landmark's poetry with prakriti

Rumjhum Biswas

Rumjhum Biswas's prose and poetry have been published in India and abroad, both in print and online. Notably in South (UK), Words-Myth (UK), Everyday Fiction (USA), Muse India, Eclectic (USA)a, Nth Position (UK), Crannog (Ireland) The King's English(USA), Gowanus (USA), Arabesques Review (Algeria), A Little Poetry (USA), Poems Niederngasse (Switzerland), The Little Magazine-( India), Southern Ocean Review (New Zea Land), A Hudson Review (South Africa), Etchings (Australia) amongst others. Her poem "Cleavage" was in the long list of the Bridport Poetry Competition 2006. She won third prize in a poetry contest run by Unisun Publishers India in February 2008. A flash fiction by her was shortlisted in the 2008 Kala Ghoda Arts Festival literature section Flash Fiction Contest managed by Caferati. Her poem "March" was commended in the Writelinks' Spring Fever Competition, 2008. She won third prize in the Muse India Poetry Contest 2008. Her story "Ahalya's Valhalla" is among the notable stories of 2007 in Story South's Million Writers' Award. Links to her work at www.rumjhumbiswas.com. She blogs at http://rumjhumkbiswas.wordpress.com/

MEMORY

I taste a certain memory now,

which tells me

that the mangoes are ripe

and ready to be eaten

tonight

and a soft rain

is falling,

falling,

falling

deep down in the gullies

where a lost bird is desperate

for a dry perch.

And the brightly printed half curtains

that mother stitched by hand

during silent winter evenings

of waiting

and more waiting are wet

from the slant of the rain

smelling of mangoes

ripening

in unguarded groves,

Amongst those undisguised secrets

that we shared

surrounded by the summer fruit

gathered

into baskets and rolled

into the courtyard, so mother

could sleep sound

in the knowledge that her children were safe…

And somewhere from a far off place

that memory tinkles like

an ice-cream man’s bell

when the child is shut indoors

and her piggy bank

is safe,

safe,

safe

in mother’s custody.

(“Memory” was first published in “A Silken Web – An Anthology of Poetry” published by Unisun Press, Bangalore, in 2007)

RAPTURE OF THE DEEP

The umbra of your soul becomes blue here

where centuries of icy restraint are converted

into popsicle bright, indigo lush layers

of incomprehensible beauty

You begin to spiral

through the translucent filaments

those ponderings of past wayfarers. You waft

Dreams turn and elongate into the bluebird's song.

The artist crushes cerulean to pollinate the waters.

The weight of Beryline tunnels through teal

with a purpose more potent than a chalice dipped into Lethe

Can anything be as quiet

as the shades that haunt

the silences of this watery world?

We derive so much of succor from the cobalt dish of sky

gently pouring into oceans, lakes and rivers.

Yet, sailors dread that deep dive

where the azures and ultramarines lie

That still washed floor

where the dice rolls. Time rolls

on ocean washed spherules

Everything ultimately spirals down

into the deep singing

a certain unspoken song

of such soul numbing beauty

That you cannot, you must not

and you do not even try to return

to your harsh world of unquiet colour.

(“Rapture of the Deep” was first published in A Little Poetry’s 2008 summer – fall issue)