We are often unable to let things take their own course. The idea of ‘letting something go’ necessitates that we do not doubt our own actions, own convictions. Mayur’s poem is a lament by a voice that makes an appearance in our lives once too often.
Failure in life, and especially in love, is often inevitable. We can either clamp down and shrink ourselves or show up and shine anyway. This is a poem on resilience; a whimsical sketch of a woman, a romantic, who refuses to be hardened by the hard experiences.
Inspired by Tom Petty’s words, ‘The waiting is the hardest part’, Jean Bonin pens a verse about what it means to wait for things one has no control over, things like growing up.
In this poem, M. Mohankumar pens the feelings of a young man waiting for a woman on a moonless night.
Chandramohan Nair recollects his brief revelatory conversation with his father over evening tea.
Mohankumar’s poem relates to the confession, many years later, of a CRPF constable who was involved in an encounter in Kerala in 1970 that resulted in the death of a Naxalite leader.
Asha’s poem highlights known and unknown secrets. While it reveals an open secret of yore that we are parts of a whole, it also speaks of the struggle of a secret, comparing it to a larva in a cocoon.
Life is inherently mysterious and for some specially called upon to be the bearer of its enigmas, the insightful secrets could be a gift whereas the dire ones could be a curse. Mandira Ghissing’s poem is a whimsical take on the extraordinary, almost heroic, effort required of us to carry this burden.
