Debarati Sen’s Two Poems

Debarati Sen is a young and promising poet. As a poet her heart beats in sync with the environment she breathes in, leading to fiery verses of protest on the outset such as ‘Fury’. Attacking patriarchy, she weaves intertextuality into her lines to ‘reclaim’ what is rightfully hers, has always been, every woman’s. On the other hand, she also sinks deep into the recesses of her inner world, reminiscing and relishing memories in picturesque details and images that delight on the synesthetic level.

1. Fury

Come, let us dig deeper into the spines of poetry and politics

to carve a nation

where women can walk fearlessly,

where her bosom is nestling for dreams and not for hiding her scars.

Why does she need to reclaim something that already belonged to her?

Let her walk down the city streets without the fear of being violated.

Come, let us wage an uproar against this rotten state machinery

that fills the crevices of our nation with termites.

It’s time we stop teaching women to be docile

It’s time we stop asking her to be soft spoken

It’s time we stop throttling her voice

It’s time we tell her

that she is the rokto karabi,

that she is the phoenix,

rising to reclaim her fury

Our streets are raging today.

You cannot chain our feet anymore,

For I am the woman who is willing to wear her scars as a medal.

‘I am the madwoman of moon days’

I am the breast-beating woman who yelps to make you remember that

‘the personal is political ‘.

‘roktokarabi’ is a Bengali name for red oleander.

2. Time’s Tentacles.

Time died in this place
trying to find a home far away from home

that bore the fragrance of sunflower kisses.

A penchant for nostalgia fluttered amidst the crevices where periwinkles bloomed

and the sourdough of memories sprouted

Reminisce flipped through the pages of my heart

and spoke to the cerulean bosom in metaphorical sighs.

Wearing clouds on my eyelids

I looked for the entwining roots growing deep in the soils of yesteryears.

An archipelago of memories laid ahead.

Peppered by the rose-coloured islands that had witnessed the sunsets of our childhood.

The orange horizon’s serenade in the cold

and the fragrance of Komorebi on winter noon.

Days of la dolce vita plummeted the spiral staircase

of the cavernous house whose inhabitants had long been decimated

by time’s grinding wheels.

The coffee stains on the table calendar,

the unused kettle in the sink where the cassoulet of remembrance brewed

muttered unfinished tales of love, loss, and changing times.

This place was once a happy home

now churned the bricks of loneliness.

My happy place is now a kryptonite

that makes my head dizzy with the migraine of grief.

The good old days rush like a forest fire

and burn through my veins.

I sigh, not being able to return to my roots.

I remain a perpetual outsider.

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