PANKHURI SINHA
Shopping
Mistakes
Shopping mistakes
Blunders
Discovered
Upon reaching
home
After walking
home
A walk that was
meant to accomplish it all
Close the
shopping list
And that too
walking
Before the
snowfall
Before the snow
fell
And took her
walking space
The proudest of
all walks
The longest walk
of the season
The last walk of
the year
Discovering
After it
The shopping
blunder
Completely caused
By people’s
strange behavior
By people
strangely talking about her
About things from
her life
Facts, figures,
numbers
No doubt
About her
Even the way in
which
The girl was
calling for her mother
Yes, absolutely
She would get her
papers made
Get her mother
here
She
The lonely sad
woman
Among the happy
families
In the ethnic
store
In the tightly
spaced
Tiny store
Warm with airs of
the festival season
Festivals that
were now
Only about the
display of wealth
Majorly a show of
wealth
Festival she had
come back to
After years
Yet the aisles
were so packed
She had picked
the wrong boxes
By mistake
So full was each
lane
Of people
Just standing
really
Quite frankly
Eyeing things
With a confidence
of too much cash
In their pockets
Or the air of it
Under a roof
Where money
brought prestige
And a social
clout
That made all
other things
Including the
ease of standing
And surveying
goods
All of it was
boosted
By the reputation
not even of buying
But simply of
having cash
All of them
Knowing her
Beyond the point
That she was
broke
Knowing the extra
famous allegations
Around the doings
of her job
All the arguments
Knowing all about
her settlement woes
Troubles with
suitors
So called lovers
The deadlock
The stalking
The broom
discourse
The brooming when
she went to eat out
The brooming as
she came to read
Somebody just
stoops to pick up brooms
To buy them
Two, a deadly
number
Two, in the sense
of double
Had been chasing
her
Chaos, clutter,
mess
She picked up the
wrong boxes
The smaller ones
Instead of bigger
And caused
herself
Grave financial
loss
With no remedies
in sight
For fatal were
the implications
Of paying
A dollar and a
half more
They would have
understood
Had they walked
in snow
On pavements that
almost
Made you skid
In freezing rain
For there were no
sunny days
In sight.
And the awesome
balance
The beauty
Of that deadly
walk
Taken away.
Coming Back To
The Alliance Statement
Coming back to
the alliance statement
After such
robbery of rights
In broad day
light
The robbery of
credit, merit, opportunity
The great big
thrill
Of doing it
yourself
The thrill that
in the modern day
Has been solely
accepted as the individual’s
Stolen, brutally
In the making of
an unnecessary alliance
Consisting of
marriage, social forces
Nationality, all
kinds of identities
Even the question
of an ongoing affair
An extra marital
affair
Made into the central
issue
And put forth at
the centre
Preventing work
Preventing
progress
But primarily
An alliance
Made up of a
proximity
Between work and
family
Most undesirable
Never permitted
An alliance
That has still
eluded
Still outpaced
you
Still resisted
being busted
Like a drug
trafficking racket
Wearing the mask
of righteousness………………….
What I Was Told
To Stand Up For
What I was told
to stand up for
Were value
systems
I did not
necessarily believe in
And in not
fiercely clinging to them
In opposing conservatism
In principle
In not critiquing
divorce
In principle
I was robbed
Of the love of my
life.
Espousing
liberalism
Should not be
turned into something so tricky.
Young girls
should not be recruited
Into the job of
defending
A rusty old order
of thoughts
Because in the
course of championing women’s lib
There is a danger
of loosing
The lover.
Playing The
Politics Of The Automatic
Playing the
politics of the automatic
Was a clever
thing to do
It needed just a
little push
Just a little coldness
here
And a warmth
there
Silence on some
very urgent issues
The ones you had
tried to open
Deliberate
evasion of them
To get you to the
point of
Standing up
Face to face with
everything
Owned by him
To get you to the
proven point of
Everything owned
by him
Or was it
Could it all be
challenged in court?
Proven half yours
Jointly owned
But driving you
away from these righteous stands
Into the arms of
other men
Yes, other men,
Deliberately
keeping you there
Waiting patiently
Waiting till all
time was over
Meeting you very
cold,
Each time you
came back to him,
Waiting with a
joy building up,
The joy of
getting away with murder,
The pleasure of
it
Emerging
victorious
Emerging as
people’s king
Emerging a man
Out of all your
affairs
Dear suzannah.
PANKHURI SINHA
PANKHURI SINHA: Bilingual young poetess and story
writer from India. Two books of poems
published in English, ‘Prison Talkies’ and ‘Dear Suzannah’. Two collections of
stories published in Hindi, called ‘Koi-bhi-Din’ and ‘Kissa-e-Kohinoor' with
Gyanpeeth, one of the most prestigious publishing houses in Hindi, and two more
coming soon. Five collections of poetries published in Hindi, and many more are
lined up. Has been published in many journals, anthologies, home and abroad. Has
won many prestigious, national-international awards, like the Girija Kumar
Mathur Award for Hindi poetry while studying for her Bachelor’s in 1995, Chitra
Kumar Shailesh Matiyani Award for her first collection of stories in 2007,
Seemapuri Times Rajeev Gandhi Excellence Award in 2013 for outstanding writing,
First prize for poetry by Rajasthan Patrika in 2017, Pratilipi Award for poetry
in 2018, Mathura Prasad Gunjan Award for her second collection of poems in
Hindi in 2019, Kumud Tikku Award for a story in Hindi in 2020. Her script for
the UGC documentary ‘Cobra-God at Mercy’, won the best film award in 1997. Her
poems have been translated in over twenty five languages, and some translations
have been published in magazines in Serbia, Romania, Spain, Czech republic,
Macedonia, Peru, China, Bangladesh, Nepal, Italy, France, Venezuela, Tunisia to
name a few. She has also published her original poems in English in magazines
and anthologies in India, in the UK and the USA, Romania, and the world over.
She has set up an international group of poets called ‘Poets Without Borders’
and regularly organizes theme-based poetry readings. She won the best
correspondence prize for her short story in the first Chekhov literature
festival, in Yalta, Crimea in 2019. She has received awards from Albania,
Romania, Nigeria, Tunisia, among other countries for her writings in English,
and won the special jury award in the Premio Besio International Poetry contest
in Italy in January 2021. Most recently, she won the Galateo prize for poetry
in mother tongue in Italy on 3rd June 2021, ‘Sahitto Excellence in Literature’
Award in Bangladesh on the 30th of April and 3rd prize for her poetry ‘Chekhov
in my Heart’, in the category, geography of Chekhov’s places, in the Chekhov
Literary festival Yalta, Crimea. She has been regularly participating in zoom
reading events in the UK, India, and other places. Her writing is dominated by
themes of exile, immigration, gender equality and environmental concerns. After
doing her BA from Delhi University, and PG diploma in Journalism, from
Symbiosis Pune, Pankhuri did her Master’s in history from SUNY Buffalo, and has
an unfinished Phd from the University of Calgary, Canada. She has worked in
various positions as a journalist, lecturer and a content editor.
No comments :
Post a Comment