POETRY FOR YOUTH coordinated by Anju Makhija and Jane Bhandari on Sunday Feb 5.
I was intrigued. Poetry for youth? What could they write about have apart from acne spots and boyfriend troubles? What are their motivations? Are they going to launch a movement to make young people write poetry? Or berate their attempts at string words together to create rhythm?
“We need poetry that is relevant to the child’s immediate environment,” said Anju Makhija and cut through many of my pre-conceived notions about this workshop. For starters, she said there are various categories…right from 4-8 year-olds to pre-teens to teenagers. What would an eight year old write? I was further intrigued…
She continued, “A workshop we held sometime back on the same lines outlined the fact that kids don’t want to know about the dark and lovely woods but want to know about Bombay.” I’m sure, I thought. With the shrinking green cover, dark and lovely woods in Bombay are as imaginative as JRR Tolkien’s fantasy fiction. “It is nearly impossible to effect a change because the textbooks are controlled centrally. But that does not discount the need for a change,” said Anju and invited writers, journalists, copywriters, poets and the likes, who had written poetry for or on young people.
First up was Sampoorna, a copywriter by profession and a poet by compulsion. “I’d rather read a wicked poem about living in my city,” she said. She read four poems varying from a child’s sense of boredom at reading boring poetry, to a pre-teen’s grouse against his elder sister’s friend, to her own experience as a girl who had grown in a co-ed school and then moved to an all girl’s school and college.
The pre-teen’s grouse…“A poem about my sister’s friendThe two of them make threeAnd she comes over to our houseOnly when she wants to pee”…evoked bubbly giggles in a crowd of people who were…well…not so young (calling them 40 plus would be polite)
Next up was Rizio Raj, editor of Navneet Publications, who has published two novels in Malayalam—‘Avinasom’ and ‘Yatrikam’. She has published poems in several journals and anthologies in India and abroad and presents her poems in various forums.
She admitted to having been fortunate enough to be born and brought up in a wonderful house with a huge courtyard and garden. Rizio attributed her unrestrained spirit to her rearing. “And that what I feel children lack today—the freedom of spirit,” she started off. She read a couple of poems, the more prominent one being about Beslan school hostage crisis where terrorists took an entire school hostage in Beslan, Russia from September 1-3, 2004, resulting in the killing of 186 children. This graphic poem ended with a sense of loss and…“all we can give is a moment of silence, our last way to hold hands…”
Priya Sarukkai Chaabria, a poet and writer from Pune gracefully walk up next on stage and read some great poems in her wonderful diction. “Sandwichwala and Nimbupaniwala were friends, and religious nose diggers…” she started. I forgot to write the rest as I was delightfully engrossed in what she read out; but I remember the end of this poem. “They taught us that forbidden stuff is best,” she ended.She then read a poem about her first ever crush at the age of 13…a boy called Neil. He left school that year and never came back. “I don’t know where he is today; but he’ll always remain 13 for me,” she said as an epilogue.
This was followed by Anju Makhija herself reading a few. Please forgive me if stumble during my reading because children do that. Or if I invent new words, because children do that too,” she warned. She started with ‘Little Strange Creatures’ and ended with ‘Colour Separation’. I’d like to put the last stanza of Colour Separation down:“When Canary sings yellowWhen parrots cluck green blueWhen peacock preens a myriad of huesThen why do humans see brown?Add to that black and white; and you could lose yourself in the human zoo.”
Then we had Marilyn Noronha of Poetry Circle and Jane Bhandari of Loquations come up and close the event with their readings. Marilyn was great and Jane effervescent.
With the crows cawing and little bits of leaves and stuff falling on my head, I listened attentively to all that was being read out. Interspersed with humour and giggles, the event was great. Unfortunately, not many people were there to experience it. But it was, indeed, a fun evening, which left you with many questions. Poetry for young people?…Why? Are they losing touch with this genre? May be. With the craft? Hell, definitely. And with memories?…
You know sometimes you wonder what happens to your experiences…as you grow older. Do you tuck them away in some cobwebbed corner of your memory and gloss over them during yearly reunions with friends? And as the years pass by, the earliest one is replaced by the most recent…the early insignificant often replaced by the contemporary significant. Can it get any worse than misplacing your memories???
If not for the art then at least for the sake of memories…one needs workshops such as these.
