RK Singh has appeared here before and it is a joy and delight to post his poems which he has graciously allowed permission.
RK has many websites, is a prominent and distinguished poet from India and through many months of correspondence, we have struck up a friendship.
Although already a published poet of over 34 books and 162 critical reviews, RK has a great enthusiasm for new writers and I am deeply honored he reads my poetry. I find his so fresh and provocative in the best sense for a poet: reading his deeply visual poems, they propel me to write more, not to imitate, but to have courage that small poems can have the impact of those with many more words. RK’s work is so powerful to me, that clearly here, ‘less is more’.
It’s the Monsoon season in his part of India, and he is awaiting the rains. The temperatures are soaring and humanity there barely breathes, awaiting the cooling, life giving rains. A few tanka that reflect those conditions but others of a different nature. Dr. Singh is prolific to say the least. It was hard to choose only these, but like a box of Godiva chocolates, they are so rich we best go slowly. There will be many more later.
Indeed, the power of ‘small’ poems.
Lady Nyo
NO MOIST SECRETS: SOME TANKA
Layers of dust thicken
on the mirror water makes
the smuts prominent:
I wipe and wipe and yet
the stains stay like sin
When I have no home
I seek refuge in the cage
of your heart and close
my eyes to see with your nipples
the tree that cared to save from sun
In the forest of your hair
my finger searches
the little pearl of blood
that stirs the hidden waters
and contains my restlessness
When I inhale in
your mouth and exhale stroking
hair or caressing
I ride you into joy and
make you hail morning like earth
Winter is caught in
waves of narrow discussions
under the blanket
fingers move by nipples erect
without sensing sinsummation
Life limits between
whence the sun rises and where
it goes to relax:
joys of a fleeting moment
I see Aditi in her eyes
Will you marry my soul?
or lend me your body?
I’ve used it to the core
the rament is tattered now
even ghosts despise it
Burning without warmth
one more hot and sweaty spell
of summer, restless
down with stroke, without light, fan
exhausted, alone in bed
Slung-jawed awake
two grinning skeletons sit
bolt upright in bed
hear the shrieks next door but
too scared to call the police
The nightly ghosts crowd
my mind’s passage to forge
gods’ names in disguise
I fail to scan the face
of thought and life in the dark
Night’s prisoned friends
keep me awake with planes
flying over the Ashram
every now and then I watch
the direction matters
A cloud-eagle
curves to the haze
in the West
skimming the sail
on soundless sea
The chill outside
deprives me of the bright moon
I breathe in my fears:
asthmatic bouts haunt and
jealousy itches the throat
RK Singh
Copyrighted, 2009
Some websites of Dr. Singh’s to read more of his poems:
http://rksingh.blogspot.com/2006/10/im-no-river-tanka-collection.html
http://www.geocities.com/profrksingh/tanka.htm
http://ezinearticles.com/?The-River-Returns—A-Collection-of-Tanka-poems&id=538863
Lady Nyo's Weblog 