Literary Vibes - Edition CXXVII (31-Mar-2023) - POEMS & Book Reviews
Title : Cherryblossom (Picture courtesy Ms. Latha Prem Sakya)
Prof. Latha Prem Sakya a poet, painter and a retired Professor of English, has published three books of poetry. MEMORY RAIN (2008), NATURE AT MY DOOR STEP (2011) - an experimental blend, of poems, reflections and paintings ,VERNAL STROKE (2015 ) a collection of all her poems. Her poems were published in journals like IJPCL, Quest, and in e magazines like Indian Rumination, Spark, Muse India, Enchanting Verses international, Spill words etc. She has been anthologized in Roots and Wings (2011), Ripples of Peace ( 2018), Complexion Based Discrimination ( 2018), Tranquil Muse (2018) and The Current (2019). She is member of various poetic groups like Poetry Chain, India poetry Circle and Aksharasthree - The Literary woman, World Peace and Harmony)
Dear Readers,
I have great pleasure in presenting to you the 127th edition of LiteraryVibes. It is as beautiful as a rainbow with multiple colours, resonating with the voice of many-splendoured talent. There are soft and sweet rhythms of childhood from poets as young as seven years, and reverberating echoes from many seasoned poets of international acclaim. What more could one dream of in a month hosting the International Poetry Day on 21st March! Entertaining short stories, some of them stunningly beautiful, add to the lustre of the edition. The essays and anecdotes provide a veneer of seriousness to make it shine like a polished gem. I have no doubt you will enjoy the offerings and refer the eMagazine to your numerous friends and contacts.
This month LiteraryVibes experienced a miracle of sorts. In the last week of January Shri Pradeep Biswal, a celebrity poet and a regular contributor to our eMagazine had hosted the Toshali Literary Festival in Bhubaneswar, drawing more than a hundred poets and writers from all over India. The crowning attraction was an interactive session with the ninety two years old poet extraordinaire Prof. Jayanta Mohapatra, a legend and a pioneer in Indo-Anglican Poetry. It was sheer magic listening to his impassioned plea for enriching literature. I was present for a few sessions and interacted with a number of poets and writers, some of them big names in the literary firmament of India.
A fortnight back I posted a message in the Toshali LitFest group inviting the members to send their poems and stories for LV127. Shri Biswal, true to his role as a coordinator, urged the members to do so. And lo and behold, there was an avalanche of writings from poets and writers. So this month we are proud to host as many as twenty nine new contributors from various parts of India. Ms. Mandakini Bhattacharya, Ms Rajashree Mohapatra, Ms. Sarita Naik, Ms. Gayatree G. Lahon, Ms. Sujata Dash, Dr. Ratan Ghosh, Ms. Parnassus Aparna, Ms. Isha Bharadwaj, Dr. Sukanti Mohapatra, Ms. Naheed Akhtar, Ms. Pankhuri Sinha, Mr. Gopal Lahiri, Ms. Anjali Sahoo, Ms. Rachita Swain, Shri Bipin Patsani, Shri Aneek Chatterjee, Ambassador Arun Sahu, Ms. Manjula Asthana Mahanti, Ms. Lopamudra Mishra, Ms. Diptorekha Das, Shri Soumen Roy, Shri Parashuram Rao Gande, Ms. Tandra Mishra, Ms. Leena Thampi, Shri Bhagaban Jayasingh, Dr. Vidyutprabha Gantayat, Shri Aravind Bhatikar, Ms. Amita Ray, Shri Bibhudatta Sahoo - are all known faces in the literary world, their writings appearing in many magazines and journals in India and abroad. As the biodata at the end of their articles will reveal, most of them have won awards which will make any literary group proud. We at LiteraryVibes are indeed privileged to host them in our eMagazine. We welcome them to the LV family and hope to get their contributions in all our future editions.
On International Poetry Day I had the opportunity to enjoy many offerings from poets all over the world. Many of them are seized of some of the burning problems of the day, such as environmental pollution, overcrowding of the earth, violence against women and many other disturbing issues. Poets and writers, like journalists, are the conscience keepers of mankind. While we wish more powers to their pen, one cannot overlook that the predominant themes in most writings is Love and Loss - Love that seeps into the heart and fills it with a sense of contentment. And Loss that breaks the heart and makes it ache in pain.
Everyone knows poems and short stories are born in mind and take shape when they are eager to come out and assume the shape of emotional outpourings. Even when ChatGPT becomes an existential reality, human mind will still fill emotional stirrings and would want to express itself. And as the saying goes, where the poet stops, the poem begins, the poem asks only that the poet get out of the way!
International Poetry Day reminded me, yet again, that love and loss have been the eternal favourites of poets, perhaps because love is where life begins and loss is where it ends. Although Indian literature is rich with love poetry from the days of Kalidasa, early English poetry from around the time of Shakespeare in the seventeenth century celebrated the theme with the Bard's Sonnet 16 (1609),
"Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove........"
John Dunne through the famous Scottish song A Red, Red, Rose (1794) immortalised his love with the lines,
O my Luve is like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June;
O my Luve is like the melody
That’s sweetly played in tune.
So fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a’ the seas gang dry.
Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi’ the sun;
I will love thee still, my dear,
While the sands o’ life shall run.
And fare thee weel, my only luve!
And fare thee weel awhile!
And I will come again, my luve,
Though it were ten thousand mile.
Love and loss took a philosophical hue in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's "The Bridge" (1820)
Yet whenever I cross the river
On its bridge with wooden piers,
Like the odor of brine from the ocean
Comes the thought of other years.
And I think how many thousands
Of care-encumbered men,
Each bearing his burden of sorrow,
Have crossed the bridge since then.
I see the long procession
Still passing to and fro,
The young heart hot and restless,
And the old subdued and slow!
And forever and forever,
As long as the river flows,
As long as the heart has passions,
As long as life has woes;
The moon and its broken reflection
And its shadows shall appear,
As the symbol of love in heaven,
And its wavering image here
But who could have captured loss more poignantly than Edna St. Vincent Millay?
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply,
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in the winter stands the lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
(1920)
Love still flows strong in the poetic heart through the passage of time. It reigns over the world of emotions like a king of eternal fiefdom. The world has passed through multiple wars, devastations, natural calamities, man-made disasters and inscrutable epidemics, yet love has prevailed over everything:
Sitting next
to you
is like taking
a sip
of eternity,
the sun, the stars,
the sky, never
tasted so good.
Christy Ann Martine - A Canadian Poet (2014)
But love is not a mere exchange of lyrical feelings between two living beings. Literature also captures love in its multi-dimensional aspects. In wider terms love can encompass various objects of attachment, the real and the ethereal and loss can cover a wide spectrum, the visible and the invisible. Life's wonder consists of overcoming loss and looking forward to love - the love that fulfils and enriches the very essence of living. One is reminded of a wonderful story relating to Franz Kafka, the celebrated writer and exponent of existentialism:
At 40, Franz Kafka (1883-1924), who never married and had no children, walked through the park in Berlin when he met a girl who was crying because she had lost her favourite doll. She and Kafka searched for the doll unsuccessfully.
Kafka told her to meet him there the next day and they would come back to look for her.
The next day, when they had not yet found the doll, Kafka gave the girl a letter "written" by the doll saying "please don't cry. I took a trip to see the world. I will write to you about my adventures."
Thus began a story which continued until the end of Kafka's life.
During their meetings, Kafka read the letters of the doll carefully written with adventures and conversations that the girl found adorable.
Finally, Kafka brought back the doll (he bought one) that had returned to Berlin.
"It doesn't look like my doll at all," said the girl.
Kafka handed her another letter in which the doll wrote: "my travels have changed me." the little girl hugged the new doll and brought the doll with her to her happy home.
A year later Kafka died.
Many years later, the now-adult girl found a letter inside the doll. In the tiny letter signed by Kafka it was written:
"Everything you love will probably be lost, but in the end, love will return in another way."
.......................................
So, the true philosophy of life is to embrace the change. It's inevitable for growth. Together we all can shift pain into wonder and love, but it is up to us to consciously and intentionally create that connection. That in essence is the task bestowed on poets and writers. We are special, we have been chosen by God to create magic, to weave dreams, to establish the connection between fantasy and reality, between loss and love - so as to make the world a better living place.
Here is to wish all of you, dear readers, love returning again and again in multiple colours, tones and splendour to make your life a story of utter joy and fulfilment. Hopefully LV127 will be a part of that joyful journey. In today's edition I have included a story of mine which captures love and loss in a way that will celebrate the spirit of true literature. There are many more pieces of creative wonder in this edition by celebrated poets and writers which will leave you in awe. Do share the edition with all your friends and contacts through the following links:
https://positivevibes.today/article/newsview/480 (Poems)
https://positivevibes.today/article/newsview/479 (Short Stories, Anecdotes)
https://positivevibes.today/article/newsview/478 (Young Magic)
There is also a medical related article by the prolific Gynaecologist Dr. Ganagadhar Sahoo at
https://positivevibes.today/article/newsview/477
Take care and enjoy.
We will meet again in the last week of April with the 128th edition of LiteraryVibes.
Mrutyunjay Sarangi
Editor, LiteraryVibes
Friday, the 31st March, 2023
Table of Contents :: POEMS
01) Prabhanjan K. Mishra
THE MONSOON IN MUMBAI AGAIN (For Adil Jussawalla)
02) Haraprasad Das
DVAPARA
03) Dilip Mohapatra
AMALGAMATION
ASYMPTOTIC
04) Bibhu Padhi
THE ICU WAIT
05) Abani Udgata
PRAYING TOGETHER
06) Mandakini Bhattacherya
MY NAME IS ROSE
07) Rajashree Mohapatra
YESTERDAY ...
08) Sarita Naik
KINDNESS
09) Gayatree G Lahon
BLISS
10) Sujata Dash
HYPNOTIC LURE
11) Dr. Ratan Ghosh
A PIECE OF FLESH
12) Parnassus Aparna
PRESERVING THE INNER CHILD
ONE FAVOURITE THING!
13) Isha Bharadwaj
REFUGEE No. 317960
OUT OF PLACE
14) Sukanti Mohapatra
MY SONG
AND I DID NOT WAIT
WORDS
15) Naheed Akhtar
SOLILOQUY
16) Pankhuri Sinha
SERDICA METRO STATION
17) Gopal Lahiri
YOU, ME, AND PALASH
MAKAIBARI
18) Anjali Sahoo
WAR
19) Rachita Swain
GOING WITH THE FLOW BOTHERS HER
20) Bipin Patsani
THE UNWANTED, UNWARRANTED
THE BRAVE LIVE BEYOND GRAVE
HOLDING THE EARTH ON NOSE
21) Aneek Chatterjee
CHOREOGRAPHY
22) Ambassador Arun Sahu
DISCOVERY
23) Manjula Asthana Mahanti
IF...
24) Lopamudra Mishra
WHEN I LOOK AT YOU
25) Diptirekha Das
THE FORGOTTEN SPRING
26) Soumen Roy
O'TOMORROW
27) Parashuram Rao Gande
DAUGHTER IS AN ANGEL
28) Dr Bidyutprabha Gantayat
THE ASSAULT
29) Tandra Mishra
THY WARM WAVES
30) Leena Thampi
INK FROM MY SOUL
31) Bhagaban Jayasingh
THE DAY I HANG UP MY BOOTS
32) Pradeep Biswal
LOLITA
33) Meena Mishra
IN SEARCH OF PEACE
34) Prof. Dr. Sidhartha Das
DESERT PANORAMA
THE STREET DOG
35) Hema Ravi
LET’S WALK THE PATH TOGETHER…..
36) Madhumathi. H
BE MY LIGHT...
37) Gita Bharath
MOMENTOUS MOMENT
38) Padmini Janardhanan
WOMEN'S DAY?
39) Ravi Rangnathan
AND THE FLOWER SPOKE GENTLY.
40) Akanksha Murali
RAINY NIGHTS
41) Jairam Seshadri
EVERYWOMAN
42) Pradeep Rath
THINKING
43) Setaluri Padmavathi
FRIENDSHIP
PASSION OR POSITION
44) Snehaprava Das
INTIMATE MOMENT
45) Arpita Priyadarsini
THE EPILOGUE OF HURT
46) Rekha Mohanty
FOOT PRINTS OF A BRAVE HEART
47) Seetha Sethuraman
PUPPETS ON STRINGS
48) Professor Niranjan Barik
WHISPERS !
