Digging up memories

A TONE of elegant poise runs through these poems, as effortlessly as a fleeting feeling converts into an over-riding emotion. And the emotions that get across are devastatingly fumigated, giving them a coating of purity, notwithstanding the nakedness of desire. "My wants come back to me/ stumbling against/ the undulating negatives/ of your body", for instance. And such instances repeatedly manifest themselves with varying degrees of intensity.

The images have been carefully crafted, and the words selected to convey a whole range of anticipation, longing and despair until they all intermingle so comfortably that it is difficult to separate or distinguish one from another. "Before I conjure up/ more such images, / I shut the album/ for I am afraid/ the images will fly away/to a time without memories/ which my vision cannot reach." There is a hidden element of exasperation, a sense of helplessness at not being able to find the sublimity categorised by physical union. And in that sense these are not poems but invocations to an unknown love that can only find redemption "beyond the erratic boundaries/ of my endurance."

Although occasional translation blemishes and repetitive metaphor do spoil the impact, there is no denying the fact that Das in these short poems lyrically displays an infinite patience in trying to woo "a displeased goddess". His are the "searching hands" of a gardener with which he tends the flowers of different hues and colours. One wishes he had been careful in not deploying the recurrent images of letters, postman, telephone calls while seeking to convey the indefinite wait of a lover despairing the non-arrival of the beloved, and longing to freeze forever the "fleeting warmth/ of your playful fingers/ on my lifeless hand". The warmth that breaks the coldness lying underneath the "sterilised language" of an unconveyed emotion, gets converted into "volcanic eruptions". This is because in physical fulfilment lies the meaning of existence, an end to all longings and despairs. This is because,

From the formidable forts
of your resolute breasts
I have seen the ironies of history
bring blossoms of promise
to the wastelands of time.

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