Review: Silence: A White Distrust

[rksingh]

Singh, Ram Krishna, “Silence: A White Distrust,” The Haiku Foundation Digital Library, accessed July 5, 2020, https://www.thehaikufoundation.org/omeka/items/show/6058. View also https://issuu.com/prof.r.k.singh/docs/newhaikutankabook .

Talking about Prof Ram Krishna is a real pleasure for me.  I met him on the Web about twenty years ago and his poetics hit me hard that time like  today.  Born in Varanasi in India, in my opinion, he is one of the most interesting  contemporary English-language Indian writers,  published  all over the world.

His new book, SILENCE: A WHITE DISTRUST, confirms a style  and, above all, a rare coherence in today's literary panorama.

This collection consists of high quality haiku and tanka poems and can be approached as a long chain of linked verses (as suggested by the sub-title itself), or as a set of poems that can be read separately.  Since I am not a writer and an expert in tanka poetry, I will concentrate my analysis especially on his haiku.  For example, the set consisting of two haiku and a tanka:

greet the sun
on the terrace—
two roses

November morning--
too many thorns to reach
the only rose
and the tormenting thought
that I am forsaken

stunted bud
in the earthen pot—
winter sun

is one of my favourite. The idea of solitude,  but much more the abandonment, is effectively conveyed by the use of images such as "November morning" and "winter sun", for example. Or the following sequence of two tanka and one haiku:

earthy body
and nightness of silence
fear in mirror
return to the river
echoing hollowed sound

long waiting
short consultation—
ophthalmologist

morning smog—
an asthmatic with grandson
coughing restlessly
on the terrace even
a limping crow seeks fresh air

which brings attention to the dramatic problem of pollution in India.  Among his haiku and senryu present in this collection, the following three are notable for simplicity (but not triviality),  in my opinion, which is a peculiarity of this poetic form:

visiting home—
shadows of forgotten days
on the wall

on the terrace
facing the sun
an empty chair

and this one inspired by the famous Indian holiday, Diwali:

noise of crackers
monotony of light
Diwali

But there is also room for other topics in his writings. Many of his works are highly erotic. This one, for example:

stain-dried lingerie
reminds of the night’s act—
flowers of lips

and also the Coronavirus pandemic, which seems to have inspired many authors around the world in this period, finds its place:

sudden downpour--
even in sleep I worry
about the virus

A theme masterfully taken up in this sequence of two haiku and a tanka:




with spring comes
burial of romance:
COVID-19

quarantined
I clear my throat
behind the face mask
breathe in unknown viruses
suffer new repressions

now lockdown
cut off life:
castration

This collection is something that leaves a mark on the reader. Poetry proves once again to be an effective means of communication to convey entire pieces of our life, and thinking of the poems of Prof. Ram Krishna Singh, the choice of Japanese-inspired poetics, with its essentiality, turns out to be once again a good choice. SILENCE: A WHITE DISTRUST is a beautiful book not to read quickly.

Andrea Cecon



Bio note:
Andrea Cecon is a hearing aids technician, a traveller, a haijin published all over the world and also an ebook apprentice. His first ebook won the 3rd place in Sharp Writ Book Awards contest 2011 (category: poetry). Residing in Cividale, Italy, with his wife, Russian haijin Valeria Simonova-Cecon. He finds his inspiration in memories, travels, and the everyday life. His books can be viewed on www.amazon.com/author/andreacecon