49) Sumitra Kumar
THE OWLS NIGHT
50) Vidhya Anand
OPERA IN SYNC
51) Dr. Sudipta Mishra
A DEEP SECRET
52) Surendra Nagaraju
THE ENCHANTMENT
MORNING’S EFFULGENCE
53) Sukanya Kunju
RIVER
54) Mrutyunjay Sarangi
POINT OF NO RETURN
Table of Contents :: BOOK REVIEW
01) Hema Ravi
Journey through Mosaic of Life by N. Meera Raghavendra Rao
02) Dr. Sudipta Mishra
RED LOTUS OF BLUE LAKE & YOGI GOBINDACHANDRA by Prof Harihar Mishra
Table of Contents :: SHORT STORIES & ANECDOTES
01) Iti Samanta
THE COUPLE
02) Prabhanjan K. Mishra
KRISHNA AND HIS UNCLE KANS
03) Sreekumar Ezhuththaani
TEAR JERKERS
04) Chinmayee Barik
MONSOON WEDDING
05) Ishwar Pati
THE WAR THAT WAS
06) Shri Aravind Bhatikar
KARMANNYE … YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW
07) Dr. Sukanti Mohapatra
MAYA
08) Amita Ray
ENGLISH MEDIUM
09) Bibhudutta Sahoo
NEVER ENDING WAITING
10) Sujata Dash
THE RAVISHING RAINBOW AND THE COCKTAIL OF MEMORIES
11) Dr. Molly Joseph
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY 2023
12) Dr. Paramita Mukherjee Mullick
THE MANGO SHOWER
13) Gourang Charan Roul
A PEEP INTO MARITIME HISTORY OF PURI
14) Prof (Dr) Viyatprajna Acharya
ABANDONING THE APSARAS
15) Sumitra Kumar
IS CHATGPT MAKING YOU QUEASY?
16) Nikhil M Kurien
UNICORN
17) Ruchi Pritam
THE LITTLE BROWN GIRL
18) Dr. Sudipta Mishra
A SOJOURN TO THE SPIRITUAL PATH
19) Nitish Nivedan Barik
A LEAF FROM HISTORY : ABOUT A MAN OF THE EARTH
20) Ashok Kumar Ray
LIFE
21) Mrutyunjay Sarangi
A PRISONER OF DREAMS
Table of Contents :: YOUNG MAGIC
01) G . Saratha Kamakshi
MOON
02) G . Shyamala Kamakshi
STAR
03) Ashmanth Anand
PERFECT TUNES
04) Trishna Sahoo
ALBIDA CLASS SIX
THE MONSOON IN MUMBAI AGAIN (For Adil Jussawalla)
The monsoon has checked in again,
the city drapes itself in swathes of green,
local trains keep halting and sighing,
tracks gone under-water.
The city women
save their dignity from prying wetness,
playing hide and seek from showers,
shying away from oglers.
At Marine Drive, the sea dances.
Kalaghoda, the Artists’ Center,
and Jahangir Art Gallery
go crazy with jealousy
at the mystique of the garden
behind David Sassoon Library in the rain.
At the Gateway of India, lovers feast
on steaming hugs.
A dog, tail tucked in, soaked to the skin,
walks to its slum shelter.
A homeless mother with her child
huddles under a bus-stop-roof,
their hunger whetted by the mean wind
wafting the aroma of fries and tea.
The dog snarls at another wet pariah.
The mother slaps her bawling baby.
Prabhanjan K. Mishra is a poet/ story writer/translator/literary critic, living in Mumbai, India. The publishers - Rupa & Co. and Allied Publishers Pvt Ltd have published his three books of poems – VIGIL (1993), LIPS OF A CANYON (2000), and LITMUS (2005). His poems have been widely anthologized in fourteen different volumes of anthology by publishers, such as – Rupa & Co, Virgo Publication, Penguin Books, Adhayan Publishers and Distributors, Panchabati Publications, Authorspress, Poetrywala, Prakriti Foundation, Hidden Book Press, Penguin Ananda, Sahitya Akademi etc. over the period spanning over 1993 to 2020. Awards won - Vineet Gupta Memorial Poetry Award, JIWE Poetry Prize. Former president of Poetry Circle (Mumbai), former editor of this poet-association’s poetry journal POIESIS. He edited a book of short stories by the iconic Odia writer in English translation – FROM THE MASTER’s LOOM, VINTAGE STORIES OF FAKIRMOHAN SENAPATI. He is widely published in literary magazines; lately in Kavya Bharati, Literary Vibes, Our Poetry Archives (OPA) and Spillwords.
(Translated by Prabhanjan K. Mishra)
If you have no knowledge
of how the divine couple
spent the night
by Yamuna in their lush arbor,
their bower lit by only a star’s glow,
an excuse for light.
If you are not privy to the lust
that dragged them
into the amorous
land of ecstasy,
then, steel your heart
to hear the truth.
It was nothing less or more
than the ubiquitous game
played in the secret garden
of flesh, just the pretence was divine.
Neither a wrap was spared,
nor the fig leaf; not the unabated
flow of sweat and spit,
until they won the promised land.
The flying of sacred flags
atop their holy shrines,
is a ploy for the blind believers,
much ado about nothing.
It is rather the wounded time
hanging on the crucifix of a suspect saga.
Its arrow, having hit a wrong target,
lie blunted, thrashing in pain.
Mr. Hara Prasad Das is one of the greatest poets in Odiya literature. He is also an essayist and columnist. Mr. Das, has twelve works of poetry, four of prose, three translations and one piece of fiction to his credit. He is a retired civil servant and has served various UN bodies as an expert.
He is a recipient of numerous awards and recognitions including Kalinga Literary Award (2017), Moortidevi Award(2013), Gangadhar Meher Award (2008), Kendra Sahitya Akademi Award (1999) and Sarala Award (2008)”
In the dampness of your eyes
resides my moist desire.
In the flames of your sighs
lies the bonfire of my hunger.
In the silence of your smile
resonates my effervescence.
In the ashes of your longing
that simmer under your skin
the embers of my passion
turn into stardust.
You follow in a trance
the tranquil scent
of dead stones
jutting out of the damp walls
of the tunnel
that leads through
the musty mosaic of moss
to the silent bones
that protrude out of
the parched
and shrivelled skins
scattered around the swamp
and take a deep breath
to smell the flowers
floating on the black waves
of hennaed hair
and that have perished
in their sleep
before undergoing an elaborate
enfleurage.
Your olfactory receptors
on over drive,
you try to crack the codes
of the chords
whether head heart or base
and separate out the notes
to differentiate
the orange blossoms
from rosemary or musk
the cinnamon
from clove or lime
and dissect
each element of odorant
to its minutest details
trying to educe in vain
your very own
absolute scent
and isolate
your very own
signature essence.
Dilip Mohapatra, a decorated Navy Veteran from Pune, India is a well acclaimed poet and author in contemporary English. His poems regularly appear in many literary journals and anthologies worldwide. He has six poetry collections, two non-fictions and a short story collection to his credit. He is a regular contributor to Literary Vibes. He has been awarded the prestigious Naji Naaman Literary Awards for 2020 for complete work. The society has also granted him the honorary title of 'Member of Maison Naaman pour la Culture'. His website may be accessed at dilipmohapatra.com.
The breath comes and goes.
From a space that encloses you inside
the larger spaces of anxious minds.
You breathe in the air as if
life were only lungs and air
and your effort to correlate both.
Listen. The water in the bottle
works itself up in bubbles, settles,
and then it is bubbling again.
Take your long hands off
the bed-side and take deep breaths.
Don’t panic. Wait. Be calm and listen.
Take your ear near the place where
the heart is or supposed to be, and listen.
Listen carefully. You hear the beats?
The big and the small?
Can you see the slow
rise and fall of the chest?
The breath staggers in and out.
Comprehend the fingers closing in
in an effort to counter our
embarrassment of waiting,
accepting the long pauses
in their natural order.
Again, listen. The water shows
very little sign of being disturbed;
Only a thin layer of unevenness
plays harmlessly above its surface
in modest circles, disappearing into
the bottle’s resting air.
The birds whisper into his ears
stories of angels in disguise,
of withdrawal and return,
their small wings flapping
in supportive play, their beaks
stroking his young dark hair.
Leave the old to their own fate and long life;
they shall understand the clarity of things
in their own slow way, in due time.
They have lived exiled in the best of times.
They will leave the rooms, crying.
Let them cry like children,
for earth’s quickly vanishing
forms, the budded lives.
That is how it ends, then begins.
Listen to my breath. See how it comes
and goes even now, without effort.
Only, less visibly than that of the old man
who left his young son because he didn’t know
how to take care of his last, loud breaths.
First appeared in Chest (Official Journal of the American College of Chest Physicians).
Bibhu Padhi's most recent magazine acceptances include The Reed Magazine, Evening Street Review, New Contrast, The Dalhousie Review, Agenda, The New Humanist, and The Times Literary Supplement. He lives in Bhubaneswar with his family. His next book of poems, This Damp House, will be out in July-2023.
We lay crouched before
the deliverer of moments.
Another mass on bare floor
perhaps washed ashore
after a shipwreck, a man or woman.
Though strangers our breaths
are familiar to each other, and lips
coated with the taste of similar ashes .
Inhaled long-residing smell of camphor,
of dried flowers and sacred syllables.
Air and sunshine waited outside.
Moments we lived inside out, tested
the bodies on the floor, and often
sent them here to the sacred stones.
As we rise on our hunches eyes closed
the flicker of the lamp spray- paints us,
question marks swaying on the canvas
of stone ceiling cracked, porous, brittle.
Away, far away, a weak sun holds
no firm assurance to flesh out
the contours of our prayer.
Abani Udgata lives in Bhubaneswar. Writes poems both in English and Odia. Udgata has been awarded in all-India poetry competitions and published in anthologies. He has been a regular contributor to LV. Email: abaniudgata@gmail.com
you and I both bled,
hammering nails into a
copybook romance.
fresh blood spilt everywhere
in disguise; on the bed, the
window sill, the books.
in the morning
the maid swept away the
red rose petals, wonderingly.
Mandakini Bhattacherya, from Kolkata, is Associate Professor of English and a multi-lingual poet, literary critic and translator. She has her own Poetry Page on the Dallas, USA-based Mad Swirl Magazine. She participated in the All India Young Writers’ Meet organised by Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi in February, 2020, and delivered a talk there on Short Fiction in 2021. She edited the international short story anthology ‘The Mixed Fare’ in 2021, and is Associate Editor of the ‘Muse of Now Paradigm’ anthology (AuthorsPress, 2020). Her latest publication, appearing from Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi (2022) is the joint translation ‘A Life Uprooted : A Bengali Dalit Refugee Remembers’. She was awarded the Philosophique Poetica International Achievement Award ‘Master of the Word’ at the World Poetry Conference, Bathinda, Punjab, in 2019. She is Joint Secretary of Proyas, a women’s NGO in Kolkata.
Yesterday , you were there,
We were too much closer than lovers
Now we are prepared to say
Good Bye' to each other
Seemed , our voice was equivocally choked.
The clouds
Crowding the sky
Ready to rain to wash out our footprints
At the entrance door .
And the dusk prepares
To gather round our home
Where love is frozen by this time
In an lonely atmosphere.
Life appears insentient with
In the tangled dry leaves
Our garden will remain inanimated
Till the next spring .
You said,
Once the love is over ,
We are strangers
Who cares what was our past,
And what comes tomorrow ...
Rajashree Mohapatra: Born in Odisha in India has received her masters degree in ' History ' and 'Journalism and Mass Communication' from Utkal University, Odisha .She is a teacher by profession. Being a post graduate in ' Environmental Education and Industrial Waste Management ' from Sambalpur University Odisha , she has devoted herself as a Social Activist for the cause of social justice, Environmental issues and human rights in remote areas through Non-governmental organisations. Poetry ,Painting and Journalism are her passions .
Life is not a battlefield
Peace runs through our heart.
Life can be a struggle
A prepectual night,
But the sun won’t rise quicker
If we choose to fight.
So let’s down our weapons
And open our arms,
Because a safe heaven
Of kindness and calm,
Life need not be a battle.
Where we merely survive,
We want to stay in peace,
We should live it while we are alive.
Sarita Naik is a prominent budding poet who works as a lecturer in English at Pipli College, Puri. She is a writer, poet, dancer and singer by passion. She is a Gold Medalist in M.phil from GMU (Gangadhar Meher University). She writes poetry in three languages - English, Odia and Hindi. Mrs. Naik is the editor of a literary Journal named “ Srujanika “ in Odiya. She has been appreciated by multiple national and international literary circles.
Drifting like a frisky cloud
Hovering over the freakish wind
Fluttering with your poems of rain
Enraptured by the hidden music
I turn into droplets of rain
And fall on you....
Making you drenched with the love of rain
Sweetening the petals of heart
Soothing all corners in fresh rhapsody
Melting effusively drop by drop !
Hailing from Assam , Gayatree G Lahon is a teacher by profession and a poet by passion. She is a post graduate in English literature from Gauhati University .She is closely akin to nature and her poems delineate her feelings beautifully. Being a true aesthete, she finds beauty in every aspect of life and nature and her ink pours those elements in a subtle way .Even the complexities of life compel her to scribble in her own way. Her poems have been published in various anthologies and magazines, both in India and abroad.
Etched in the sands of perpetuity
time's presence piles upon
our days and nights
It's hypnotic lure
makes us hold our breaths
our indulgences reach another height
as we traverse in our timeless sojourn
countless tiring falls
Interspersed with sparkling shores
some enriching weaves of affection and love
make our sinking spirits soar higher
clinging tenaciously
to the hem of positivity
mending broken dreams
diffusing devious plots with alacrity
we march on at the behest of supreme’s calling
such is the power of time!
It makes and mars things
quells twinges of panic
by spilling aura of bliss
time has its timings
Its way of dealing with situations and things
healing scars and maladies
we need to wait patiently
for our turn
till harsh blows soften
once things are set right
the aroma of subtleties
will flap its wings.
