Sanhita Bandyopadhyay’s Two Poems

Poet Sanhita Bandyopadhyay is a poet whose poetry vibrates with the pulse of life, the colours and fragrances of nature and its lilting cadences! She deftly weaves the cruelty of unbridled lust into the breeze of the Sal forest intoxicated by the Mahua. Her verses reflect the synesthetic influence of Keats in her use of imageries. The poet expresses an affinity with Vincent Van Gogh whom she calls the ‘mayhem’ in his refusal to quit whatever the day might be or use violence and destroy. As a poet she creates beauty from all life offers as Vincent created legendary paintings!

1. Fulmoni

The tale of the blood-red palash is dark indeed.

Its only adornment—Phulmoni.

Banjara bangles chime, a tambourine echoes by the river.

The woman’s conch-shell breath halts and sways—

a storm brews within her.

Her ochre robe lies abandoned in the forest,

whispering secrets with the Mahua breeze.

Do your twin peaks not rise,

pressed beneath desire’s weight?

He drowns,

utterly engulfed by the Mahua flood.

A plundered body, smouldering with the last embers of a hookah.

They say this girl could light a chillum on stone.

What woman is she?

The shadow of the Sal forest?

Will you not show me your wilderness heart?

Her eyes, a restless tide—

smudging the kohl of longing at will.

Even the hardest stone bears scars, sometimes.

Then she becomes—

a bamboo flute,

a curved sickle,

a rebellious tale untamed.

Only the moonlit night of her silent companion saw her corpse.

“Where do you go?”

called the lustful spring cuckoo.

2. Vincent- The mayhem

Sitting under the tree of forgiveness

You see nothing. Nothing at all.

Thoughts graze the skirts of time azure

Fields burnt out after reaping the harvest.

Do you at all need any more crops this summer?

And sow your seeds on the tarnished yards

I wonder how he painted sun kissed cornfields

As shadow of mayhem loomed before his eyes.

Do you know how?

As clouds crowd   your pensive worldly self

Bitter crows jut out of lonely sky

Do you, like me realise, come what may!

You either quit or take up the axe to kill!

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