It was such a pleasure to welcome Amit from noon to 12:40 by Zoom. He did read aloud the two poems sent out
(Maternal Dusk, Paternal Light; Last Will and Testament of the Tiger") but it is his stories and his infectiously uplifting manner that makes it such a joy to hear these poems. Without the stories, we do not have as full a sense of what the poems invite us to understand.
He explained about what poetry means to him… how for 25 years, he has been writing a poem a day — not that he is trying to be a “great” poet — but that this act of writing poetry, is a gift to bring to the world, a spirit and way of being. His dedicated work, bringing this spirit to others is contagiously effective!
And isn’t that what we want and need?
I am reminded of this quote:
Poems help us emphasize what makes us happy — help us sort through what makes us feel miserable…"The trick is in what one emphasizes. We either make ourselves miserable, orwe make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same."
Carlos Castaneda
He explained how before coming to the zoom, he had been in a café, where everyone was talking in a glum way about the return of the new version of Covid in Bombay… but when he said he was reading in America to a group of poets, suddenly everyone began to clap!
That’s the power of poetry!
It heals the air, fills the void! Writing a poem a day is like feeling the beads of a rosary, a simple demonstration that honors “the alchemy of life”.
Imagine, touching 12,000 people, encouraging them to read and write a poem a day!
Maternal Dusk, The paternal light:
Indeed, there is “no triumph of light over dark”… so if we are to celebrate the “lightness of being”, we must also celebrate the stillness of the “godly maternal dark”—
to be complete.
The Will and Testament of the Tiger
Amit also went on at length about the Tiger, his upbringing where his parents would take him on camping trips in the jungle… how the Tiger will probably not survive because it needs the deep, dark forest… but also the grassy plains now used for cultivating rice and the swamp lands… how man’s impact on the environment forces
a shift of the natural order of things. Speaking in the voice of the tiger, he explained, he had written the poem after the 2nd and 3rd wave of Covid had come to New Delhi.
Before reciting the poem he made a gentle small roar.
I asked him to explain “the terrors” —and he explained it is not guns, machinery of war, but what lies in our imagination and projections. He did read the “Terror of the Mango” (p. 43)— how he had read it to school children — and the 9 year olds immediately understood that the fish and mango, when small, were fine together. But as the Mango grew… the fear of the fish was that it would take over!
The teacher did not understand… like probably a lot of other adults reading his poem.
He also read "Terror of Hunting" p. 50 and told the story about the hunter’s jacket and meeting a man on a train, asking him questions that seemed odd, is important information to understanding what “the terror” of that jacket is about. The terror was Amit’s misunderstanding, his desire to get away from this stranger who was asking him if he were Iraqi… and other strange questions. He felt so ashamed when the man asked, “Do you know any prayers in Iraqi Arabic? My son is there, and maybe this might help protect him.”
Oh, what do we understand about anything?
Amit loves trout fishing... horses... he did read The Trout (p. 35) .
We could have continued all day listening to him.
Thank you Amit!
No comments:
Post a Comment