Sujata Dash is a poet from Bhubaneswar, Odisha. She is a retired banker. She has three published poetry anthologies (More than Mere - a bunch of poems, Riot of Hues and Eternal Rhythm by Authorspress) to her credit. She is a singer,avid lover of nature. She regularly contributes to anthologies worldwide.
Though from my cord you are everyday born
But alas...!
I read, reread and regret alone!
Since all are fed from the Biblical scriptures such deadly venom
From a piece of flesh why was I born?
Ever twisting, tormenting and troubling my brain cells and bones
Forever telling me the tales of my own
I am piece of flesh that was torn
Alas!
From a man's bone...!
Oh Almighty, the designer of hell!
What ignited you to make me thy tale?
Was that your treason or fanciful will?
How long will you drown me under thy man made grills?
I am a woman of his breast cells…!
Oh almighty, the designer of hell!
Years, decades and centuries passed in thy deadly jail
Burning burning burning in the garden of spell
Oh almighty, the designer of hell!
How could you be so unkind and cruel?
Oh almighty, the designer of hell!
Can you tell me why I was dragged in thy fanciful hell ?
Who tempted you to dash me with such mortal shell?
Still I am living in thy arid airless Jail...
Oh almighty, the designer of hell!
Why was I born of the flesh of man?
Ha ha ha! I guess you too were insane then
To make me a bait of thy evil plan
Only to bury me with my helpless clan
Though from my cord now all Adams are planned
Yea, all Adams from my cord only are planned
Yea, all Adams from my cord only are planned
But I am a helpless woman!
But I am a helpless woman!
Living in thy den….
Dr. Ratan Ghosh (PhD) India is an Indian poet, Editor of international Journal ‘The Mirror of Time (ISSN-2320-012X), Novelist and Short Story writer. His poems have been featured in many International E- journals, Journals and paper back anthologies across the globe. His published books are MY LOVE, THE WEEPING SOUL, QUOTABLE QUOTES, BRA AND OTHER TALES. His edited books are GENDER DISPARITY SUNUP, CASCADE, NOSTALGIA and CONTEMPORARY WORLD ENGLISH POETRY
Little, lovely, bubbly girl
Happier was she
Ignorant about
Devious world
Hurt by sly foxes
Innocent as a calf
She longed for love
Virtues tested
Chided and criticised
She grieved
Yet never lost hope
Betrayals and loses
Taught ways of the world
Still she preserved
The inner child within
She believed in goodness
And tried to spread love
With every passing day
She strongly believed
For one day
The world will turn
Into an abode of love!
I feel to tread gently on this earth
I would love to shed all my worries
Concerns and expectations
I would love to drop
All little things that bother me
Like a people who don’t
Reciprocate your smile with eye contact
Let them be grim
May be they are unhappy
And not in a state to smile
People who misunderstand my actions
And never want to hear
May be they have own assumptions
And are fixed to it
And have no time to listen
Sometimes even the favourite ritual
Of getting dressed up
Seems to be a great task
Feel like shedding those colourful
Earrings, bangles and trinkets
And live light!
How one favourite thing
Becomes a burden
With passing time!
Aparna is a poet, writer, academic and a lover of literature. “Speck of a Soul" was her first published anthology of poems in 2019. Her poems have also been published in several anthologies of repute. She coauthored and published “Painting Dreams" - yet another anthology of poems in 2020. She was the Editor of “Metamorphosis”, a book devoted to Art and Poetry.
Asian Literary Society conferred “Poet of the Year Award” on her in the year 2022. She received “Poet of the year” award from Ukiyoto Publishing House in the year 2022. She was awarded the “Best Poet - Editor’s choice” by Spectrum Awards in May 2021. Her poem *Saviour’s Destiny* was long-listed for IPR Annual Award 2020.
The Altrusa international Madras club on the occasion of Women's day (March,2020) awarded her for her service in the field of education and writing. Her latest collection “Snippets of the Soul”(2021) is a book of quotes. Aparna lives in Chennai, with her tag line,” She lives a life of Poetry”.
“No-one leaves home unless
Home becomes the mouth of a shark.
You only run for the border
When you see the whole city running as well.”
Hello. This is refugee numbered 317960
And this is my story!
My home? Shell-bombed.
My city? Turned into a heap of
Debris and rubbles.
My people? Hunted, maimed and killed
All in broad daylight.
And I? I ran. I hid. I escaped
I somehow survived !
When my home turned into
A blackhole of memories,
When my ammi and abbu were shot
Right before my eyes,
When I had to muffle myself in order to survive
Lie about my name, my identity just to be safe
Spends days and nights in the back of truck Trying to escape,
Walk around barefoot, all bloodied and soiled
Quenching my thirst and hunger pangs with Thrown half-eaten food off the bin
When I crawled, scrambled and ran to escape My home, my country
When I landed in your country
With an unknown anthem in my breath
No identity, no name, no country and no home
Into an unfamiliar place, among unfamiliar people, speaking unfamiliar language
With a promise of food to eat, clothes to wear,
A roof to stay and a safe haven to breathe.
I thought I will now be okay.
But when men who looked like my father approached me,
When the airport itself humiliated me
When the camps served inhumane living conditions
I understood, Your government did accept me. But you never did.
You call me dirty immigrant,
Asylum seeker, Savages and rampant,
Sucking our country dry,
Messed up their own country and now is messing with ours.
My dear friend, let me tell you
I never wanted this.
I too had a home, a family and a dignified life.
And I trusted my country to keep me safe and secured.
But this game of politics and power knows
no humanity
One who was once a familiar face,
today holds a gun as a toy.
The protectors of my nation have turned into terrorists who run the government.
The world turns blind to money and fame.
I adopted your language, your culture, your style
Just trying to be a part of a community, again
Trying to have a life, again.
Yet, you call me Syrian, Afghan, Rohingya, Somalis, Kashmiris
But at the end of the day, I call myself
Refugee numbered 317960.
At the end of the garden
Atop a green lustrous apple tree
Sits a crow, judging and deciding.
Quite an owl it seems.
People inside a jungle it says,
And out of place.
A Barbie in the hands of a boy it sees,
And out of place.
Women asking for an equal pay, leaving their child at home?
Prisoners demanding for a humane condition?
A lion befriending a rabbit?
Oh, what has the world become?
So much out of place.
All while craftfully hatching a Koel's egg,
With so much love.
Isha Bharadwaj is a poet devoted to English literature. For her, poetry is all but a form of emotion that renders the voice of the society. True to her thoughts, her poems speak for themselves, impelling the world to be a better place.
Many of her originals have been published in various national and international magazines. For her love for Odia Literature and with an aim to present its richness to the world, she has penned down Sandcastle, a translated collection of poems, from Odia to English. Another collection of her original poems is soon going to hit the stands. She can be reached at ishabharadwaj08@gmail.com.
A solid block of ice started melting inside me
when the rays of a new sun rose up
in the corner of my mind
in the present's brightness
an illumined love spread its wings and
a distant flute attracted my attention
with vibes of renewed joy
earth sang to its tune
and waves danced.
Somewhere close to me
someone whispered
that perennial truth
which was withdrawn
from a thinking self's cunning
observation and
from duality's eternal confusion
life opened its secret doors
with a single knock of destiny
that presented me a gift sublime
I rejoiced in my new-found joy
I cherished the desire
that asked for nothing.
From a distance I heard his flute
Calling my name day in and night
The tune was enticing, the call urgent
I felt a churning in my heart and I did not wait.
And I did not wait for the wheel of time
To roll a past for me to create a present
I didn’t wait for the moon to wink either
As I see an inviting smile in a star afar.
And I did not wait for the silent night
I set out then following his call on flute
There he stood under the azure sky
Where a brimming Yamuna wistfully lays.
And I didn’t wait until my limbs bleed
My senses numb with a strange fatigue
Slowly and slowly I let it happen
Even death bowed when love won.
Words engulf me
in abysmal depth of time
flowing from day to night.
evening to morning.
Words sweet and acrid
soft and rough
of command, of demand
lucid and obscure.
With their swift wings
they beat my nerves
activate my dormant self
to action.
I run here I run there
I receive words and return words
soaked in feelings or dry humour
they bind me
to people, to hearts
far and near.
Words trick me
into believing things
ornamental, bejeweled words
I cling to them
with my cherished hope
with sweet dreams
and with my life's savings.
Words caress my hurt spirits
my desolate self
soothe my aching heart
with balmy feelings
and give me company
till I climb the mountain of silence
and spread myself like air
every time, everywhere.
Dr. Sukanti Mohapatra, works as a Senior Lecturer in English at Charampa Mahavidyalaya, Bhadrak, Odisha. She has contributed poems to many national and international anthologies. "Life at a Glimpse" is her best known book. Her guiding principle is: "I have a sky inside myself where I fly at my will"
The new version of me
An endless soliloquy
How dull, weird;
It is to my own ear
And the naked firmament
Lost twinkling permanent
And my particles alone
Sit hopeless and groan
My speeches abundant
Peered with prayers blunt
Laid at the sea shore
The weeping eyes bore
Naheed Akhtar is an Assistant Professor of English, a Writer and Poet based in the city of Hyderabad, the Southern part of the country. . She has three poetry collections to her credit, titled 'Phantasms of My Heart' 'The Earth's Love' and 'The Morphine'. She has received the honorary awards for three consecutive years 2020, 2021 and 2022, a combined initiative of the State Government of Gujarat and Motivational Strips, on the eve of India's 74th, 75th and 76th Independence Day respectively titled "Gujrat Sahitya Academy Award.". ..She has recently been awarded the Higher Distinction Honorary Doctorate (PhD) in the field of humanity and social work.
She has participated in various literary festivals. Her third book 'The Morphine' has been launched in the National Kolkata Book Fair on the invitation of the Sahitya Academy and the department of Culture and Language in association with the Gvernment of West Bengal. Her poems have been published in various National and International Magazines. She also writes in Urdu and she has been participating in Mushairas at different parts of India. She has been awarded Certificates of Participations at there events. She can be reached at naheedakhtar123119@gmail.com.
Walking amidst the remains of Serdica
An age passes by quietly, almost
Till absolute order descends over extreme chaos
Time freezes or not hard to say
But Athena comes riding
Her chariot, patrolling her territory
Spinning and weaving threads of peace
And just as the cuckoon, readies to rest
Ares's arrows pierce the warmth
And once the glass breaks
It just breaks and breaks !
Mars joins too! Time is not
A fresco but a melting pot
Roman legions stand guard
Not even Cleopatra can diffuse the stand off!
Aphrodite and Venus
Nymphs and goddesses try together!
But once begun, the war is a brutal sport !
And not just for athletes!
Generals and Colonels, Marshals and Captains
On horses and on foot, Survey the land
And the map! Oh! Weapons and weapons
Escalate the war ! But have you seen
Paintings depicting the end? Retreating armies
Death around, the stench of blood!
Peace treaties are brutal too!
But look there glimmers an ancient
Agreement, in stones ! Age old writing
On stone columns, 30 years peace contract
Between kingdoms of Bulgaria and Byzantine !
Dear Athena, Call Apollo ! This world
Needs healing! Spinning around! Looking for time!
There isn't any! The metro 's here! Before you board
Strech your arms and hold !
Athena's gone but she is here!
Sveta Sofia still smiles ! A bird in hand !
Turn around, embrace the glory and beauty of life!
The train leaves but come again to Serdica
And post peace letters to all you can!
Pankhuri Sinha is a bilingual Indian poet and writer with ten books published, many lined up. She has won many prestigious, national-international awards, including Premio Galateo and Cittadel Galateo in Italy, and has been published in journals and anthologies, home and abroad. She has been translated in over twenty seven languages.
Into the light they go, the wise and the lovely.
They are gone to color the Palash in spring,
The sparrows are half-skipping on the courtyard.
A fragment of what you feel, what you know about
an alphabet, a phrase remains
to translate the shaky block letters,
More precious is your eyes, the light within,
then the Palash,
forbid me from departing,
Gently they go, the tender, the kind, the caring,
down, down, down,
for the edge, so depleting and so free,
Quietly they go, the witty, the brave, the shiny,
but our eternal matches remain strong,
You, me, and Palash.
I walk around the Makabari Tea Estate
puddles of slush, the tea bush, the mist
roll into a dusty painting,
the wind blows the message around
and the garden falls silent,
lush foliage hides the old wound of the workers.
The monastery is perched at an elevation
uphill road winds through market,
frescoes on the wall capture
religious texts and votive objects,
ahead each curve on the path, brings new sights,
all metaphors scale new heights.
Amidst sunlight and faint coldness, the narrow path
opens into a valley.
flutter everywhere, flowers spilling out of branches
in an orange light- yellow, mauve, scarlet,
the bird tweets- Let there be light
the forested hills calculate their steepness.
I feel I can turn to anyone in a new time, in a new cadence.
