Shadows of the Real is a collection of 63 poems written by
poet K.K. Srivastava who hails from Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh. His are poems
which occupy either small spaces (tercets, five to ten-liners, a page or two)
or wider spaces (nine, sixteen or 17 page poems). Concision occupies one end;
on the other end there is a train of contemplation which takes the reader to
the deepest of tunnels of thought.
One of the first elements that strike the reader of this collection is the
fact that Srivastava’s poetry is very profound, philosophical on the one hand,
human and critical on the other. From the beginning Srivastava discusses
“ontological dilemmas” and describes life as an “abysmal continuum” and writes
about humankind’s “schematic perceptions”; man lives hand in hand with illusions
(“We survive in mirrors/ having lived beyond oblivion”, A Mirror), also in a “maze of false/ starts and imperfect endings”
(Our Being Us). In his descriptions
of what makes us human beings, thus our being, Srivastava has no half measures
but uncovers both negative and positive aspects: he writes about “the
possibility of our being us/ a mere, simple coincidence” and about our life
made up of fragments. This creates in us a sense of “sizzling hollowness”, of
“nothingness”, fatalism, and disillusionment. In Lonely Travellers Go Astray we read that:
“Everything
someday,
sometime
becomes standstill,
in a
lampless cell
Everything,
someday,
comes to
a halt, a standstill,
establishing
their equation
with
time.”
But “Our being us” is also “a perpetual renewal”, “a continuous flux – a
moving horizon”, thus “being and becoming” (see Our Being Us). The former is linked to the poet’s deep sense of awe
when faced with life. Srivastava tries to fill in the gaps (“holes in the
wall”) of life’s “missing parts” by his profound verse. This links perfectly
with Sealed Remembrance where
Srivastava admits that “Sometimes our lunacies are our brightest spots”.
Such thoughts are also expressed in Time’s
Emptiness. Life lasts only one second and this thought again creates a sense
of futility, an inner “abyss”. Once again it is poetry that tries to give
meaning to life and breadth to the reader. Poetry is an “iridescent/ light of
intellectual apogee”, even “mental asylum” (Mental
Asylum and Poetry). Thus words become meaning, life itself; words have more
permanence than memories and life itself. Time is given an identity, animated
through various images: “you have lived here, there, everywhere/ sightlessly
rejoicing your divine gaze;/ Your owlish glasses”; or “An unknown nymph guards
us”; or “An infinite living force/ your stillness moves everything else/ your
stillness stands still”. Like life, even time has a paradoxical nature.
Srivastava analyses life from within and without. The poet becomes “An
interpreter” who “seeks to look and feel inside” (Time’s Emptiness). Reading his poetry is like walking on a tight
rope: the reader has to be attentive all the time or else he loses balance. No
solutions are offered, but a sense of understanding of life with its
contradictions and betrayals:
“Reality
owns everything but in
Transmuted
form;
Another
day swings between
Trauma
of being and
Greater
trauma of becoming;
In
between we journey into
Fraglity
of dreamless sleep: life.” (Our Being Us)
We understand that being in this world is finite, but becoming is infinite.
One may thus speculate that Srivastava fights strongly against this sense of
being in order to enjoy a better becoming. Being is thus transitory and
becoming becomes a destination.
One of Srivastava’s favourite poetic mecchanisms is playing on words which
have deep meanings. There are numerous examples: “its permanence makes a being
a becoming/ and becoming a being”; “Doubts have details/ details doubts” (On Being Us); “action stirs dream/dream
stirs action/[...]passion stirs desire/ desire stirs passion” (Time’s Emptiness); “We time placements
just as/ we place timings” (Faces).
Other poetic mechanisms are the anaphora: “or an enigmatic
irrationality/ or a treacherous self/ or a mixture of all three”;
alliteration: “Endowed with inertia/ the existence of
being/ an exteriority to itself” (On Being Us); “Hang heavily/ leftovers of/ hardened
hours” (Between Night and Morning);
“Open to opposing
possibilities” (Faces);
personification: “Night has just left me/ morning wears an unwashed dress” (Between Night and Morning); “Lonely lamp
listens and waits” (A Sketch Made in
December) ; imagery: “From within/ waves of forgotten horizons/ look for
invisible anchors” (From Within); paradoxes:
“night has arrived/ another chance/ to drown myself/ into my wakefulness” (An Insomniac’s Dilemma); oxymoron:
“shimmering tombs” (A Mirror);
internal rhyme: “every vision, a revision” (Through
Time).
The poet also manages to give solidity, make tangible, abstract things such
as the mind (“an amorphous collection/ of ruined realities,/ half-thought
dreams”), decisions (“unreal stars/ on a dismal plain”), hopes (“Milky haze/
lingering, far off,/ shrouded mountains”), the day (“The day is like/ a rain
coming in drops/ insufficient enough to swim/sink”), doubt, contemplation
(“Something is always afoot/ knocks at the door”), melancholy (“Inconspicuous
sense/ of worthlessness”), and success (“thin, long rope [...] an intriguing
rope”), all these titles given to different poems. “Youth and old age” are
“like next-door neighbours shunning each other” (Afternoon Musings).
Srivastava’s verse leaves the reader breathless as he/she comes face to
face with harsh reality itself. All this is expressed in a clear language –
which flows naturally and hand in hand with knowledge of us and what of lies
around us - but with abyssal depths and levels of meaning. One can spend weeks
pondering about lines such as the following: “Sagacious time – a hollow
survivor”, or “Consciousness rips apart/ the dissolving streams of/ infinitum./
The wait continues...” (Time’s Emptiness).
This kind of poetry is not only meaning to be uncovered, but also an inner
experience and a search of what humankind truly is.
Love is another important theme in this collection. That Night is a poem about love, or about the need for the return
of love. Night here comes to life as the poet is overwhelmed by memories of a
mysterious “faceless woman”. Even in A
Woman, love, sensuality, nature and finally, poetry itself, form one
composition.
In Chanakya Puri of New Delhi the
reader sees Srivastava as the observer of humankind – with its social class
differences and opportunities - and other living creatures through time and
space (Nehru park and Sarojini Nagar market). This is also an example of
Srivastava’s socio-political verse in the widest of meanings:
“Empire,
dark,
quite and unshakable
it give
us songs
that
have no note of
compassion,
have no thoughts.”
Such
world is a “headless world [that] has lost all its/ meanings”. Such meanings
may be “discovered” every time humanity experiences a beggar’s death (A Beggar). Srivastava’s socio-political
verse is strongly felt also in Faces where
he writes about hypocrisy: “Our great strength;/ the still-life faces like/
skulls without jaws/ concealing deceitful jades in/ glamorous roles.”
Srivastava’s
poems are not only works intended to be read and understood, but also
compositions to be heard as each one has its music, its particular notes and
sound. There is also the visual element: his verse creates beautiful cerebral
images to watch and savour more than once because of their colours, shades and
hues. There is beauty itself, even untimely wisdom, in Srivastava’s verse. There
is poetry and beauty behind everyday happenings, many of which go unnoticed by
the many (see Fog). Thus even small
things acquire weight and meaning. At times these small things are placed in
the foreground thanks to the acute eye of the poet. Through Srivastava’s eyes
reality is described through a special lens which makes it look magical,
profound at times mystical. Srivastava is the poet who has traveled long
distances and feels that he has “nothing left to tell”. Is this knowledge that
he has reached a final point, or that he has understood the essence of life? (Nothing Left To Tell)
This study can also be read on
PATRICK SAMMUT (Malta, November 2013)
