Yesterday’s Rain: Six Poems by Sakkho Goon
Poetry: ‘I placed my parents on a bench / And refused to let the sunset / Dawn upon their lives.’
A Better Place to Rest: Three Poems by Kiriti Sengupta
Poetry by Kiriti Sengupta: ‘Death pauses verdict; the authority mars evidence. / The doomed is put on the pyre; rallies slit through / the silence.’
Halima – Segregating Junk
The collection Awaaz: Voices of Govandi has emerged from the need of the people of Govandi to reclaim the narrative about their neighbourhood, and carve out their own future. Here is an excerpt from the collection. Edited by Nisha Nair-Gupta
Hearts Marinated in Lies: Two Poems by Vrinda Bansal
Poetry by Vrinda Bansal: ‘I am rage and blasphemy, God in a dungeon, / a domesticated wolf, the brain of a terrorist party / I am your grandmother’s birthday party and a child’s funeral, / a barrel of kerosene’
Prayers to Peace: Three poems by Smita Agarwal
Poetry by Smita Agarwal: ‘The dahlias grow hawa mey— / off the air, we’d say / Down steep ravines / into which the monsoon // munificence would flow’
Mother of All Beings
Fiction by Neera Kashyap: ‘The next week he, Paltu, joined the moulis. To gather honey, to pay off debts, to induce his mother to eat two meals again, to oil her hair, to soap her body, to close the door to their hut. For his father had gone, and would never return.’
‘A Knot that Would Not Unknot’ – Two Poems by Gopi Kottoor
Poetry by Gopi Kottoor: ‘And then, the sip / From the spoon / That’ll soon become memory, / That slowly drawn inward kiss’
Holding Hands with the Stars: Five Poems by Sayan Aich Bhowmik
Poems by Sayan Aich Bhowmik: ‘I have been told the entire cosmos of our being / Hair, skin, Tissues / Renew themselves. / The old ones dissolving in air, without pain / Much like ice melting on the kitchen shelf.’
House of Quiet
Fiction by Anannya Nath: ‘Prosenjit forgets to react. What would he do now? How should he talk her through this? Is this what happens once you forget about being a father?’
Two Fridas: Two Poems by Shreya Sharma
Poems by Shreya Sharma: ‘‘i will make for you one and a hundred popsicles in each flavour you can think of. pink bubblegum big collective miracle evening and so on.’
Kolkata Feasts or Firewood: Three Poems by Shome Dasgupta
Poems by Shome Dasgupta: ‘take me back / to the moss and crawfish, please / Krishna—take me back to moonlit / moss and claws red like tandoori / curry, soft and savory.’