Gopal Lahiri is a Kolkata based bilingual poet, editor, critic and translator. He has published his poems in both English and Bengali language. He has authored 29 books (19 in English and 10 in Bengali) which includes three solo edited collections of English poetry on Jallianwala Bagh, translations of Tagore songs, Voices Within, and jointly edited collections of English poetry on Indo-American Anthology, Scaling Heights, Home Anthology and Poetry Conclave Anthology. His translation work (From English to Bengali) of short stories of Israel was published by National Book Trust.
His poetry is also published in various anthologies and in eminent journals of India and abroad. His poems have been translated in 16 languages. He has been nominated for Pushcart Prize for poetry in 2021. He is the recipient of the Poet of the Year Award in Destiny Poets, UK, 2016, Setu Excellence Award, 2020, Pittsburgh, US. His latest collection of poems ‘Alleys are Filled with Future Alphabets.’ has received Pan Asian Ukiyoto awards.
A talk began with a girl,
Since we smiled at each other
On a road we happened to share!
‘What do you go on thinking and what is that in your hand?’ I asked.
She turned her little eyes towards me and asked,
‘Do you know what a really war is!’
I wondered wordlessly.
Still we trundled down the street,
With a blank sky in mind
Suddenly she showed me her sketch of a cart
With thousands burning dreams together…
With the title “WAR’’
And left me in teary eyes
I started sketching a world of imported grief
From the war-torn land
Pounding my un-sketched self inside!!
Anjali Sahoo writes poems both in English and Odia. Her first poetry book A Tryst with Thunder (2021), published by Authors Press, New Delhi, sheds light upon manifold aspects of life. They take the readers to the world of imaginative vibrancy, unearthing hidden mysteries of the world. Her published works include three poetry books and two short stories collections in Odia.
GOING WITH THE FLOW BOTHERS HER
Flailing her arms,
The canal flowed in a rage,
Swallowing the fences of shacks,
Beside the banks,
Bobbing up and down
As the rustic kid’s head
In a class, unbothered by
What he understood—
The flow persists
Carrying corpses
Murdered out of jealous squabbles,
Identified by none.
Rushing with gusto
When the gates open
The canal flowed in a fury,
Overpowering steps of the banks
Surging in little waves
As a teacher’s voice
Unbothered by what he teaches
And, what he swallows—
The flow persists
Promising a big fish
Murdered by tense, wobbling nets
Claimed by none.
Rachita Swain is pursuing her PhD degree in English at Ravenshaw University. She is passionate about reading books, and aspires to be a conscious writer from the unconscious subtleties of life.
Her articles and book reviews have been published in local e-journals; the book reviews are posted in a U.S. based journal, Jaggery Lit. and Singapore based journal, KITAAB. Kabita Live published her poem recently.
That which is wrong is wrong.
That which is imposing and an attempt
to impair the dignity of others
by aggressive behaviour and deeds,
that which makes mankind scared and wretched,
that which reduces living to just exist
in utter helplessness and despair,
is wrong and disastrous.
Those who terrorize people in the neighborhood
and enforce the horrors of war,
destroying life and peace in any part of the world
leading to unwanted exodus, must be condemned.
When siblings of different tastes and chemistry
refuse to live together and drift apart,
it is ridiculous to imagine in our greed
a much bigger world for us, expanding
the area of our ego, trying to reverse history.
Stop playing the bloody game of divisive nature
that makes our thinking narrow.
Aggressive nationalism maybe appealing in a film
and satisfy our ego.
The need of the hour is a visionary world leader
who would stand steadfast for peace and harmony,
not just one who feels great, one who feels safe
to be seen close to a power centre
that would enhance his image and ensure
his return as an all-time superhero.
(An excerpt from a long poem)
Bipin Patsani
The brave, not scared of graves,
live beyond and awaken us
in their arousing inspiring waves.
************
Pity be to them
who far from being honest and alert,
ready to raise their voice whenever they see
human values subside
and injustice prevailing everywhere around,
they boast only of their racial bravery in the past
and feel great, while all kinds of exploitation
and nuisance run free under their nose
by their own people and most often
with the patronage of those whom they choose.
Be it of home or foreign,
no rule, no colour in name of national honour
be allowed to make people so much handicapped,
that helpless, they would take things for granted
and embrace little favours
with their gloomy dispassionate applause.
Pigs in a barn claim to be
the most intelligent creatures
and they affirm
they only have the right to rule
as in Orwell’s Animal Farm.
So, they continue to enjoy their time
and misadventures at the prime.
They don’t miss the opportunity
of showing up and exhibiting
their funny pedantry
in history, literature,
science, religion and culture
of the country
to impress the audience and win
the majority of swine support,
distorting thereby everything,
facts, fiction, myths
and even nomenclature.
They mock at everything rational
and see terrorism
in all intellectual activities,
prohibiting, discouraging
such service, sparing only
goons and sycophants.
They put behind bars
whosoever they suspect.
Their dogs chase out
critics and opponents
from their model resort
as did Napoleon get rid of
Snowball from their soil.
They foresee deluge and doom
if they won't be there at the helm.
So, they believe, it is only them
who matter and thus they pose,
they bear the burden of the Earth
at the tip of their nose.
Bipin Patsani (b. 1951) has published poems in many prestigious journals and poetry anthologies including Indian Literature, Chandrabhaga, Journal of Indian Writing in English, Indian Scholar, Kavya Bharati, Poetcrit, International Poetry and Prophetic Voices etc. He has been translated to Spanish and Portuguese. He has three poetry collections to his credit (VOICE OF THE VALLEY, ANOTHER VOYAGE and HOMECOMING). He is a recipient of Michael Madhusudan Academy Award/ 1996 and Rock Pebbles National Award in 2018. He did his Post Graduation in English at Ravenshaw College, Cuttack in 1975 and served as a teacher in Arunachal Pradesh for 34 years till his superannuation in 2012. He also received Arunachal Pradesh State Government’s Award in 2002 for his dedicated service as a teacher. He lives with his family at Barunei Colony, Badatota in Khordha District of Odisha, India.
This long corridor leading to the open lawn
has small squarish gaps, for oxygen and for
viewing the green.
Few minutes ago,
you took a guest to the lawn.
I saw you two loitering on the green.
And I fixed my gaze through
a squarish gap. Suddenly, oxygen stopped
as I saw you both dancing hand in hand, on the lawn.
Finally, you saw the guest off; came back
and told me you had a choreography practice
for the next dance show.
I realized that our existence,
daily sojourn up and down, are nothing
but unplanned choreography.
Aneek Chatterjee is a poet and academic from Kolkata, India. He has published more than five hundred poems in reputed literary magazines and poetry anthologies across the globe. He authored 16 books including four poetry collections titled, “Seaside Myopia” (Cyberwit, 2018), “Unborn Poems and Yellow Prison” (Cyberwit, 2019), “Of Ashes and Persiflage” (Hawakal, 2020) and “Archive Avenue” (Cyberwit, 2022). He also co-edited the “Poetry Conclave Year Book 2022” (Authors Press). Chatterjee has a PhD. in International Relations; and he has been teaching in leading Indian and foreign universities. He was a Fulbright Visiting faculty at the University of Virginia, USA and a recipient of the prestigious ICCR Chair (Govt. of India) to teach abroad. His poetry has been archived at Yale University. He can be reached at: akchatjee@gmail.com
I don’t call anyone
No one calls me
Not found on social media
Neither in a social gathering;
Marriage, anniversary or award ceremony,
Success party, nor disaster mourning.
“Anything wrong?”
You had asked.
On the path that I stride
Intertwined are life’s crack and time,
No urge to mend or patch.
Simple are the rules
No sound, fury or hurry,
Neither vengeance nor regrets;
No judgement, guilt or shame.
Nothing wrong, dear mine,
You can see,
In this stormy night,
I am with you, by your side.
Arun Sahu is a diplomat and a writer. He was India’s High Commissioner to Trinidad and Tobago, India’s Deputy High Commissioner to Canada and Deputy Director General of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR). He served as a Board Member on the US-India Educational Foundation and the Canada-India Centre for Excellence in Science, Technology Trade and Policy at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. As a diplomat, he has served in Indian Embassies in Beijing, London, Tehran and Ottawa.
He writes poems, fiction and non-fiction in English and Odia. His recent publication is “Trinidad and Tobago: A Diplomat’s Cultural Expedition”. His previous publications are Iguana and Other Poems, Shunyara Shantulana (Balance of Zero), Jajabarara Jatra (A Mandarin’s Journey), Chira Malata (The Torn Cover) and Akashara Luha (Tears of the Sky).
At present in Delhi as Joint Secretary (Central Europe), Ministry of External Affairs.
Life is an interesting journey
Even if not, make it palatable
You have got everything,give pleasure luxuries,
Even if not, be contented with whatever you have
You recieve immense love, care
Even if not, love yourself at the top
What is the need of worldly appreciation
Be happy as you are a 'Man' in true sense
Not only good, route also can be fascinating
Even if not, make the path playful besides loving target
Your life is not monotonous
If yes, change your life style, be creative
You have extremely strong will power
Even if not, recoup your esteem, confidence
You have got one life only, most precious
Can't let it go wasted, live joyously, fruitfully
You have multiple colors, bright & beautiful, around
Yet White is prominent, dominates
As it denotes Love & Peace
Most adorable, desired by everyone,
If you don't have it, practice to be satisfied
Peace is a Utopion dream without checks,
Expectations arise antsy, misery
Even if you don't have, it's not late
May be dusk, but you are not done yet,
Remember the bare truth
'Even the wealthiest person of the world
Is not the happiest one '
Manjula Asthana Mahanti is a post graduate in Sociology and Hindi. Her Graduation was in English honors. She is a Sangeet Prabhakar (vocal) and has done her B. Ed. She worked in a college as Senior Lecturer. Her last assignment was that of a high school Principal. She lives in Forest Park, Bhubaneshwar, Odisha, India.
She is a published trilingual poet, author, editor, translator and story teller. She has eight collections to her credit along with a long list of participation in national, international anthologies, e-magazines, etc. She is a recipient of several national, international awards, Samman Gujarat and Telangana sahitya akademy award amongst many more. Her recent award was "Icons of Asia"
I really don’t know how to judge the things
I come across
I really don’t have the perfect blend of words
To express my expression
At times,
When I swim with bounty of thoughts in my head
Then I look at the sky
I see the stary night, concealed milky way and the limitless horizon
I feel free and see freedom
When I see the dirt in the road ,I feel my wound has renewed
After brooding for an hour,
I seek breakthrough
When I look at the ocean
I find like me hundreds crossing the roaring waves
Every minute and second
I dream of serenity
and then,
When I look at you
I see everything I wanted to see
I feel everything I desired to feel
I experience calmness
A divine aura immersing me to non-entity.
Lopamudra Mishra, a contemporary poet, author, translator and editor, hails from Bhubaneswar, Odisha. Her writings are intended to touch the inner chord softly by emphasizing on "Sense and Sensibility" of attachment and bonding. She has six books till date in her name- “Rhyme of Rain”, “First Rain”,” Tingling Parables”, “Rivulet of Emotions” and “Red Tulips” . Her sixth book, “Hurricane Heart under the Honeyed Sky” is on the way. Her poems have been published in various magazines and anthologies. She has been Editor of Radical Rhythm-4 & Co-editor of Radical Rhythm Series and Durga.
She is an alumnus of Sailabala Women’s College and Ravenshaw University, Cuttack.
Spring !
The king of the seasons.
The blooming earth
The exuberance of budding youth and radiant love.
Serene, sublime, soothing breeze’s tour
Vistas of verdure just post winter
Nowhere to be found now.
Perhaps it is in slumber.
A season so close to everyone’s heart
The aromatic wind and the happiest song of the larks.
No longer in existence
Almost disappeared now.
It’s only the feeling of hot summer just post winter.
Once used to be solely the spring tour.
Probably the vengeance of mother nature
That now we’re experiencing the extreme climatic disorders.
Scorching summer during pour seasons and heavy rains in winters.
A big lesson to the irresponsible human behaviour
That now nothing can be taken for granted
Neither the seasons nor our world.
The paramount urgency of protecting the climate should be our top task of the hour.
A wish…
Let again the spring comes alive beyond just our poetic lines.
And not to be remembered as “the forgotten spring”.
Diptirekha is from Bhubaneswar, Odisha. She is a postgraduate in Economics. Also an active blogger & a bilingual poetess writing both in English & Odia language. She has contributed towards many anthologies in form of poems & articles. Her passion is literature. She loves literature in its varied forms. She has also written a few articles addressing women oriented issues in various social platforms.
Searching a better tomorrow
Some pearls shined in the corners of my eye
Igniting a candle, I travel here and there in the darkness
Don't know why?
If tomorrow never comes, will my tears bid a final goodbye
Nobody will come to know the saga of pain oozing from my eye!
Will my wait shrink forever, with all its hopes?
Had poetry bid me its final goodbye!
Will the world ever remember with the glory I have left in some alleys?
Don't know why this thought tortures me so much
Suddenly comes a gusty wind and kisses me deep within my soul
Said everything is material, and I smiled to its light
A solitary reaper reaping and singing the sonorous melodies
And I remained perplexed and charmed,
Walking with my smile all alone
Soumen Roy is a professional writer, best selling author and a tri-lingual poet. He has been vasty anthologized. His novel and poetry books have been part of International Kolkata Book Fair as well as Newtown book fair. He is the receiptent of Laureate Award 2022 along with many others. His poetry has been a part of international poetry festival 2017 and Panaroma international Literature festival 2023. He has published in different newspapers, magazines and web portals. He has been part of a web series named Showstopperzz, a cinema for a cause. He loves photography, painting and music.
