Nikita Parik
Caked in mud
caged in faith
prayers keep me alive
108 names but
I recognize none
(“Devi 2.0”)
The binaries of personal and public must be subverted when seemingly personal concerns voiced through personal expressions transcend to achieve a universality of sorts. In her debut poetry book, Apostrophe, Barnali Ray Shukla’s versification of seemingly...
Writa Bhattacharjee
Fantasy fiction is one of the fastest growing genres in Indian popular culture today. Spurred by access to international books and media, as well as the rise of a new breed of authors, fantasy has been rising in popularity over the last couple of decades. But what exactly...
They Won’t Forget to Pray
(verses in response to “So Long Marianne”)
In the night,
you asked for silence
to speak to angels
for Marianne, for Marianne.
You opened your lips
and dry as they were still breathed
the confession of stillness.
Darkness approached as you addressed
love in its trembling thoughts.
I can’t hear your voice.
It is quiet and...
Civil Guardsmen
From a field of grasses dried
by wind, two civil guardsmen stare
toward the sun for traffic
on the lonely road
they have been stationed to protect.
They are tall
against the burnt horizon,
still as the ground itself,
and one is the reflection of the other
as, side by side, they stand
in place. Should one
turn around,...
Debasis Tripathy
He had lost interest in life. His life had turned into one like those countless chickens in poultry farms, just that unlike the chicken he had the capability as a human being to end his life by his own will. There were many a time when he had...
Terry Sanville
1.
On Friday morning, Dad took Shasta, our shorthaired terrier with a white-tipped tail, to the vet. I didn’t even know the poor dog was sick. At seven, I didn’t understand illness and suffering. But my older sister, Betty, seemed to know. She waited with me in the living...
Mitchell Krockmalnik Grabois
An airless pink balloon rested in the Ash tree by the lake all Spring. Every day I walked by it and wondered when a gust of wind would unseat it, but it was tenacious. I once saw a short Mexican man peering at it, as if he...
Deepayan Bhattacharjee
I hate the coffee they serve at Starbucks. But I like one of the baristas in our local shop. So I go to that terrible coffee shop almost every evening, stay there for two to three hours, read a little and study for a while and write some...
Paperback: 86 pages
Publisher: Five Oaks Press (August 13, 2017)
Language: English
Price: $14.00
ISBN-10: 1944355367
ISBN-13: 978-1944355364
Reviewed by: Pramila Tripathi
The Temple She Became by Rachel Custer is the poet’s debut book, consisting 61 poems. Going through her poems will present the readers before a world of her time spent in Indiana, which she...
SCAR
The love byte is a frozen ripple
seeking the other shore
just as the curve
seeks the circle,
the curly hair seeks the halo
encircling the head.
May be because raw effort is
prettier than the outcome,
sun fondles the dark underbelly
of the forest, floods it with light
only for darkness to regrow
like waiting.
Humans remain banks with the
turbulence...
GRANDFATHER
You remember more of what is no more.
Past steps into your bedroom and your grandson
becomes your newly born. You love to address
him as Baba – this is how you called your first born.
The present blurred and faceless has no challenges
for you. Your face perks up and breaks into...
Publisher: Dhauli Books (2018)
ISBN-10: 8193604741
ISBN-13: 978-8193604748
Price: 350 INR
Reviewed by:Koushik Sen
The first thing that would catch your eye while you leaf through the pages of this book is the sharp, post-apocalyptic images that have been ruthlessly painted by the poet with a dash of his uncanny wit. When you read...