MID-TERM ASSIGNMENT FOR WAYS OF READING

1)      Poems based on historical/mythological character

A)     Turing

(Note: Alan Turing is widely regarded as the father of modern computing. His work was cut short by his untimely death by cyanide poisoning, after he was forced to undergo chemical castration for being openly gay. Throughout his lifetime, Turing also expressed a deep interest in fairytales and fantasy. His suicide by taking a bite of a poisoned apple is regarded by many as homage to his favourite story: “Snow White and the seven dwarves”. This poem picks up moments before his suicide, and also fictionalizes how he might have reacted to the opening of Disneyland in the US, which was announced a month before his death)

They are building a park in America.

Not another Blecthley Park.

A different kind. A kinder kind.

One with castles and dragons,

Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse,

All come to life,

Rolling through space and time,

In fantasy’s holy pantomime.

Unless the bloody Americans manage to ruin it too.

Joan would scorn at me for saying it,

“Your hate would never pass the Turing test”.

Neither would theirs, my dear Joan.

A hate that forbids a man from loving another,

A hate that emasculates, and

A hate that brings shame to one’s mother.

An intelligent computer can deceive a human

Into believing that it was human.

But no mathematical equation

Can instill humanity into an ‘intelligent’ human.

(Maybe the Americans can work on it)

Until then

I must sleep the sleep

Of a love that dare not speak its name,

Finding solace in the fruits of my hard work.

And with trembling fingers:

“Dip the apple in the brew/ Let the

Sleeping death seep through/

A symbol of what lies within…

His breath will still, his blood congeal/

Then I’ll be the fairest in the land!”

B)      Ahalya

It started as rough braids along the length of my hair

But soon, with every passing hour

 like beads of sweat trickling down,

The stony silence of my existence

Gained the slipcover of moss.

But that was years ago

The moss doesn’t burn anymore

(Nobody told me that moss burns)

The Morning Glory laced around my finger

Doesn’t do justice to what my beauty was

I know it, and

So does the man who was supposed to be my father

But then became my husband,

He knows it too.

What I do not know is how to

Look my child in the eye,

Try as I might to move them,

But I can’t meet his gaze.

And here he comes

Eyeing my perfect form,

With eyes that would see a civilization across the sea

Raised to the ground.

In his princely fingers lay my redemption.

If I had known what those kind eyes would do,

To a sister born of the same earth

And with their love gone past

It would better be for us

If you were stone…

4) Poems that rely primarily on description

A) The Photo-frame

A single photo-frame

hangs from my bedroom wall.

Everyday, it is the first thing I see

Before I see anything at all.

It’s slightly tilted,

Colours faded,

A thin layer of dust rests on it.

Every other day I wipe the dust off,

Sometimes I gently blow it off.

But it rests undeterred

Part of it’s existence now.

It is an unusual photo frame

Shaped like a little girl’s frock,

Bought when I was one of those little girls

Wearing a frock.

On both sides two puffy purple sleeves,

And a bow around the neck,

Two teddy bears just below the sleeves,

Eyes wide,

The dust giving them grotesque eye-bags,

Hanging heavy with history.

I do not remember the face of the man who took the photograph,

Some stranger on a Digha beach,

My first time on a beach,

Our first time on a beach- me and my sister’s,

Both holding on tight

To a parent each-

My arms around dad

Legs clasped tight

Whatever happens

I knew the wayward sea

Couldn’t beat my father’s might.

It’s not easy to tell that the photo was taken on a beach.

The sea looks grainy like a gravel road

The beach itself cannot be seen.

We are standing right at the shore

Just to be sure

The water didn’t look trustworthy.

And if you look close, very close

Even the shiny silver sunglasses,

Cannot hide the fear in my eyes.

B)  Of Plants growing in Unusual places

There is a plant growing out of my balcony door,

Out of a tiny crevice of earth on the floor.

Taller than my arm now,

It slants outwards

Like the leaning tower of Pisa.