Daughter is an adorable angel
Daughter always shines like the
Moon in the dark sky full of stars
Daughter is a symbol of love
Daughter is a symbol of hope
Never undermine your daughter
She brings glory to you and your family
You know her value when she is sent off
After her marriage
Your eyes are filled with tears
She sheds pearls of tears uncontrollable
Provide her opportunities
She proves her mettle.
Daughters are as powerful as sons
They can fly planes high
They can drive trains far
They can fight enemies on the border
They can be engineers and build
Bridges across rivers
They can save human life as doctors
Let us love them, and in return be loved.
ParashuramRao Gande is the Former Head,Dept of English,SRR Govt Arts& Science College Autonomous Karimnager(TS).He is the uthor of two poetry books entitled " Pebbles in the Pranahitha", and " The Sound of the Surging Waves".He is the recipient of three awards Enchanting Muse Award,Radhaballabh Roy Memorial Literary Honour-2022,and Poiesis Award of Honour(Jury Award).He contributed poems to Sixty International Anthologies.
You are a female
Being woman is your biggest blunder
A wicked breeze can blow past your dignity, for no reason
For no reason instigate them to crush and demolish the pillars of your gait and glory
Past innumerable eras and ages, years
Days and nights
A blanket of brutality, A cloud of iceberg. A murderous shadow of black desire chasing you
As if your own shadow
May you be three years or
seventy three
A mishap in every three seconds is your destiny
You are no sinner, no ugly scar on your being human
You are no
magnet attracting, inviting ugly tooth and nail to shred you apart in to a pool of blood and pain
You are a female, half the population of this wonderful creation.
Animal kingdom never discriminate where human dares!
Alas! They don't grant this right and respect at any cost!
One female, many loopholes!
One male, many escape routes!
Professor Dr Bidyutprabha Gantayat is a well known and acclaimed writer, poet and translator of odia literature. She belongs to Odisha, lives in Bhubaneswar. A retired professor in chemistry by profesion. She writes in Odia, Hindi and English and translates to and fro in four languages namely Odia Hindi English and Bengali.
She also pens childrens literature. She has published 18 books on all the above category of literature to her credit. Among her significant literary work the translation of Gyanpeeth awardee Mohadevi Verna's poems, short stories and essays form Hindi to Odia and published books. Since 2014 she regularly publishes The Japanese format of English poetry ( haiku poetry ) in different poetry groups of social media worldwide. Published and earned accolades.
She has also been honoured and felicitated by different litrary organizations of the state.
Everyday You come at my door.
Everyday I see you lying on my floor.
Thy warm waves splash on me, make me wet,
Help me all scratches to forget.
Everyday Thy presence makes me glee,
Without wings, without feathers Gives me vibes to flee.
Everyday in corner of my room you enter stealthily.
And remain long to whisper something silly.
As the nights pass,
you go away slowly.
To touch you,
becomes a dream only.
You go far far away
But why never good-byes you say?
Why never good-byes you say?
Tandra Mishra is a poet from Raiganj,West Bengal, eastern part of India. She is an honours graduate and post graduate in English. She has been writing poems since her childhood. Many of her poems have been published in online websites, print magazines and anthologies. Some of her famous works are "Oh Lady!", "I, A Female Foetus", "A Heavenly Gift", "No More War, Please" etc.
She is a published author. Her first poetry book's title is 'Oh Father!'. She is a member of World Nations Writers' Union. She has received an award from FUREC, which was launched by our former President Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam. She writes on social issues, specially about women's empowerment. Her ironical and satirical works advocate peace and corruption free society.
I woke up from a maze dream, pulled by conflicting covet.
Nothing is ME,Mundane says
Who I should be and who I am meant to be.
This is my final awakening call
inviting my soul and breath, to meet the fragrance of myself,
In the dawn of effervescence
Wet encounters,enlightening conversations an ultimate detour to self discovery .
Despite being hit by the breeze, the beautiful flowers never cease to love the zephyr deeply.
Some flowers are like that ... they neither need spring to bloom nor winter to wither
Will the cut petals crackle again...?
They leave a sweet fluidity of ecstasy perfumed in the lap of silence
Everything that fell was destined to fall,except integrity and pride.
Wilting poppies wail within my irises,
Symbolising the eternal life of the soul,
flicker of fireflies in the evening spreads rays of hope.
If only we supported each other
If only we knew our faults
Maybe then we’d love one another
Maybe then we’d stop the mud slinging and assault.
Feel the beat, come together
Express yourself and learn the language of the soul.
Soul speaks through Books, Nature,Rain,Music and Art
Solitude and silence,
synchronicities and signs,
random connections, and thoughts that flit through the mind.
Born in Jammu and brought up in Delhi ,Leena Thampi is an articulate writer who's lost in her own little epiphanies and she gives them life with her quill. She's an author extraordinaire with three books to her credit -"Rhythms of a Heart", "Autumn Blaze" and An Allusion To Time'. She has many articles published in India and abroad. She has received many elite accolades from different literary platforms worldwide.
She has been awarded by Gujarat Sahitya Academy and Motivational Strips twice for her best contribution towards literature in the year 2021 and 2022.She was also the recipient of Rabindranath Tagore Memorial literary honours 2022 by Motivational Strips. Her work mixes luminous writing, magical realism, myths, and the hard truths of everyday life. Besides her flair for writing and deep-rooted love for music, she is an Entrepreneur,Dancer,and a Relationship coach She is currently working on her fifth book which is a collection of short stories.
THE DAY I HANG UP MY BOOTS
Dr. Bhagaban Jayasingh
No more do I have to bend
my head in sheer subservience
before the king and call him
the maker of my destiny
emperor of my sick love and sins.
In the crowd of crazy cowards
I do not have to stand any more
with folded hands for a living
and pretend to honour
the direful devilry of his whims.
Now I am the king, the monarch,
the imperator of my impulses
the sovereign ruler of my world
till shivering I fall to the ground
by the axe of a fraudulent crank.
Hereafter I have to laugh
in the teeth of your passion
coax your blood in the night without moon
tame the wild beasts of your lust
through the half-forgetful lines
of our sacred texts.
I know: hereafter I have to
spin my own cocoon,
reglue my broken foot
forgive my unrequited love
enjoy pampered lyrics on dead lips
that once sang my story of
love to the blood moon.
I am free now, yes, free as the wind
that soughs through the spring leaves
My world looks bright as
the wild hyacinths on the lake
I am happy that I am to hang up my boots
today in the afternoon
when I am not still not ready to die.
Dr. Bhagaban Jayasingh, an eminent bilingual writer, has published 9 collections of poetry in Odia and 8 in English and English translation. Black Eagle Books has brought out The Dapples of Darkness, a collection of his poetry and Footprints of Fire, a translation of seventy-four contemporary Odia poets. Dr Jayasingh has also published Door to Despair, a critical work on modernism in Odia poetry. He edited an anthology titled 7950 Parabarti Odia Poetry for Sahitya Akademi. Sahitya Akademi has also published Sitakant Mahapatra: A Reader in 2021, selected and edited by him.
Dr Jayasingh has received a flurry of literary awards, including Vishub "Jhankar", Bhanuiji Rao Kavita Puraskar, besides Utkal Sahitya Samaj Samman and Odisha Sahitya Akademi award for his book Ferranti Ghar in 2016.
She’s handsome
In her tender age
Smarting pink skin
A petite face
Curly hair
Bright blue eyes
Leafy eyelashes
Voluptuous hips
Ripe bust
And the spring
Dimpled on her cheek
She’s like a fluffy flowering bush
In the forbidden garden
She came silently
And conquered
In a hilarious moment.
The world’s at her feet
She’s the princess
In exile now
Sitting cross legged
Pinging pebbles
At the shores
And singing a sweet song
She could hide
The troublesome days
Under her shoes.
She sat beside me
On the window sit
In the flight
And looked bewildered
At the mountains of clouds
Under the crimson sky
She imagined to dive into it
To collect the dolls
She liked most
But she’s the cutest doll
Ever I have seen
Her luscious fingers
Once touched mine
The sky dissolved slowly
On its own
Hardly it matters
Who chose whom
Surely a lavish afternoon
Waiting for us
Behind the curtains.
Mr. Pradeep Biswal is a bilingual poet writing both in Odia and English. His poems are widely anthologized. He is also an editor and translator of repute. A retired IAS Officer, Mr. Biswal presently holds the position of Member, Odisha Real Estate Regulatory Authority and stays with his family at Bhubaneswar. Views are Personal
IN SEARCH OF PEACE
Meena Mishra
I kept on moving from one prison to another,
For years and years and had no strength to move further.
I started doubting myself, losing all hope,
As if there was no way out, absolutely no scope.
Ruminating over my own condition,
I almost forgot to participate in the conversation.
Until brought back to senses by the strong touch of the jailer,
We had almost reached the unreachable cellar.
How traumatized was I at the sight of the carcass!
Was that a horrendous painting on the canvas ?
The unexpected click of the key opening the oxidized lock,
Brought a stir in the painting and it began to flock.
Moved the silhouette, flagging and limping,
Mumbling in a voice flimsy and quaking quavering.
How shaken was I at her condition!
Observing her moth-eaten clothes, her chiselled face and blood flecked eyes.
I notified her how much for her, the humanity cries.
With her contorted, rheumatic fingers, she held my hands.
Just have a look at me, my son and tell me today, where do I stand?
MEENA MISHRA is an out of -the box-thinker, inspiring hundreds of students, teachers and working professionals across the world, turn into published writers and poets. She is an award-winning author, poet, short-story writer, social worker, novelist, editor, an educator and a publisher. The Impish Lass Publishing House is her brainchild. Her poems, stories and book-reviews have been published in many international journals and magazines.
She is the recipient of several prestigious awards. She is an active member of Mumbai English Educators’ Team and was invited by the Education Department of Maharashtra to be a part of The Review Committee for the new English text book. She has been working as the International Coordinator for British Council activities for more than 10 years. She has been invited as a judge for several literary competitions and lit fests including the Lit fest of IIT Bombay and NM college fest. Her poems are published in many magazines, including the prestigious periodical Woman’s Era. She has been a contributing author and poet for more than 100 books. Her books include- The Impish Lass, Emociones Infinitas , Within The Cocoon of Love and The Impish Lass Book 2.
Caravan moves in the desert road,
Colourful canopies covering their hoods .
Camel is mesmerised in the morning beauty,
Raises his head with love and gaiety.
Admiring the panorama from sky to ground,
The 'ship of the desert' looks around.
The head held high in the desert wide,
Invigorates the trailers on their stride.
Blue and crimson hue of the sky,
Beholds the mind of the owner sitting by.
Vast fields of sand all around,
Mingles with the sky at the horizon.
Desert may be ruthless boiling hot in summer ,
May be bones chilling cold in winter.
The panoramas it offers to weary eyes,
Is but the magnificent gift of nature wise.
It spreads the message of victory through toil,
To people and youngsters eager to rise.
Tar coated road guides the caravan,
In the barren desert as if guardian.
Awestruck are all, gazing the celestial beauty,
Amazing painting by the brush of Divinity.
Be it the dry herbless desert of Thar,
Caravan of progress will never stop.
Tricolour adoring the colourful canopy,
Reverberates the message of happiness and prosperity.
How I came to this street,my memory doesn't know.
As a puppy, rushed to hide with sounds or when horns blow.
Nooks and corners of deserted buildings made our home.
Mother fed and nurtured we sibs all alone.
She taught us to bark and demarcate our zone.
We ran for food, as we grew, from door to door.
Life taught us tricks of dangers and survival.
Many sibs didn't follow and lost under racing tyres.
Prudently I grew in the domain of my own.
Time toughened my sinew and made me grown.
I guard my domain, all through the night.
Perch for a nap on parked rickshaw seat.
Neither rains nor winter scare me a least,
With cohorts, bark off intruders at dead of night.
In the day I am the monarch of my domain,
Be it a wall or heap of sand, rise on it as the sovereign.
Prof. Dr. Sidhartha Das is a renowned Medicine Specialist and Diabetologist of Odisha. He retired as Principal of the SCB Medical College, Cuttack. He is a recipient of many awards including Life Times Contribution Award (2014), Madras Diabetes Research Foundation, Life Time Achievement Award (2019), Research Trust of Diabetes India, Distinguished Services Award (2019), Research Society for Study of Diabetes in India. He has been, among other things, the Chairman of the Association of Physicians in India, Odisha Branch (2011) and Vice President, Diabetes India, and a Medical Expert for the Odisha Human Roghts Commission (2010-19). He lives in Cuttack and is passionate about literature, reading and writing poems and anecdotal stories.
LET’S WALK THE PATH TOGETHER…..
(Picture Coutsey N. Ravi)
A pious princess – one-pointed devotion to the Lord!
Fearlessly, she disregarded conventions and norms.
A chaste woman fought injustice in the King’s Court
for the spouse who deserted her; soon, came back to her.
