Vinita Agrawal
My short story Visiting Orchids and a poem ...

Dear Friends,

I have a few words to say to dear Juthatip aka Tippy, as she would have me call her. First and foremost is or course a warm thank you for zeroing in on my work, which I'm sure happened quite by accident!

Nevertheless, thank you Tippy for pondering over my creations and coming up with uncanny conclusions behind my motivation for writing these pieces. 

I must also share that although our researcher chanced upon the story at a website showcasing the work of Indian writers, the story found place in an anthology called Voyage published by dear Nagasuseela and Gopichand of Guntur University, Andhra Pradesh. ...

Vinita Agrawal
This far and much further…

Nothing Like Winning! First Prize in the Wordweaver's Contest.

I submitted my entry to the WordWeaver's Contest in August, I think. Or perhaps earlier than that. My poem House For Sale was inspired by a true incident in Mumbai. Poetry is often triggered that way - by the things we see happening around us. This was one such poem.

During the selection process my entry first made it to the Longlist and then a month later to the shortlist.

The results were announced today i.e. 1st November 2014. I was pleased that my poem was chosen the winner from amongst so many wonderful entries! Yes...there's nothing quite like winning! I'm all smiles now. Thank you Escribes!

Here's the poem- 

Four Poems in RædLeafPoetry-India

Linda Ashok or Lee as I call her is a poetry promoter with a difference. Yes she, like many others has a wonderful website to promote excellent poetry from all over the world. Yes, she also has a wonderful poetic sensibility like many other splendid poets. What sets Lee apart, is her soul. Her passionate, righteous, tender soul that bleeds like an open wound when the underprivileged suffer or when injustice is in the air and burns like a hot flame, scorching anyone trying to pass off mediocrity for real creative talent and trying to cut corners to just put their work out into the world. For Lee, poetry must be gut wrenching, sword-like, blending blood and tears together and yet flying away tenderly with your soul.

How I love this 28 year old, upright, liberated poet cum promoter of poetry!  I'll have all you readers know that she chose my picture to go with the poems herself, from my Facebook album! That's Lee!

Four of my poems are up on the site. 

http://rlpoetry.org/vinita-agrawal/

 

Autumn Surrender - poem in NorthEast Review

http://northeastreview.com/2014/10/22/autumn-surrender/

Autumn Surrender 

Immense.

Autumn is a season of sown miracles.

A weather-vane, bleeding red.

Starched auburn perfection.

Old spirits of heaven and earth

torching soil and sky, like love.

 

With turrets of blushing earth piercing air;

Plum tinted, glinting like a rooster's feathery back

celebrating something no one knows anything about

bringing alive the worn-out tyre of the earth.

Nothing prudent about autumn;

it snatches our eyes through open lips.

 

Nothing passive -

it forces us to listen to something other than ourselves.

Our heartfelt moans sink in it,

mottle the sienna maple leaves with treacherous tales.

The cold battles of our minds steal some warmth

from its melting ochre pyres and flow past time.

*********

Land's End - poem published in Stockholm Literary Review

 Land's End

The souls of pavements

and the silence of footsteps 

that have nowhere to go

slope down into the sea

here, at Land's End.

Salt licks air.

Something unfinished

lies in the net of the night

like fallen stars

and the railings 

mating perpetually 

with the sea's spray, 

beckon to leap

into the mess of my past

hoping to become food for fish.

So many sandbags of me

heavy with touch

are lined against the shore's crags.

Vastness floats to me

seeps inside my jute.

I look like earth's lips:

Parched

Parted 

Puckered 

Dry, as all the nothingness

that pants like a tired, broken leaf

seeking Land's End

and then, the endless burn of seas.

*********

Bare of Shade - Published in Stockholm Literary Review

Bare of Shade

They said I'd reach home if I reached your heart.

So I took the odd path

went left 

followed blood trails

rabbit burrows

wizened grass, dry wells.

Until I reached un mended fences

barbed wires, geographical chalk lines, 

morbid like skeletal grins.

Then I went right 

walked through eyes that shone

like sweat in the hollow of the collar bone

followed the scratch of the twig in the mud -

followed wilted tuberoses

strewn on the road like tortured, white, fairy brooms.

Until I reached alphabets, vernacular kick starters  

poetry and the rustling-bamboo flutter of turning pages

jaundiced by sun's mania.

And then I knew

Not reaching

Not settling

Not winning

Not being

I knew that homes are bare of shade.

They hang like dead birds from wires of distance.

Claw at air to send litanies that make even seasoned Gods kneel.

Homes are in those pining gazes we exchange

when we pretend not to look at each other,

aware of the galaxies that so easily keep us apart.

*********

Two Poems in Stockholm Review

I chanced upon the call for submissions to the Stockholm Literary review quite inadvertently. And suddenly many memories of my father's college days in Stockholm, Sweden came alive in my mind. Suddenly the thought of submitting two of my recent writes to the journal seemed more appealing. It seemed to symbolism a personal connection with the place where my father did his masters.

