffin's version below of Reshmi Warrier's translation Nursery of Words..
I have an idea the original must be really good, if even a casual translation sounds fine.
There are a couple of people including Vijay Nair, who do translations and transliterations from their original Malayalam. Their modest promotion of literature from their native tongues is note-worthy, I wish more people would do this.

Casually

Like you would look at your overgrown nails
Like a long forgotten tune remembered without reason
Like a dream you thought you dreamt before

And because there is nothing to restrain the loss of memory

We dig out buried meanings to see if they have sprouted roots.

Song of Job (Maliha Raza)

Maliha's Song of Job is here...

We stride along the shadowed paths
The dappled fall of sun and star
Down the haunted darkling gorge
Up the sunlit cliff and scar

All the demons rise and walk
All the corpses come alive
We meet again in fire and heat
My mourned, my buried pain and I

David Israel's critique of the same is very good. It is rare that someone can get technical and yet be readable, and more than that, make it interesting.

The Tiger's Den (Poem) - Ozymandias

Amidst the jungle’s myriad cries
Beyond the brightness of the skies,
Marked with bones and drying gore
And a fearful dreadful roar
I am the mighty tiger’s den!

Now when men have come to stay
And sow and reap and cry and play,
The roars still echo in the night
And the weak avoid my sight:
I am the awful tiger’s den!

continue...

Do read this one fully.
Usually explanations are unnecessary for what inspired the poem. But in this case, understanding Ozymandias's Waghbil connection was useful.
Aparna

Blurring - Poem (Seekstill)

Blurring around the edges
torn against the night shade
midnight is bluing
into the winter ice moon,
I move between the spaces of my fluidity

continued..

That was well done. Death leads,we follow. Where else can we go?
Aparna

The nights are tough (Rahul Pandita)

Eleven years have passed in this city. Next to where you are breaking your promise of serving breakfast only to me, I remember buying a book from my first salary: Safdar Hashmi - The fifth flame. Life had just begun to explore new theatres of existence. I was raw; I did not know how to cut a slice of pizza. I would lose my way almost every day, thinking South Extension was nearer to Saket than IIT Gate. There were no counters of boiled corn those days; people would eat peanuts while waiting for the bus, warming their hands on a small bonfire lit by a friendly watchman. Very few people had cars those days. The roads were emptier. There were no malls, no Cafe Coffee Days. The lawns of the National School of Drama offered solace to lovers. Holding hands in the darkness of a cinemahall would rid the heart of triglycerides. Mosquitoes would still die from Tortoise coils.

continued..

I liked it immensely. Holding on to memories, painful as they may be and reliving them through a pilgrimage of old haunts.

I found two corrections.
'pilgrimages' has an extra 'm'
Coconut oil on (not in) his head

Aparna

Love letter from Komalavalli - Story in Verse (seekersought)

I used to wear my hair long
and had a permanent beard
then when my lips bore Beatles song
I liked to be seen and heard

My youth drunk in recklessness
nothing felt impossible
I swaggered in casual carelessness
to be unloved seemed improbable

We huddled by parking spaces
talking music, naxalism, poetry
we wore such enigmatic faces
in love with ourselves dearly

continue...

Seekersought, you are a lady of 'many whorls'!
I'd like to use up all the superlatives right now - this was outrageous, fantastic, pure brilliance. This has to be one of the best posts I can remember on this forum (no offense to others, blame my 'benign forgottance'- yes, I'll be using that phrase very often in the next couple weeks :-) )

To borrow your words a bit, (and return them to you a little  dirtied),

I'm
"unwilling to refute
that which roused my blasted mind
was not caffeine, but your Caferati post"

Aparna