Another 'sati' brought her husband back
from the abode of 'Yama.'
'Chudikodutha Sudarkodi' – this damsel adorned
the garland, and then, offered it to her Beloved.
Choosing her husband in 'swayamvara'
she followed him like a shadow into the
dense forests of Dandaka, was abducted,
and rescued by her husband with the help of vanaras;
to prove her purity and be accepted again,
she underwent 'agni pariksha.'
Such archetypal women are my role models.
However, do recognize that
I have emotions, preferences and prejudices,
I can empathize, walk hand in hand with you,
be reasonable and just; tolerate and accept,
on occasions, agree to disagree…
Hobbies, I will continue to enjoy,
with friends I'd like to hang out occasionally;
as I strive to know you better,
be your companion, and walk alongside
Will you take seven steps with me?
Hema Ravi is a poet, author, reviewer, editor (Efflorescence), independent researcher and resource person for language development courses... Her writings have been featured in several online and international print journals, notable among them being Metverse Muse, Amaravati Poetic Prism, International Writers Journal (USA), Culture and Quest (ISISAR), Setu Bilingual, INNSAEI journal and Science Shore Magazine. Her write ups and poems have won prizes in competitions.
She is the recipient of the Distinguished Writer International Award for excellence in Literature for securing the ninth place in the 7th Bharat Award, conducted by www.poesisonline.com. In addition, she has been awarded a ‘Certificate of Appreciation’ for her literary contributions by the Gujarat Sahitya Academy and Motivational Strips on the occasion of the 74th Independence Day (2020) and again. conferred with the ‘Order of Shakespeare Medal’ for her writing merit conforming to global standards.(2021). She is the recipient of cash prizes from the Pratilipi group, having secured the fourth place in the Radio Romeo Contest (2021), the sixth place in the Retelling of Fairy Tales (2021), the first prize in the Word Cloud competition (2020) and in the Children’s Day Special Contest (2020). She scripted, edited, and presented radio lessons on the Kalpakkam Community Radio titled 'Everyday English with Hema,' (2020) a series of lessons for learners to hone their language skills. Science Shore Magazine has been featuring her visual audios titled ‘English Errors of Indian Students.’
A brief stint in the Central Government, then as a teacher of English and Hindi for over two decades, Hema Ravi is currently freelancer for IELTS and Communicative English. With students ranging from 4 to 70, Hema is at ease with any age group, pursues her career and passion with great ease and comfort. As the Secretary of the Chennai Poets’ Circle, Chennai, she empowers the young and the not so young to unleash their creative potential efficiently.
Half of her, surrenders
Half of her, coils up
You watch both the plays
With your, omniscient smil
And
Opaque silence
That confuses the tiny atom...
Pain in the roots, never allows
Peaceful blossoming
Not all flowers are fortunate
To gracefully kiiss the earth
And taste the raindrops
Or embrace the shadow
Before they shrink
Some are slain by the storm
While they are buds...
Oh Cosmic dancer!
Can you please pause
Kindly speak!
Let your voice flow
Slap her, and let that sound
Be the song
In her desolation
Scold her, and let your anger
Water her hopes
That
There is someone directing
Meticulously planning
Her tears
Fears
And
How she sheds them
Unfriending "what ifs"
Breaks
Shatters
Slowly gathers
And
Rises again
Like your favourite child.
A bilingual poet-writer(Tamil, English), Madhumathi. H is an ardent lover of Nature, Poetry, Photography, Music. Her poems are published in Anthologies of The Poetry Society(India), CPC- Chennai Poetry Circle's EFFLORESCENCE, IPC's(India Poetry Circle) Madras Hues Myriad Views, Amaravati Poetic Prism 2015, and in e-zines UGC approved Muse India, IWJ - International Writers Journal, Positive Vibes - LiteraryVibes, Storizen, Science Shore, OPA – Our Poetry Archives. e-Anthologies Monsoon moods - Muse India, Green Awakenings - On Environment, by Kavya-Adisakrit.
Ignite Poetry, Breathe Poetry, Dream Poetry, Soul shores that have 10 of her poems published, Soul Serenade, Shades of Love-AIFEST, Arising from the dust, Painting Dreams, Shards of unsung Poesies, are some of the Anthologies her poems, and write ups are part of. (2020 to 2022). Besides Poetry, Madhumathi writes on Mental health, to create awareness, break the stigma, believing in the therapeutic, transformational power of words. Contact: madhumathi.poetry@gmail.com :: Blogs: https://madhumathipoetry.wordpress.com :: http://madhumathikavidhaigal.blogspot.com/?m=1
Long hours of preparation
The competitive exam,
The application process,
And after, not knowing
Not daring to guess
Whether I’ve done as well as I thought.
As well as I ought–
After the long hours of study.
Pitting myself against
Unseen forces
Hoping I’ll get
Into University
With my chosen courses.
The ping of my laptop
Heart thudding to a stop
The fumbling finger
Scrolling down to linger
On the one word– “Accepted” !!
On to the “What you are expected
To send in…”
That one moment of pure joy
When fear gets lost
In what seems like the distant past
The moment that I savor most
Touching that longed-for goal post,
Not even the moment after
When the thrill has dissolved in laughter,
But that exact moment of acceptance
Is the height of exuberance.
Gita Bharath has enjoyed five years of teaching middle school before starting on a banking career that lasted thirty four years. Now, happily retired, she focusses on writing and trying out kolam art. Her first book Svara contains three hundred poems, comprising narrative, humour,and philosophical verses. Her work has featured in international anthologies, and won prizes from Literoma, Asian Literary Society, Story Mirror, etc,
To remind us that gender differentiation
Is just for species sustainability?
And naught else.
To remind us that heterogeneity
Is natural necessity
The contrary, unviable
To remind us gender differences
Are not differentiation?
Only welcome distinctions.
To remind us to seek not equality
And lose uniqueness?
To celebrate differences.
To remind us to dispense role demands
Social and personal?
Both gender driven and not.
To remind us that the supreme Purusha *IS*
All else prakuruthi?
The soul stands sans gender.
Note:
* Saint Meera expresses this truth to a sage who indulges in gender discrimination.
Purusha - the male entity - tradition holds that only the Lord is male entity and all else prakruthi
Prakruthi - the created, the world - here, denotes the female aspect.
Padmini Janardhanan is an accredited rehabilitation psychologist, educational consultant, a corporate consultant for Learning and Development, and a counsellor, for career, personal and family disquiets.
Has been focussing on special education for children with learning difficulties on a one on one basis and as a school consultant for over 4 decades. The main thrust is on assessing the potential of the child and work out strategies and IEPs (Individual Educational Plans) and facilitating the implementation of the same to close the potential-performance gap while counselling the parents and the child to be reality oriented.
Has been using several techniques and strategies as suitable for the child concerned including, CBT, Hypnotherapy, client oriented counselling, and developing and deploying appropriate audio-visual / e-learning materials. Has recently added Mantra yoga to her repository of skills.
She strongly believes that literature shapes and influences all aspects of personality development and hence uses poetry, songs, wise quotations and stories extensively in counselling and training. She has published a few books including a compilation of slokas for children, less known avathars of Vishnu, The what and why of behaviour, and a Tamizh book 'Vaazhvuvallampera' (towards a fulfilling life) and other material for training purposes.
Eloquent silence of the petals with overawing hue,
diamond drops
glistening on the green leaves....
The flower took its own time
to blush...
In the first flush,
the stir so subtle,the ploy so plush
like tremulous tenderness
of the magical maiden kiss..
I regained my lost wish.
Blush over,flowered into a smile, that Blessed smile....
No guile,it lasted a while,
a profound profile;
tranced me as I dazed...
Face to face,
Opening up with grace..
She bespoke
in a language
I could fully guage !
Ravi Ranganathan is a writer, critic and a poet from Chennai. Also a retired banker. He has to his credit three books of poems titled “Lyrics of Life” and “Blade of green grass” and “Of Cloudless Climes”. He revels in writing his thought provoking short poems called ‘ Myku’. Writes regularly for several anthologies. His awards include recognition in "Poiesis award for excellence" of Poiesisonline, Sahitya Gaurav award by Literati Cosmos Society, Mathura and’ Master of creative Impulse ‘award by Philosophyque Poetica. He contributes poems for the half yearly Poetry book Metverse Muse . He writes regularly for the monthly webzine “ Literary Vibes” and “ Glomag”.He is the Treasurer of Chennai Poets’ Circle.
I like the town on a rainy night
When the streets smell of petrichor
While the puddles sing a song
Pitter-patter with a rhythmic beat
and the lamp post flickers
I like the town on a rainy night
When the birds have gone to sleep
And the stars are tucked in
While the clouds wrap the sky
warm in the inside, cold on the outside
I like the town on a rainy night
When the world's pretending to sleep
But in every house there's a pair of eyes
Peeping through the window or gazing on their roof
At the messy yet mesmerizing sky
I like the town on a rainy night
When the moon's lost in darkness
And everytime it thunders, the moon cries
but thy sky on hearing the wails
Lightens to show it back home to the stars
I like the town on a rainy night
Because rain, night, sky and clouds
Reflect my heart on the canvas
They help me find my way back
to myself, him, us and words.
Akanksha Murali is an aspiring engineering student with a dream of becoming a successful entrepreneur and author. Weaving together words to unravel emotions is what She tries to do with her work. Books and words have always been an escape for her, a home in her world. A voracious reader and an enthusiastic writer. When she is not telling stories through words, She tells stories with her photographs.
EVERYWOMAN
Part 10 of many such
Jairam Seshadri
She commits …
She denies herself bliss-bubbles
When she shuns what she loves.
Because she “may not be good”
Or because the other
Is “so much” or even
“just a tad” better
(“How can I be seen
In any less
Of a light?”)
Or she
“Will never live up to expectations -
Even my own”
(Hello! Both skewed perspectives!)
Or because,
she will do it “in good time"
“Another time will come a-begging.”
(Hello! It is a-begging now!)
Or it may well be
That genuine reasons keep her at bay.
(Hello! Let’s talk! We will overcome)
When she denies herself
Bliss that permeates
Tingling that tingles
An inner smile
From that she loves to do
She commits …
She commits suicide.
For suicide
Is
Of the Mind
Of the Spirit too
While yet ‘living’.
And as violent.
When she denies herself
What God sends her way
She disembowels herself.
Jairam Seshadri is the author of MANTRA YOGA ( 2021 Rupa Publications) WOOF SONGS & THE ETERNAL SELF-SABOTEUR (2019 Partridge) and JESUS SAHASRANAM - THE 1,008 NAMES OF JESUS CHRIST (2018 Authorspress). He is a CPA with an MBA from the US and has worked in the U.S, Canada and England for over 30 years before returning to India to take care of his father.
He founded the India Poetry Circle (IPC)) six years ago, which has seven anthologies to the group’s credit, in addition to two more in the pipeline to be published this year. IPC, through its offshoot, IPC PLAYERS, has also produced and staged several skits, as part of its ‘POETRAMA’© series, including a production of Shakespeare’s MACBETH online. Shakespeare’s KING LEAR will be staged online this Christmas 2022.
Jairam lives in Chennai and can be reached at 9884445498 or jairamseshadri@hotmail.com.
When I think of you,
several images juxtapose and stare at me and I am overwhelmed.
Of Dal lake tranquil and serene telling tales of horror when blue mountains were
tinged with innocents' blood,
slices of greyish and azure sky of Swiss Alps
where white clouds hover
languidly over layers of snow,
thunderous Nayagra waterfalls whitish and broad,
roaring at the sudden twist of a placid fortune,
fleeting fairies playing hide and seek at extreme landscapes of Nepal
when no one looks.
I rise from the hazy inertia, try to catch you with some feeble attempts,
you scorn and give me a slip,
tease me and fade.
Pradeep Rath, poet, dramatist, essayist, critic, travelogue writer and editor is an author of ten books of drama, one book of poetry in English, 'The Glistening Sky', two books of criticism, two books of travelogues and two edited works, Pradeep Rath was a bureaucrat and retired from IAS in 2017. His dramas, compendium of critical essays on Modernism and Post modernism, comparative study on Upendra Bhanja and Shakespeare, travelogues on Europe and America sojourns, Coffee Table book on Raj Bhavans of Odisha have received wide acclaim. He divides his time in reading, writing and travels.
Your appearance with a smile
Your amicable gesture
The trust I have in you
Your energy boosts me
Let me survive in this malicious world!
In my muddled and Thorny path
Have you ever pat me with a warm hand
Money has no role between us
Time connects us, not people
Time, is the healer of minds!
A relationship is everlasting, dear
Promises, I do keep forever
Neither rain nor sunshine can stop
Travel with me in my mighty ship,
I never throw you in the middle of the sea
O dear, travel in my mighty ship
The comfortable and mighty ship
Friendship.......
With zeal and great enthusiasm
He travels every mile with a goal
Ambition takes many shapes and forms
His passion has no change
Change is constant in him
His thought alters like every season
Sometimes, a perplexed man
And sometimes a perfect artist
His actions speak volumes of ideas
His mind tells stories in thousands
As the passing cloud, his focus slips away
Can I say he is imperfect or less interested?
