I struggled hard to create unique phrases,
got stuck with clichéd metaphors,
tried to freeze the magic of life
in extreme close-ups and wide angle shots
and ended with a senseless collage,
wrote of ‘chirping birds and twittering sparrows’,
watched thoughts ‘pirouette’, kept dreams ‘etched
in memory’, and failed miserably. Poetry
did not arrive in search of me. Perhaps
I lack experience, ‘real’ experience, mind it,
or I am insensitive to life and language,
or it’s my tpying, full og typpos, you see,
or it’s my blind faith in free verse and its
irreverent choices of
lexis
and
alignment,
or it’s just my attitude, my faltering faith
in the ways of the world of creativity.
I know there is something wrong for sure.
I have even started to wonder
whether the problem is with my readers.
(To be continued)
Jose Varghese is a writer/translator/editor from India who is currently teaching English in the Middle East. ‘Silver-Painted Gandhi and Other Poems’ (2008) and ‘Silent Woman and Other Stories’ (forthcoming) are his books. He is the founder and chief editor of Lakeview International Journal Of Literature and Arts.