triveni spotlight: 3rd March 2025

triveni spotlight A FEATURE EVERY ALTERNATE DAY hosts: Anju Kishore and Mohua Maulik GUEST EDITOR: Dipankar Dasgupta

3rd March 2025

triveni spotlight March 2025

mental hospital     my shadow stays outside

George Swede

Eye to Eye with a Frog, Juniper Press, 1981

Theme: Mystery

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I read a lot of haiku and admit that I can’t connect to everything I read. Some of the poems appeal to me, some don’t. And there are some that I can’t quite grasp and keep coming back to.  

The famous George Swede once wrote to me: 

Keep searching for your own voice. We all begin by imitating poets we admire and then gradually find our own style. 

I have followed his advice. I am yet to find my style, but I think I know now what I am after. 

Keeping this in mind, the only criterion I employed in my selection can be called Excellence. There is no other unique theme for the poems. However, should anyone be looking for more concrete themes, I have assigned to each poem, a theme of its own. These are indicated at the end of the poems. It’s best that I leave it to the readers to decide if they are appropriate. For example, the theme for one of Kala Ramesh’s poems is CLASSIC. For me, classic stands for old gold as in Jane Reichhold. 

I have interpretations for the other themes as well. In all cases though, the poems are more important than the theme titles. What matters is that each one is excellent in my opinion. 

Dipankar Dasgupta

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Thank you for being our next guest editor, Dipankar. An interesting March this promises to be.

_()_ triveni spotlight team