Like late evening, thoughts take a back seat
A dream doesn’t let him sleep,
The routine doesn’t stop his contemplations
Passion or position? Pick anyone!
Passion pleases you, but position feeds!
See dear! Plan a plan with a vision!
That leads you to complete your mission!
Mrs. Setaluri Padmavathi, a postgraduate in English Literature with a B.Ed., has been in the field of education for more than three decades. Writing has always been her passion that translates itself into poems of different genres, short stories and articles on a variety of themes and topics. She is a bilingual poet and writes poems in Telugu and English. Her poems were published in many international anthologies and can be read on her blogsetaluripadma.wordpress.com. Padmavathi’s poems and other writings regularly appear on Muse India.com. Boloji.com, Science Shore, Setu, InnerChild Press Anthologies and Poemhunter.com
I sit half buried
Attired in a robe of sand
Wearing a sun on my head, and
Mopping the drops of molten gold
Off my century old face,
I drink the flowing heat
Eat the smouldering clouds
Breathe the arid emptiness
And wait in cool patience
For my intimate moment,
Then there will be cracks
all over and inside me,
I will fall apart
Bit by bit
Big pieces
growing smaller and smaller
I will be pulverized to
become a heap of sand,
In an invisible crack within me
Ice tears would melt and
A stream will flow
To spread over the sands
Forming an ocean
The sky and the sun
would bend over me
The spell would lift
I will rise from the dust,
spread out my wings
Across the infinity and
Become a woman once again!
Snehaprava Das, former Associate Professor of English is a noted translator and poet. She has five collections of English poems to her credit Dusk Diary, Alone, Songs of Solitude, Moods and Moments and Never Say No to a Rose)
You could've been me
And I could've been you
Yet we could've been us
Without looking back
At a single thing
That bothered us
Cause the togetherness
That overpowered
Still remains intact
Somewhere in between leaving
And choosing to stay
What if all this ends someday
And what if that someday is today
What if all the courage
that I've been trying to gather
Vanish away just in a fraction of second
And what if the “not-so-brave-one”
Again falls into the trap of self-hatred
The fear that persists
And the dreams that I still cherish
Aren't just dreams
But somewhere parts of me
That fell apart one after another
Yet shined with the mere thoughts of spring
Hurt takes away more
Than what love gives
Or
We've never been loved the way
That will relish love over the
Memoirs of hurt
I move myself away
From the sights of the ones
That I tend to hold myself onto
Just to see
If they seek or want to get seeked
Cause what we seek
Might or might not always be seeking us
May be sometimes
The seeker also needs to be seeked
we pass on the hurt
That we've been through or afraid of being through
So hurt persists
Over our fear of loving
And we see hatred in the eyes
Of the ones loving us
The concept of hurting
Is never embraced
As vastly as love
As we fail to think
That hurt has caused the hurt
Rather than love
While love can only cause love
Arpita Priyadarsini, a Post Graduate of Department of Statistics in Utkal University, has keen interest in literature. She loves reading fiction and poetry. She started writing poems few years back and has been published by an international publication house twice. Her Instagram handle is @elly__.writes, which is solely dedicated to her love for poetry.
You were in pain but bore a faint line of smile on your face,
I quietly concealed my tears and buried pain in my heart…..1
I douched the stirring flames of sadness and sorrow inside me
by liquid drops flowing
from a mass of frozen tear,
That melted day and night
by anguish of fire……2
Many a times
I rather did not look at you
taking off my eyes away,
Lest you could feel mine
and your smile will go away……3
If some wet spots I felt under my eyes
I hastily wiped it away
to look fresh and radiant before you,
And shower love and strength
Help you brush aside all the torments you had taken into your stride
with patience like a courageous soldier that were you…..4
I had written a letter of
all unspoken words of our life
which I found has lost its
meaning and value
that I tore into pieces
and let it go away,
By signal of time
by a gush of wind
it was lost into an oblivion sky……5
You were still smiling even if tired
at the last leg of your journey,
And I locked my agony inside
and smiled with you
to give you company…….6
You are living with us that
we feel today so clearly
and distinctly,
But miss you always
and to be happy again
will follow your foot prints
very dearly……..7
Rekha Mohanty is an alumni of SCB Medical College.She worked in Himachal Pradesh State Govt as a medical Officer and in unit of Para military Assam Rifles before joining Army Medical Corps.She worked in various Peace locations all over India and Field formations in High Altitudes.She was awarded service medal for her participation in Op Vijay in Kargil.She is post graduate in Hospital Management and has done commendable job in inventory management of busy 1030 bedded Army Base Hospital ,Delhi Cantonment for six years and offered Sena Medal and selected for UN Mission in Africa.After the service in uniform she worked in Ex Service Men Polyclinic in Delhi NCR till 2021.She writes short stories and poems both in English and Odia as a hobby and mostly on nature.Being a frequent traveler,she writes on places.She helps in educating on health matters in a NGO that works for women upliftment.As an animal lover she is involved in rehabilitation of injured stray dogs.
She lives mostly outside the state and visits Bhubaneswar very often after retirement.She likes to read non political articles of interest.She does honorary service for poor patients.
(We are all puppets on the strings of life.)
We presumptuously believe we are dancing of our own accord,
And, falsely, pride ourselves for that power in our hands,
Nothing is farther from the truth than those misplaced thoughts of ours,
Over the years, life sets right that record.
We are all puppets on the strings of life.
The strings get entangled in the storms brought along, oftentimes,
Developing twists and knots and scarily shortening its length,
How much ever we struggle to disentangle and smoothen its course,
It seems like an unending effort lasting more than a lifetime.
We are all puppets on the strings of life.
Nevertheless, bravely and gracefully accept the challenges that life throws at you,
And, make it your partner to swing along, up or down,
Discover your happiness in the smallest of moments before the seconds' hand tick tocks along,
Beating those demons in your thoughts, black and blue.
We are all puppets on the strings of life.
Seethaa Sethuraman has had a creative orientation right from her school days – dabbling in writing,drawing and painting as well as learning Indian dance forms and Carnatic music. Thereafter, the usual suspect in professional education and corporate pursuits assumed centre stage (B.Pharm, MBA by education and a Health market researcher by profession); till the pandemic strongly nudged her to delve back into her creative side; alongside her continuing corporate endeavours. While formally learning Bharatanatyam had already begun since mid-2018; writing poems and drawing-painting turned somewhat prolific since the last 2 years.
As per seethaa, she writes/ draws-paints when the calling within her turns so strong at that moment; that it just cannot be brushed aside till it has been acted upon. So far, she has been doing them for her own self without giving much thought about publishing them. Coming across the Literary vibes platform has, however, enthused her to share this creative happiness with the outer world. Through this process, she also looks forward to receiving feedback/ comments that will encourage her to keep creative expressing; always.
Don't know if and what the Elephant whispers ,
Dont’s ants do so ?
(The miniest of the mini creatures,
Who minds if they get trampled !)
But wind certainly does ,
It says about conspiracy all around ,
While you, my rival ,nay the enemy ,
Perhaps sitting there in the cloud ,
In a darkest of dark mood;
I try find the meaning of Camaraderie on the ground,
That Rao Jr and Ram Charan can do ,
Leaving behind the legacy of a burning of heart and fingers,
Legacy of mind becoming muscles
You may flip the names ,
It will be the same again, the same two,
Divided they fell ,but needed to stand
Stand erect ,hand in hand ,
They searched for a common ground
They found it in another R,
Two becoming three,
Rajamouli , another Rose ,
You call it by any name, it would smell weet
You may not roar ,nor revolt ,
But rise first , open your eyes ,
See the sun shines in the day ,
Moon smiles in the night ,
Little Stars do their bits,
Surround the sky in sparkles,
Their silent gentle smiles, disarms the enemy in me,
They make the children dance in a frenzy,
Clapping at their little wonders.
Breeze now whispers in a different tone,
I don't know who is my friend ,and who the foe !
Dr. Niranjan Barik is a retired Professor of Political Science from Ravenshaw University, Odisha and is currently attached there on teaching and research on an ICSSR project. He is passionate about literature and writes poems, short stories.
(This guy hoots all night. For over a week we thought our neighbors were newly into the habit of snoring loud at night!! My husband spotted the culprit one famous night, took a pic and showed me. I loved the shot and asked him to pen his thoughts just as he used to in the past. So it’s his sample poem after a long time! My poem is a follow-up to his.)
Oblivious he was pondering
To my shoot in stealth
Did I approach to disturb
His nocturnal spell Sharp
Are his ears as his scan Turned
To my camera and to a stranger
On his terrace or so he thinks
In confusion decided not to
Confront a larger species Retired
To his den amidst hoots
Or two Did he care when
He again found me chasing
to get a glimpse from
A different angle to the twice
In a span of minutes Brush
With a stranger that’s me….
The Owls Night
Territories marked cameras positioned
Mainly to prevent strangers of their ilk.
Their species, though plenty,
Not as much a stranger as the owl that peeped
From his new residence that night,
As if to ask—what the hell?
His abode, of course, usurped off the pigeons!
Know not when the incident
But surprised the human no end.
Was he pleasantly shocked?
Held the phone in excitement, and went
Click Click Click!
And then
Posted on Social Media,
Thrilled over ‘likes’ that followed!
Starting as a blogger and poet, Sumitra Kumar became a frequent writer for a lifestyle magazine called Women Exclusive or WE. Her first published book, Romance with Breath - the story of aspiring Indians through simple poems - was launched in April 2022 and listed on Amazon. She has contributed to the anthologies of India Poetry Circle or IPC, and The Soul Scribers Society.
Her varied career spells saw her as a software programmer, flight attendant in Air India, and later, self-employed as a fashion boutique owner and futures and options trader. Sumitra presently makes her home in Chennai, India, working with her husband RR Kumar as Directors in their packaging and automation business. The joy of writing precedes all when thoughts flash, impelling her to delve deeper at bedtime and early mornings.
You can reach her at sumitrakumar.com and follow her on http://www.instagram.com/writer.poet.sumitra
Frenzied flowers fluttering its petals,
Flocks of wings scattered in the sky,
Swinging of the melody in tunes,
Ye Nature, thou opera in sync!
Morsel of dews yet to drop,
On the thin blades of grass,
Morn mist in hues and blues,
Ye nature, thou opera in sync!
Streaks of green gleam through,
Gloomy meadows growing fertile,
Flushing flow of shining streams,
Bejewelled crystals of white,
Ye Nature, thou opera in sync!
Amiable cuckoos cooing far,
Alas! World is not free from wars.
I stare at the windows gazing,
Well, time to pick my thoughts in clutter,
My journey ahead is long forever.
Vidhya Anand is an enterprising woman with a successful career in Training and development for almost two decades, she has been providing quality training in communication skills and other soft skill programs in leading IT and non-IT companies. She has conducted career guidance programs to young college students in chiselling their future towards their goals in profession
Her forte in style and accentuation, has catered to be a talented voice and accent neutralization expert during cross cultural training sessions. She has been an influential speaker and anchor in social and welfare workshops on special needs children and their wellbeing. She has been a passionate writer penning down poems and articles for magazines too. Her role as a persevering mother of an autistic boy has all along been driving him towards progress and positivity in his life. Words and expressions are rooted in her personal anecdotes and narratives, fresh from her own perspective.
On the walls of the golden sky
The Moon hangs like a lonely tree
Nobody except me longs to see
I wait for hours to watch the movie
Like a circus, the moon glides
Through the foggy, blue evenings
' The ceaseless moon cruises along',
Like a pearl of the sea, it sails in my fantasy
The silvery crescent moon often winks at me
Sometimes, it surges like the ripple of the sea
Often, it fades away like the untamed waves,
In the live theatre, I'd only stare like a mad
I merge, emerge and marvel at the spatial wonder!
Nothing can quench my thirsty desires
It is a deep secret between the moon and me
Nobody can measure the depth of my eyes...
Sudipta Mishra is a multi-faceted artist and dancer excelling in various fields of art and culture. She has co-authored more than a hundred books. Her book, 'The Essence of Life', is credited with Amazon's bestseller. Her next creation, 'The Songs of My Heart' is scaling newer heights of glory. Her poems are a beautiful amalgamation of imagery and metaphors. She has garnered numerous accolades from international organizations like the famous Rabindranath Tagore Memorial, Mahadevi Verma Sahitya Siromani Award, an Honorary Doctorate, and so on. She regularly pens articles in newspapers as a strong female voice against gender discrimination, global warming, domestic violence against women, pandemics, and the ongoing war. She is pursuing a Ph.D. degree in English. Her fourth book, Everything I Never Told You is a collection of a hundred soulful poems. Currently, she is residing in Puri.
A fluttering song with quickening awoke
In the radio’s womb and gently spoke;
Onto the smouldering sprightly Maru Bihag
Did my heart crawl and daintily hug.
Notes magical wafted by the gentle breeze
Floated like soft petals with gaiety and ease;
Flowing by my side O, Music Divine!
Oft you pull me and caressingly twine
(A self-rendering of my Telugu poem composed by me after listening to the rendition of Vidushi Prabha Atre)
The dreaded gloomy night that stung you
and spread pitch darkness in your blood vessels
will be pierced by sunray needles
The night will flee.
