Recourse in poetry

Any of us look up to poems in these trying times. Poets, too, are happy when their glorious and succinct words radiate the reader’s life. But while being rendered hopeless due to the virus, the migrant crisis, Imphan cyclone, loss of employment, among others, how have Indian poets made sense of these times through their prose?

“It is hard to concentrate after seeing migrants measure great distances under grave conditions from metros to their hometowns,” says noted poet and translator, K Satchidanandan. “It was dreadful that many lost their lives. I have written three poems on migrants’ crisis and three reflecting obliquely on our present times. Along with this, I have translated Kabir’s poetry. Given his spiritual secular ideas, Kabir is the need of the hour,” he says.

Satchidanandan is also editing an anthology with US-based writer Nishi Chawla, to be published by Penguin Random House later this year. The anthology includes 400 poems by over 100 poets worldwide, depicting many moods as observed by the poets during this pandemic. “I am editing the anthology to keep myself and my poetry alive at this point. It is called Singing in the Dark Times, the title taken by a German theatre practitioner and poet Bertolt Brecht’s poem Motto,” he says. 

Elizabeth Kuruvilla, Executive Editor, Ebury Publishing & Vintage Publishing, Penguin Random House, calls this anthology a poetic response to the lockdown. “The loneliness, the togetherness, the silences and the fact that we now have to learn to re-enter society – readers will turn to poetry to understand the deep impact the pandemic has left on us. This kind of poetry is making its way on to platforms like Instagram too,” says Kuruvilla.

Similarly, Ratio Auream Publishers LLP launched its debut poetry collection, Isolocation, having 44 poems by nine poets about their reflections on the pandemic. Nirav Mehta, who co-edited the anthology with Ishmeet Nagpal says, “Themes such as feminism, family, love, mental health, and the current socio-political climate will be found in it.”

Disoriented by the times

Well-known poet Manohar Shetty, has written six poems on the pandemic for his upcoming book, Borderlines. He shares one poem with The Morning Standard, titled The New Untouchables

An excerpt:
The days tick past in slow motion,
The times not ripe for hugs and kisses,
For back-slapping celebrations.
The deserted streets are like
A war zone though no sirens
Signal the all-clear, the enemy

Shetty says, “One poem led to another. It doesn’t usually happen, but the gravity of the situation and the immediacy of it, and the worldwide ramifications led me to write something about it.”

On the other hand, Delhi-based poet Sabika Abbas Naqvi finds the emotional exhaustion overpowering.
“I have written a lot of poems during this pandemic. A number of themes have emerged in my writing, such as resistance poetry, love, ideas of touch, and how society has changed. The lockdown has given a lot of space for introspection. Sometimes, it required a lot of energy to complete the poems. So, I have a number of incomplete poems as well.”

Sonnet Mondal, a Kolkata-based poet and editor, has completed 15 poems and has many incomplete ones just like Naqvi, since March. Mondal says, “I feel there is a wall in front of me, blocking me. I used to attend many poetry festivals across the world, where a number of ideas were shared. But poetry has also offered me a certain respite and has helped me pass this time well. I feel the pandemic has unmasked our pitiable faces and my forthcoming book is on the situations around us now.”