Great poetry always bears witness to human sufferings and trauma. It is in standing testimony to the social and political angst of his age that K. Satchidanandan’s Nilkkunna Manushyan transcends the mundane of the everyday and becomes social memory at its trenchant best. Each poem in this collection narrates the story of people who have been wounded by civilisation, and each wound cries out to be seen, to be heard, to be lamented. Often Satchidanandan’s poetry is like a slap on the face that jolts the reader out of complacent subject positions and states of elite indolence.
These are poems penned in the last two years, which, according to the poet mark an era of deep unrest all over the world.
The civil revolts in Turkey, the atrocities in Gaza, the repressions in Syria, socio-cultural crises in India and many other parts of the world, create an angst that fires the poetic mind. Therefore, we encounter a set of poems that narrate wounded geographies and histories. Even as the poet in his brief preface speaks of his travels in South Karnataka, Sri Lanka, Peru, Columbia and Cuba, one sees maps unfolding in his poems, of a world ravaged by wars, poverty, inequalities, and rebellions.
The language and imagery of these poems have a beguiling simplicity, an astute clarity and an amazing intensity. Particularly striking is the metaphor of standing, of being transfixed in protest, defiant of power, rebellious to oppressions and dominions, and denouncing all dictators.
These are poems that celebrate the lone human being who finds the courage to stand up for her/his own right to dignity of life, and the rights of the teeming multitudes around.
The poetic voice betrays a carefully controlled urgency that is touching in its ardour and vigour. Satire, ridicule and parody become powerful weapons in the hands of a seasoned poet, and Satchidanandan does wield them with political rigour and ease.
Many of these poems carry a clarion call against dictatorships of all shapes and shades. The social and sexual politics in Kerala come alive in the twin poem of ‘Nilkkunna Manushyan’ and ‘Chumbanam’ where the poet concludes with radical passion that poetry is an intimate kiss that spills provocatively into public spaces.
‘Sparsham’ is a poignant elegy to sensitivity, reminding a benumbed generation that death is when we cease to touch others and when nothing touches us anymore. ‘Mahabharatham’ asks the simple question of whether mythologies or histories would be any different if wars had been won by the losers.
The ones who are ultimately victorious and triumphant are those who foment wars and not who fight them. The last poem is a firm reminder to Malayalis stricken by linguistic Alzheimer’s that only mother tongue can preserve cultural memories and thus fight the malady of forgetfulness.
This slender volume engages the committed reader in a dialogue with history. Not poetry of the highest order or the poet at his creative best, it nevertheless combines poetics and erotics with politics, giving different registers by which to read the here and the now.
These poems are characterised by a moral realism that becomes a hallmark of the poet’s style. Nilkkunna Manushyan is unique to our age because in the midst of so many travesties of history it pulsates with a passionate conviction that poetry matters, that poetry cannot die as long as the lone human being can stand up to life.
(A column on some of the best reads in Malayalam. The author is director, School of English and Foreign Languages, University of Kerala)
Nilkunna Manushyan
K. Satchidanandan
DC Books