Emancipation to thee from the clutches
of devilish black night.
Hopes, the yawns of night
will be reborn with a dawn.
Grief won’t appear
in the sweat of the weary torso
that generates dreams studded with
electrified desires for progress.
The heart sanctified by the touch of
benevolent thoughts will glitter
in the moist eyes ruminating the old wounds.
From the daybreak’s effulgence
that cleanses the blemishes of high dudgeon,
will sprout a thousand rainbows
Dr. Surendra Nagaraju, born in 1953 in Telanagana State, Elanaaga is a well-known poet, translator and critic in the field of Telugu literature. He is a paediatrician, but now only pursuing his literary interest. After working as a Medical Officer abroad for 6 years, he rendered his services in Andhra Pradesh Vaidya Vidhana Parishat and retired in 2012 in the rank of Deputy Commissioner.
He penned 32 books so far, 15 of which are original writings and 17 are translations. Of the latter, 8 are from English to Telugu, and 9 are from Telugu to English. His works comprise books of free verse, prosodic poems, experimental poetry, language-related essays, essays of criticism, standard crosswords and so on. He is an ardent fan of Indian classical music, especially Hindustani.
I sit beside the riverside
watching its ebb and flow
I see how it's moving
forward and unstoppable
freedom personified in its every ripple
Life is like the river,
sometimes it sweeps you gently along,
sometimes the rapids come out of nowhere,
It flows and ends like a flood.
When you do things from your soul,
You feel like a river moving in you, a joy.
A dream is like a river ever changing as it flows
and a dreamer's a vessel
that must follow where it goes;
I want to be a bird,
Birds are so free,
they do not want to stop, just keep flying.
I want to fly,
fly so far that when I finally land,
no one will know my name or who I am.
When you feel sad and lonely
I hope you will come to me,
So I can be your friend
We can build mansions with dreams.
No woman ever steps in the same river twice,
for it’s not the same river,
and she is not the same woman.
After death, our ashes go to the river
and it joins the sea
to rest in eternal peace.
Sukanya V Kunju is a post graduate student of St.Michael's College, Alappuzha.Most of her poems have been published in Literary Vibes as anthology. She is a aspiring poet. She is the Co author of the book Dusk and Dawn.
POINT OF NO RETURN
Mrutyunjay Sarangi
One of these days
I will not get up from the floor
Where you have thrown me
Again and again, with a vengeance
That grew with time
And sprouted cruel thorns
To prick me and draw blood,
My pleadings never moved you.
Many a time I thought I held life
Within my quivering palms,
Like a soft cuddly doll,
It did smile on me
Again and again, with a joy
That comes from unconditional love.
You snatched it away, with a force
Life could not resist.
I walked on the coloured paths,
In the avenues of playful trees
The flowers smiling happily
Touching me with their fragrance
Again and again, with a tenderness
That comes for one's own.
You plucked the flowers,
Stamped on them in anger.
I dreamt of a new world
Where people would look at me
Taking my name in pride.
You drove away those dreams,
Again and again, with a darkness
That suppressed the dreams.
It felt like the end, with hopes gone,
The path stolen, dreams throttled.
One of these days I will surrender
To you living within me.
You will win, I will lose
I will go away, you will call me
Again and again, like you want to
Give me another chance
I won't get up, for I know for sure
My end will also be yours.
Dr. Mrutyunjay Sarangi is a retired civil servant and a former Judge in a Tribunal. Currently his time is divided between writing poems, short stories and editing the eMagazine LiteraryVibes . Two collections of his short stories in English have been published recently under the title The Jasmine Girl at Haji Ali and A Train to Kolkata. He has also to his credit nine books of short stories in Odiya. He has won a couple of awards, notably the Fakir Mohan Senapati Award for Short Stories from the Utkal Sahitya Samaj. He lives in Bhubaneswar.
BOOK REVIEW
Journey through Mosaic of Life by N. Meera Raghavendra Rao
Meera Raghavendra Rao is a freelance journalist, blogger and author of 11 books, which include fiction, nonfiction, and free verses. Beginning her writing journey with “Madras Mosaic” which received rave reviews and second publication, Meera was motivated and went on to publish “Slice of Life,” “Feature Writing,” “3Es of Writing-a coffee table book,” “Journalism-Think Out of the Box,” “Madhwas of Madras,” “Pinging Pangs” and more. She particularly enjoys writing features revolving around life’s experiences and writing in a lighter vein about the brighter side of life which makes us laugh at our own little foibles.
Her travels within and outside the country has made her a keen observer of people and places; her coffee table book with about 120 pictures from her non-digital camera is the proof of the pudding! Accordingly, it comes as no surprise when a prolific writer with over 2000 literary contributions to her credit - that include interviews, humorous essays, travelogues, children’s stories, book reviews and letters to the editor in mainstream newspapers and magazines like The Hindu, Indian Express, Femina, Eve’s Weekly Woman’s Era, Alive, Ability Foundation among others, chooses to come up with her biographical work titled ‘Journey through Mosaic of Life.’
As Meera states in the preface of this twenty chapter memoir- ‘I wish to retain the title of my debut work, Madras Mosaic, albeit with a difference. My first book is Madras-centric, whereas this one as the title suggests, covers episodes of my life from the time I remember since my childhood days spanning to the present.’
In these days when the joint family system is on the decline into oblivion, Meera Raghavendra’s Rao’s nostalgic accounts create deep and everlasting impressions in the minds of readers, even while giving insightful glimpses into the value of relationships, primarily the MIL-DIL equation about which the author writes: ‘Still waiting.’ In the early years of her marriage, a relative had asked her jocularly ‘Have you started quarrelling with your MIL or not?’ The author in her memoir recounts: ‘I lived with my MIL for 30-plus years and we had a very cordial relationship.
Surprisingly, No Tu -Tu-Main- Main story here!
Talking about ‘Aunty’ as Meera addressed her, she recounts: born into an aristocratic family, my mother-in-law studied in a convent school. She had a pampered childhood. Yet when at the young age of 15 she was married, she soon settled well into her new, large family. Despite having a handicapped first born, she was never one to moan her fate or make others in the family miserable.
A wonderful take away from the lives of two empowered women.
As one of her friends recall about Meera- ‘her pleasing smile, her ease as a homemaker, her spontaneous affection, her joy at whatever she accomplished…’ Truly, these endearing qualities of Meera would have held her in good stead in her social and professional contexts. Talking about her choice to be an ‘independent journalist,’ Meera elucidates: ‘you are your own master, can work at your own pace, without having to meet deadlines, free to choose to work on topics close to your heart and finally and more important, take care of your family as well.’ With much precision, this has been highlighted by Shri. K R A Narasiah, historian-author in his foreword: Meera ‘brings out the bond between members of the family in its entirety that unfortunately is lacking in society today.’
Without much ado, in her own lucid style, Meera has brought out the importance of work-life balance, the quintessence of life in this fast-paced gadget-afflicted world. Bryan Dyson, former CEO of Coco-Cola in a powerful speech illustrated the now famed ‘Five Balls of Life.’ Dyson referred to work as ‘ a rubber ball’ and ‘family, friends, health and spirit as glass balls.’ The rubber ball, as everyone knows ‘will bounce back’ the other four balls are definite to ‘shatter.’
With child-like simplicity and glee in ‘Visiting the house where I grew up,’ Meera takes the reader along into the ‘bungalow’ of the ‘pre-Independence days ‘its high-roofed sheds, outhouses, trellis…’ and the ‘gold-fish pond’ in the garden adorned with mango trees, custard apple trees guava trees, a wood apple tree, and a big pipal tree. The naming of the mango trees according to the ‘physical build’ of her siblings and herself is amusing, while her accidental fall into the pond is not. In this episode, Meera has faultlessly recounted a societal evil. Malligadu, the sweeper ‘was watching the entire episode transfixed, broom in hand’; when her anxious mother questioned him about his not rushing to save her –‘Amma, I thought I was not supposed to touch Papa!’
Yet another example of her forthright views is observed in ‘Medical Melange,’ reproduced from her own piece in the Open Page of The Hindu – ‘I feel that one size does not fit all. This applies not only to readymade clothes but also to patients……this conclusion after my experience with specialists and surgeons who don’t think twice before treading on the beaten path.’ Again, after a prolonged stay at the hospital after a surgery caused by infection, Meera blurts: I had made up my mind never to marry a doctor who spent more time in the hospital than with his family’. The same episode and the following one entitled ‘Doctors – our saviours’ has affirmative statements about ‘conscientious medical practitioners’ who ‘give the patient a patient hearing’ and ‘care more for their patients’ health.’
A picture speaks a thousand words! The author has meticulously amalgamated her writing with photographs of her family, friends, and events, all of which not only validate her stories, they come to life with greater energy and excitement.
The author’s note at the end of the book –‘looking forward to my journey through Mosaic of Life to continue.’ Having read the book with engrossed enthusiasm, I can reveal that Meera Raghavendra Rao, with her uncanny ability to look at the ‘bright’ side of things will continue to empower the young and the not so young through the power of her pen. Echoing Shri Narasiah’s words: ‘bringing out ordinary moments of life with feeling’ makes it ‘a pleasant experience for the reader.’
Hema Ravi, an educator with three decades of teaching experience, is currently a freelancer for IELTS and Communicative English. She is a poet, author, reviewer, editor (Efflorescence), event organizer, independent researcher and resource person for English language development courses. She is the author of ‘The Cuckoo Sings Again’ ‘Everyday English,’ ‘Write Right Handwriting’ Series 1,2,3, co author of ‘Everyday Hindi’ and ‘Sing Along Indian Rhymes.
A briefing about the book launch:
Journey through Mosaic of Life was launched by former Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Shri T.S. Krishnamurthy at CP Arts Centre, Chennai on 10 January 2023. Shri Bhimasena Rau, renowned corporate professional and Dr. N. Raghavendra Rao are seen in the picture.
‘Journey through Mosaic of Life’ is priced at INR 150/-. Copies of the book can be obtained by contacting the author @drrao09@gmail.com or through mobile contact @ 9444052312.
RED LOTUS OF BLUE LAKE & YOGI GOBINDACHANDRA by Prof Harihar Mishra
Our eminent novelist Sri Harihar Mishra has weaved a masterpiece by crafting his magnanimous creation, Yogi Gobindachandra which is brilliantly drafted by our creative genius of postmodern literature.
Prolific writer Narasingh Charan Dash has translated his creation intricately with much precision.
Focusing on the novel itself, we can trace a tone of revolt against the male-dominated society by our writer.
The manipulation and exploitation of females in the pre-independent era of our nation are imitated by Sri Harihar Mishra. The pinch of rigidity and the hegemony of superior power over poor people can easily be marked in the story.
We can discern from the novel that superstition and prejudice prevailed during that period.
The evil practice of proving the chastity of a woman is paralleled with polygamy in the tale.
The major characters like King Ripuchand, Devine Queen Muktadevi, and the ascetic Hadipada with his revered wife Sahaja Sundari progress to hold the readers into the charisma of their characters till the end.
With an astounding effect, the writer has painted the darkness of the then-era and strived to illumine the darkness through the light of yoga, meditation, and enlightenment.
At last, the protagonist Gobindachandra has succeeded in breaking the illusory mirror of his life by relinquishing the material pleasure of his life just like the scarlet lotus that remains unaffected by the substance of water.
As an avant-garde writer, Sri Harihar Mishra has opposed the stigma of pre-independent time that clouded over the grimy sky of our country.
As a mature painter, he has accomplished designing the carnal desire of the characters so skillfully.
By crafting this masterpiece, he has awakened new dawn in the history of Indian literature with his exceptional mastery over language. History has been contextualized with the magic of storytelling.
He has successfully imbibed the preaching of Buddhism and laid the importance of true knowledge over worldly pleasure.
For the future generations of this world, it's a powerful treasure indeed.
Sudipta Mishra is a multi-faceted artist and dancer who has excelled in the various fields of art and culture. At a young age, She has already weaved more than 100 books as a co-author. She has been ceaselessly musing on different social platforms like Youth Ki Awaaz, Momespresso, The Pink Comrade, Story Scraper,etc.
The prestigious Notion Press has so far published three books to her credit. Her book,The Essence of Life, is credited with Amazon's Bestseller recently. Her book, The Songs of My Heart, so well crafted, is all set to scale newer heights and pinnacle of glory in the days to come. She has garnered numerous accolades from various international organisaorganizations outstanding contribution to the literary world. A strong female voice against gender discrimination, global warming and domestic violence against women, pandemic and the ongoing war in the global scenario, she has penned down countless articles in the newspapers of Bihar and Odisha.
Her poetic excellence has been duly lauded globally and she is conferred with Honorary Doctorate by International Academy of Culture, A Word With Renaissance, and the International Human Organisation. As an author as well as a poet, she has reached the acme of success and zenith of glory receiving recognitions like the International Besties Award by Bhabya International Foundation and the Best Author of 2021 by the Indian Golden Award Organisation. Currently, she has been bestowed on the highest accolades like Rabindra Nath Tagore Samman and Mahadevi Verma Sahitya Siromani Award for her creative writing Presently, she is pursuing a Ph.D. degree in English at CVU in the Kingdom of Tonga.
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