Book Review: Naveen Kishore바카라�s 바카라�Mother Muse Quintet바카라�

The sounds that the poet draws us into through his verses reveal a universe that has been neglected or dismissed by us, either knowingly or unknowingly. This universe, informed and enriched by memories, some forgotten, some remembered, some even made up, opens another door of possibilities that had been hitherto hidden from plain sight, as evident in these lines: 바카라�바카라�my retelling of the 바카라�tales바카라� you told me. 바카라�Making up바카라� what had slipped past me. I gave them the happy endings you never had.바카라� The 바카라�you바카라� here is the poet바카라�s mother.

A kaleidoscope of sounds, smells, shadows, and sights, Kishore바카라�s poems are deeply personal but have a universal appeal. The mother, who is at the centre of all the poems 바카라�some just a few lines, others coloured in prose바카라� does not have a static, stagnant, tangible form, and rightly so. 바카라�In my mind, the sari she wore is always a pale pink. Almost ivory. And a chiffon. Let us give her a name, shall we? Mother.바카라� The mother is identified by what adorns her. The first images that one could think of immediately are the softness of the 바카라�pale pink바카라�, the strength of 바카라�ivory바카라�, and the splendour of 바카라�chiffon바카라�, all at once. It is as if the poet has assumed the role of a potter but the spinning wheel is dictating the potter바카라�s hands and not the other way around. Therefore, when the poet writes that it is the 바카라�바카라�seamlessness of remembering that amazes me바카라�, what comes across beautifully is the blending of a mother바카라�s fading memory and her son바카라�s inheritance of the mother바카라�s once agile memory. 

However, there is lament and despair when the poet reconciles with a harsh reality: 바카라�You gifted me my memory. We did not know then that one day you would lose yours.바카라� She does not lose her memory. After all, it stays alive in her son. 바카라�An entire lexicon of memory바카라� is the ultimate gift that the son gives his mother. Also, important to consider is the fact that in the act of recalling, it would be an unfair expectation to have an incident or an event remembered in whole or in a chronological, logical way. No, a memory does not strike with a sense of definitiveness. It is infinite. Because one image leads to another, which in turn clicks open yet another window in our mind바카라�s eye. Every fragment therefore is a whole. The fragment, the shard of glass, the last ray of the sun cannot be treated as broken parts of a whole, each of these fragments make a whole picture. 

This is why when the poet바카라�s mother says, 바카라�Build me a self. She pleaded바카라�, the poet replies, almost taken aback by the request: 바카라�A whole one?바카라� There is no whole. Instead, every crevice, each hole, every crack guides the poet to the memory of his mother, a mother who once had an elephantine memory. The poet comes across as a practitioner of the Japanese art of Kintsugi; except the threads of repair are not washed in gold but mended in black ink on a piece of brittle white.

The recurring image of the white in the foam, fog, clouds, milk, etc., cannot be missed in the verses on memory. White is symbolic. White can mean transcendence. White can mean a state of blankness where you let your imagination flow or scatter on a canvas. No judgement whatsoever. White can mean stillness, blindness, even darkness. Yes, white can assume the cloak of darkness when memory, the act of forgetfulness, and compulsive remembrance all get entangled in a knot because the lines blur in the transformation of recalling to putting it to paper. The metamorphosis may not be always to the liking of the poet much like a potter바카라�s dissatisfaction with the final creation. The invisible gap between the recalling and translating or transcribing is magnified, and the white spaces in the fissures of memory and language demand and crave attention. Screams, silences, and pauses all accumulate in this white. And the potter바카라�s wheel starts spinning again. 

On her 75th birthday, the poet gifts his mother a mirror that she ends up never using. The son always thought why she never had a dressing table of her own. Maybe, there was no need. An entire mirror to see the reflection of what stares back at you? Would it have been unnerving for the mother to see herself in entirety, something she was not used to? Named 바카라�Prem바카라� by her father, the poet called his mother by her name Prem and added 바카라�ji바카라� to it as a mark of respect. Prem means love. Her father wrote screenplays for silent films in the Lahore of the 1930s. And she would enact every scene to her son, remember all the lines effortlessly, and don 20 different characters without losing the nuance or integrity of the plot. 

The poet is mesmerised by his mother바카라�s magical ability to remember, to preserve, to conserve. Soon after, Partition happens. Years pass on, so does the mother, who slips away quietly after nursing a lot of pain and struggle. The poet releases the ashes into the river. What remains is a scar on the palms of his hands. The only gift that a son received from his mother apart from her memory, was this scar 바카라� finally, a gift that could be seen and held.

Mother Muse Quintet is more than just an ode to the memory of a mother. It is a recognition of beauty in fragility, glory in defiance, refuge in silence, and calm in chaos.

(Mother Muse Quintet by Naveen Kishore was published by Speaking Tiger.)