A Festival of Free Verse

By Bharat Trivedi

The Orange~
In green bowls
leave lasting impressions
like poems.
Poems
written on oranges
start to fade at sunset.
-Bharat Trivedi

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 17, 2014
• ISBN: 9781493154548

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by Bharat Trivedi.

ISBN:      Softcover      978-1-4931-5453-1

                eBook            978-1-4931-5454-8

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 12/21/2013

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CONTENTS

Foreword~

The Stallion Canto~

A Diaspora Poem~

Dawn~

The Owl~

The Shell~

Mahashivratri~

*Baval*, the Scrub Tree~

A Diaspora Poem~

O’ My Love, My Sweet Sweet Love~

The Tree Grove~

What Do I Care?~

Word~

A Poem in Manhar’s Style

Vimli, in Your Memory~

The Orange~

God~

Incomplete Family Portrait~

How to Pick a Poem~

Time~

Corruption~

After I am Gone~

Waiting 1~

The White Cow~

The Art of Verse~

Verse/ Poem~

The Farmer~

I’m Afraid, Really~

My House in Fallingbrook~

Homewards, in the Evening~

Nathdwara~

Returning Home After Years of Exile~

Vadodara 1~

Vadodara 2~

Fresh Off the Boat/ Newcomer~

Greyhound~

The Wandering Cow’s Soliloquy~

Outside the Window~

The Terrace~

Honey I’m Home!

The Ant~

The Black Thief~

Ravana Assassination~

Let There be Light!

Milwaukee, Wisconsin 1~

Milwaukee, Wisconsin 2~

As Usual~

A Sermon in Verse~

For My Father~

A Celebration of Verse~

This Morning~

Holi~

Nature~

A Big Fish~

Ars Poetica~

A Bug~

No Rules~

The Glass~

The Mango~

Jagdish no chevdo~

The Thirty-two Step Well~

Springfield~

Home is Home~

A Puppy So Distressed~

Peepal~

Night Creature~

The Poet and the House Sparrow~

About a Cow~

Platform~

Ahmedabad~

The Crow~

Camel~

Kidnapped~

A Town Named Kapadwanj~

The Poet’s Visage~

Vadodara 1~

A Poem About a Real Nice Mango~

In Memory of the Sea at Dumas~

A Home Poor Dear~

A Family Portrait~

A Sandwich for Lunch~

Vadodara 2~

The House on the Canvas~

A Diaspora Love Poem~

Budhabhai~

Play~

The Word~

In Case I’m Not Around Tomorrow~

Mother’s Day Poem~

Word~

A Surreal Poem~

The Deer~

The Bullock~

Afternoon~

A Tulsi in My Garden~

The House~

The Afternoon~

FOREWORD~

1974. Class 4, at a culturally-rich school in Ahmedabad. The class is excited, nervous about an upcoming Spring Festival; everyone working feverishly to prepare a handwritten, beautifully calligraphed book of poems and stories, perfect for presentation to the newly crowned Spring-King. There is much pomp and music and dance, but the highlight? The book presentation, of course, after a celebratory procession around the campus. Regal. That excitement is a living thing, palpable.

With the same excitement and flourish, we’re delighted to present before you,* A Festival of Free Verse", a volume of translated poems by Bharat Trivedi.

A few months ago, a Facebook and blog friend, Sonal Vaidya, asked me if I’d like to look at a few poems for translation. The Stallion Canto was the very first I attempted, and I must admit I was hooked.

*A Festival of Free Verse" features handpicked poems from three volumes of free flowing verse by established immigrant poet Bharat Trivedi—*Acchandotsav*, *Batriskotha Vav*, and *Videshvato*.

I choose the word immigrant over NRI because Bharatbhai has made his new land his own as well, accepted its foibles as much as its bounty; he owns and revels in the experiences of his chosen abode as much as he does his land of birth.

These poems defy easy categorization; there are poems of exile and thirsting for one’s homeland, there are poems that descry observer-like, the state of the nation; poems that take pride and ownership of the new land. There are poems on wonder of the creative form, as well as poems that mock the purported convulsions of the creative process, there are poems that gently describe the changes in relationships in a new land and new time, like *Happy Mothers Day*.

One common factor—for the apparent meaning, simple, skim the surface; and after-thought, after contemplation, reach deep for the meaning within. *Batriskotha vav*, or the Thirty-two step well reveals its secrets, unlocked to the simple word *jaso*—until the death threat, one would imagine one were reading about a historical event.

Are these poems the absolute best? I’d like to think of these as a sampler; and reserve comment—there is much that is rich and varied here, a feast for the senses. But there is so much more. The limitations in transcending the boundaries of