Brrrrrr…went off to a different tangent…back to KG…read on for the talk with Shantaram…
P.S.: The poetry quotes are not verbatim…sorry, I forgot I was carrying a Dictaphone…remembered in the middle of the next event.
“We need poetry that is relevant to the child’s immediate environment,” said Anju Makhija and cut through many of my pre-conceived notions about this workshop. For starters, she said there are various categories…right from 4-8 year-olds to pre-teens to teenagers. What would an eight year old write? I was further intrigued…
She continued, “A workshop we held sometime back on the same lines outlined the fact that kids don’t want to know about the dark and lovely woods but want to know about Bombay.” I’m sure, I thought. With the shrinking green cover, dark and lovely woods in Bombay are as imaginative as JRR Tolkien’s fantasy fiction. “It is nearly impossible to effect a change because the textbooks are controlled centrally. But that does not discount the need for a change,” said Anju and invited writers, journalists, copywriters, poets and the likes, who had written poetry for or on young people.
First up was Sampoorna, a copywriter by profession and a poet by compulsion. “I’d rather read a wicked poem about living in my city,” she said. She read four poems varying from a child’s sense of boredom at reading boring poetry, to a pre-teen’s grouse against his elder sister’s friend, to her own experience as a girl who had grown in a co-ed school and then moved to an all girl’s school and college.
The pre-teen’s grouse…“A poem about my sister’s friendThe two of them make threeAnd she comes over to our houseOnly when she wants to pee”…evoked bubbly giggles in a crowd of people who were…well…not so young (calling them 40 plus would be polite)
Next up was Rizio Raj, editor of Navneet Publications, who has published two novels in Malayalam—‘Avinasom’ and ‘Yatrikam’. She has published poems in several journals and anthologies in India and abroad and presents her poems in various forums.
She admitted to having been fortunate enough to be born and brought up in a wonderful house with a huge courtyard and garden. Rizio attributed her unrestrained spirit to her rearing. “And that what I feel children lack today—the freedom of spirit,” she started off. She read a couple of poems, the more prominent one being about Beslan school hostage crisis where terrorists took an entire school hostage in Beslan, Russia from September 1-3, 2004, resulting in the killing of 186 children. This graphic poem ended with a sense of loss and…“all we can give is a moment of silence, our last way to hold hands…”
Priya Sarukkai Chaabria, a poet and writer from Pune gracefully walk up next on stage and read some great poems in her wonderful diction. “Sandwichwala and Nimbupaniwala were friends, and religious nose diggers…” she started. I forgot to write the rest as I was delightfully engrossed in what she read out; but I remember the end of this poem. “They taught us that forbidden stuff is best,” she ended.She then read a poem about her first ever crush at the age of 13…a boy called Neil. He left school that year and never came back. “I don’t know where he is today; but he’ll always remain 13 for me,” she said as an epilogue.
This was followed by Anju Makhija herself reading a few. Please forgive me if stumble during my reading because children do that. Or if I invent new words, because children do that too,” she warned. She started with ‘Little Strange Creatures’ and ended with ‘Colour Separation’. I’d like to put the last stanza of Colour Separation down:“When Canary sings yellowWhen parrots cluck green blueWhen peacock preens a myriad of huesThen why do humans see brown?Add to that black and white; and you could lose yourself in the human zoo.”
Then we had Marilyn Noronha of Poetry Circle and Jane Bhandari of Loquations come up and close the event with their readings. Marilyn was great and Jane effervescent.
With the crows cawing and little bits of leaves and stuff falling on my head, I listened attentively to all that was being read out. Interspersed with humour and giggles, the event was great. Unfortunately, not many people were there to experience it. But it was, indeed, a fun evening, which left you with many questions. Poetry for young people?…Why? Are they losing touch with this genre? May be. With the craft? Hell, definitely. And with memories?…
You know sometimes you wonder what happens to your experiences…as you grow older. Do you tuck them away in some cobwebbed corner of your memory and gloss over them during yearly reunions with friends? And as the years pass by, the earliest one is replaced by the most recent…the early insignificant often replaced by the contemporary significant. Can it get any worse than misplacing your memories???
If not for the art then at least for the sake of memories…one needs workshops such as these.
Brrrrrr…went off to a different tangent…back to KG…read on for the talk with Shantaram…
P.S.: The poetry quotes are not verbatim…sorry, I forgot I was carrying a Dictaphone…remembered in the middle of the next event.
posted by Maya @ 11:48 PM
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