I sent the editors two poems - both freshly written, both particularly special to me. Quite unusually, the editors got back to me in a couple of days stating that they would like to publish both the poems. Of course I was pleased...firstly because they accepted both poems and secondly because their come-back time was so short! Inviting you to read both poems at the link below :-

http://thestockholmreview.org/the-stagnelius-section/vinita-agrawal/

 

Summer We Called Home


Unfulfilled promises jangle like an empty syringe of morphine 

Sprinkling the pain of blockages further into the veins

The chapel at the turn of the street is cob-webbed with morbid confessions

They tar its facade; reduce it to a box of walls when faith disappears

I cannot pray anymore...I am sunk in the creek, in a jungle of letting-go

When rescued, I'll make triangular boats and float them in your name, like water flags

Seasons will come and go and I will continue to sing the songs you wrote for me

From between the jowls of my December mufflers...

...Will continue to torch the corners that failed to receive light

In the spell binding, fleeting, summer of our love...a summer we called home

*********

Nirbhaya Anthology by Kusum Choppra

What happens when women want more from life?

NIRBHAYA is a unique writing project that ropes in sisterhood across generations and takes on the tyranny of unwritten rules, customs and misdemeanours to help women find their place in the sun.  

Strange stories evolve: NIRBHAYA & OTHERS WHO DARED is that Anthology of Hope. 

Nirbhaya’s women are grandmas, mothers, daughters, sisters, wives: brutally gang raped, inhumanly burnt for dowry, shunned from their rightful inheritance, deserted by their families or may be, just living a lifetime ‘adjusting and tolerating’.    

Finally the traumatized, broken spirits lift. They learn to think out of the box, find incredible new age solutions to age-old problems. 

Quietly but firmly they stake out their own space and live in it. No loud speeches, no bra burning; just a new quiet resolve to live their lives with dignity and courage. Doing what is right and simply going about their lives - tacitly challenging anyone who threatens to impose on their space.

The message here is that the new dawn on women's horizons is quiet but promising, soft but with a blazing core of gold and tentative but full of new directions and firm vigour. No atrocities can suppress the beautiful female spirit any longer. 

The proposition is that every female has a Nirbhaya in her that can evolve to take a step forward, sans confrontation, with the confidence of sisterhood. 

To know more about the project and about the author, please visit www.kusumchoppra.com

Here's raising a toast to Kusum for this incredibly relevant work and wishing her book all the success!

 

 

 

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My interview with Jayanta Da in Leap+ - A magazine for Writers in Asia

LEAP+ has been developed as a way to help advance the careers of writers, and for anyone interested in what’s happening in dynamic literary communities around Asia.

With contributions from writers around Asia and beyond, it seeks to provide pragmatic advice on creative writing, editing, literary translation,  finding publishers, opportunities to present new work, and places to find writer peers and mentors. It welcomes ideas and articles from established writers, editors and others willing to share their expertise and experience.

LEAP+ is not a literary magazine. It does not want to duplicate existing resources, and there are now plenty of good online literary magazines produced in Asia. 

My interview with the doyenne of Indian poetry Jayanta Mahapatra is in the current issue of LEAP+. I hope you enjoy the read!

Here's the link: 

http://www.leap-plus.com/the-explosive-art-of-poetry/

Cara's Sweethearts

 

Fox Chase Review is doing wonderful philanthropy work. They've put together a gift basket of poetry books for a fund raising event for Cara's Sweethearts.

Cara’s Sweethearts is an organization that does the right thing by children and their families during their stay at Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia. There is a link to their website at the bottom of this post under the flyer for the fundraiser. I wish them the best.

I too contributed my book to this basket. :) Thank you g Emil Reuter for your good heartedness.

http://foxchasereview.wordpress.com/2014/10/10/gift-basket-for-caras-sweethearts-beats-from-the-heart-fundraiser-10-18/

 

Three Poems in Poetry Pacific

I waited so long to see these three poems published in Poetry Pacific because there was a looong gestation time between submission-acceptance-publication.

Abd then when they were published in May as decided by the Editors I missed seeing them altogether! I was in Vegas then - 5th May :) 

I still have to write a letter of thanks to the editor - Changming Yuan. Will do that straightway after posting the link here for all my readers!

 

http://poetrypacific.blogspot.ca/2014/05/3-poems-by-vinita-agrawal.html

 

POETRY PACIFIC

a literary e.zine for true lovers of words & wisdom

My Poem in Pea River Journal

 

8:04 AM — Vinita Agrawal

I swear no one promotes poets the was Pea River Journal does, once they've accepted your poem. My poem is in the Fall 2014 issue of this journal. Patricia, the editor was gracious enough to post it on their website as per my time here in India though the journal is published from USA. I am touched and needless to say look forward to submitting to Pea River Journal again!

Thank you Trish! 

http://peariverjournal.com/2014/08/22/feature-from-the-fall-issue-vinita-agrawal-summer-we-called-home/