THE MELITA HUME SHORTLIST 2014: SOHINI BASAK (8 OF 11)

Sohini Basak (pictured) was born in 1991 in Kolkata. She studied literature for her undergraduate degree at St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi, during which she won prizes for her poetry at the RædLeaf India as well as the Reliance-Unisun TimeOut competitions.

Her writing has been published (or is forthcoming) in journals such as Ink, Sweat and Tears; The Cadaverine; Ambit; The Four Quarters Magazine; Helter Skelter and Muse India. She moved to the UK in September 2013 to study for an MA in Writing at the University of Warwick where is working on her first collections of poetry and short fiction.

How to Breed Lilacs

First, learn not to stereotype months, then walk

on all fours, sniffing the garden soil, stop at the warmest

patch of earth. Then, dig. Dig deep, dig with love, do not use

a shovel, dig until your ankles are covered, upturn minerals

until the earthworms tickle your toes. Always use your hands,

for everything. Watch out for the microscopic snails who leave

behind trails, softer than your fingers make. If you have powdered

bones, sprinkle them, with ceremony, without hurting others.

Calcium works faster than singing softly to growing plants. Plant

the tiny, the new, the world-condensed-in-a-grain-full-of-potential

seeds. Another piece of advice: do not use adjectives unless you

need them. So revised: plant those seeds. Simply. Use more water

for libation, nothing else purifies, nothing else soaks the soil, mixing

memory and desire. Afterwards, wash your fingernails clean, return

to the kitchen, make yourself a cup of tea. Again you will find the uses

of water. Dripdropdripdrop. Cup in hand, sit down by the window,

you will see the seeds bursting out, the roots travelling in tunnels

deeper than your reach. Then, you will see the branches growing:

spreading out, those gray brown birds, reaching towards

everywhere, you will see lilacs clustering, each petal singular,

designed with your fingerprints.

Comments

IQ AND THE POETS - ARE YOU SMART?

When you open your mouth to speak, are you smart? A funny question from a great song, but also, a good one, when it comes to poets, and poetry. We tend to have a very ambiguous view of intelligence in poetry, one that I'd say is dysfunctional. Basically, it goes like this: once you are safely dead, it no longer matters how smart you were. For instance, Auden was smarter than Yeats , but most would still say Yeats is the finer poet; Eliot is clearly highly intelligent, but how much of Larkin 's work required a high IQ? Meanwhile, poets while alive tend to be celebrated if they are deemed intelligent: Anne Carson, Geoffrey Hill , and Jorie Graham , are all, clearly, very intelligent people, aside from their work as poets. But who reads Marianne Moore now, or Robert Lowell , smart poets? Or, Pound ? How smart could Pound be with his madcap views? Less intelligent poets are often more popular. John Betjeman was not a very smart poet, per se....

Poetry vs. Literature

Poetry is, of course, a part of literature. But, increasingly, over the 20th century, it has become marginalised - and, famously, has less of an audience than "before". I think that, when one considers the sort of criticism levelled against Seamus Heaney and "mainstream poetry", by poet-critics like Jeffrey Side , one ought to see the wider context for poetry in the "Anglo-Saxon" world. This phrase was used by one of the UK's leading literary cultural figures, in a private conversation recently, when they spoke eloquently about the supremacy of "Anglo-Saxon novels" and their impressive command of narrative. My heart sank as I listened, for what became clear to me, in a flash, is that nothing has changed since Victorian England (for some in the literary establishment). Britain (now allied to America) and the English language with its marvellous fiction machine, still rule the waves. I personally find this an uncomfortable position - but when ...

"I have crossed oceans of time to find you..."

In terms of great films about, and of, love, we have Vertigo, In The Mood for Love , and Casablanca , Doctor Zhivago , An Officer and a Gentleman , at the apex; as well as odder, more troubling versions, such as Sophie's Choice and Silence of the Lambs . I think my favourite remains Bram Stoker's Dracula , with the great immortal line "I have crossed oceans of time to find you...".

E Y E W E A R, THE BLOG - FREEDOM MEANS BEING UNAFRAID TO WRITE WHAT YOU THINK

Search This Blog