Jaydeep Sarangi (India) is a poet, poetry activist, and scholar specializing in postcolonial studies, marginal studies, and Indian writings, with 48 books to his credit. He is based in Kolkata and Jhargram. His eleventh poetry collection, The Half-Confession, is currently in press. Along with Rob Harle, he has co-edited six poetry anthologies bridging Australian and Indian literary traditions. With Amelia Walker, he guest-edited a special issue for TEXT, Australia. His recent works include Mapping the Mind, Minding the Map: Twenty Contemporary Indian English Poets (Sahitya Akademi, 2023) and A Life Uprooted: A Bengali Dalit Refugee Remembers (Sahitya Akademi, 2023). His latest book is Mapping the Mind, Minding the Map (2023, Sahitya Akademi). Sarangi is currently President of the Guild of Indian English Writers, Editors, and Critics (GIEWEC). A life immersed in poetry and literature, he serves as the Principal of New Alipore College, Kolkata.

English

MIGRATION

If I am on a deathbed,
leave the window open.

My love is reading Lorca’s Ballad.
(From my window I can see her gestures.)

My aged mother is cooking rice on an earthen pot.
(From my window I can smell her.)
Let me see her happy, writing.
Memory escapes the myth of time
Zeus seduces Leda, I seduce her soft moves.
I wonder if the world will carry these memories,
pass the edge where we shall cease to be.
If I am on a lean tattered bed unattended for a long
call me a ‘poet’, leave the  window open!
 
CROSSING DOORS ONLY
 
 
 We listened to  crows singing together
 unknown faces appearing and disappearing
we talked about the rise and fall of rivers,
chores of daily domestic works
washing, cleaning, cooking and mopping.
 
I this cold winter of crossing borders
our mind is full of plants, open
smiling, whispering, writing  and dancing.
 
In this hot summer,
delayed and delayed, off petals
no show to the world
how the heart is hurt, unnerved.
 
Here is my long script of the heart
a letter perhaps, read it and forget
to your door of faith where I stand unmoved.
 
One word could have been
exchanged, one e mail to wait, for the delay
If I am,  may I send  you
my apologies by these words of the Church?