The veins of its leaves stretch from end to end

Like a hungry river gouging at its banks:

In another place and in another time,

You could see a river flowing right outside my balcony door.

Its leaves are fragile

Wilting towards the ground,

And with every raindrop I can almost hear a

“THUDD!”

And every six months when I leave the apartment,

I come back to find it dying.

And every time, within a week

 it magically re-grows.

A plant that needs human company?

Or am I just projecting?

9)Poems based on ‘Maus’

A)     The Honeymoon (based on the chapter of the same name of Part 1 of ‘Maus’)

I am sure it’s too early to know

But I know it nonetheless, that Vladek won’t let go.

The train seemed more cramped than usual to me,

But with his arms around me,

I felt that that I could face it all.

Even flags with spiders scrawled over.

I did everything the doctors wanted me to do:

Phosphates or phosphites,

And tonics, and journeys

And fresh air, and exercise

And waiting for Papa’s letter

Waiting to know that my baby was alright,

Waiting to know that I didn’t have anything

To be guilty about.

But the guilt came still,

And grew nonetheless

And spread like drops of coffee

In a cloud of milk.

It starts with Ms Stefranska and silk,

And of three months spent in the gallows

With Papa’s money to fill the hollow

-ness of what could have been

Death. And sometimes

It goes back even further

To a man with red books bound in leather

And to years of hoping for a revolution,

Waiting and breeding the solution-

“No, Anja. Relax!”

Vladek’s reassurances

And warm embraces

Keep me going.

“Let’s go for a dance!”

They are playing a polka tonight.

It is difficult for me to keep up

Left and Right and Left and Right and Right.

The room is heavy with smoke

My head feels woozy

I loosen my grip on Vladek’s body,

But he senses it in a minute.

“Oi Anja! Did I ever tell you the story

Of my papa’s pillow?”

And then he would begin-

A tale of a carriage ride

A lost pillow, and a will to not die.

At that moment, I didn’t know

What horrors awaited us

Blanketed in snow.

All that was to be lost,

All that would never be past,

Of train rides and ghettoes unknown,

And of friends lost and mercy bestowed.

But Vladek didn’t seem to care.

The story about the pillow hadn’t ended

He couldn’t end it,

Couldn’t stop himself from laughing at his own story

Couldn’t stop himself from trying to fix the world for me…

“I love you, Vladek! Don’t ever leave me!”

B)      The Beginning of the End ( based on the chapter “And here my troubles began” of Maus part 2)

It was the time of many plans

The war was very near to the end

The bombs got closer and closer,

Until

Over a field, we saw one land.

“It’s the Russians! They are going to free us!”

The horizon of red clouds kept getting closer to us.

“The Germans are not going away so easily”

“They’ll burn us!”

“…bomb us?!”

“…take us back to Germany?!”

Or worst still…

Nobody knew what was the worst they could do.

It was the time of discarding plans,

Of leaving behind

A room full of fake passports and half-torn pants.

To join the March

To Death.

No time to stop to catch your breath

"KEEP WALKING!"

No time to trust

"KEEP WALKING!"

No time to bribe

"KEEP WALKING, YOU FILTHY JEW!"

Behind me there is something jumping,

turning and rolling,

could be human, or something else

They maybe killed there a dog,

A mad dog, trying to

Scream and scratch its way back into

Sanity. Or wait.

Maybe it was no dog afterall.

Finally, they led us into a train.

No windows

No food

No water.

But it did not matter to me.

I kept myself fed on snow,

Stole shoes from the dead

"They would never know"

We said to ourselves.

We owed it to the dead,

to keep on living,

on stolen stale bread.

And then one day,

A week or so later, no one really knew

They opened the doors!

They gave us hot coffee, and bread which was not stale!

And we were all so happy

that we almost did not notice,

The cattle-train that we came in

was still full-

Full of the bodies of our brothers

who would never get to enjoy

A cup of hot coffee

And bread which was not stale...