Review of Indian poet Sridhala Swamy’s poem ‘Revisions’

 Review of Indian poet Sridhala Swamy’s poem ‘Revisions’

I request readers to read the poem first from the link below and then only my review. Thanks.

https://www.poetryinternational.org/pi/poem/30280/auto/0/0/Sridala-Swami/REVISIONS/en/tile

Sridhala’s poem is straight and appreciating it is easy, but there are plenty of distinctions in this poem. Using major theories or systems that transformed the way we live in a poem, is like the poet grabbing your hand gently and pulling you into the world of keen observation. She has observed things that are patterned and is keen to decipher how the system evolved. The Dewey Decimal System finds a place in this poem. We can infer besides being lover of books, she went deep into finding out how the cataloguing system now used worldwide in libraries. She just prepares the reader to understand that poets transformed a hopeless linear world of homogeneous stereotyped life. Nothing was bright there. Among the ending lines this one is very penchant:

clouds sometimes wheedled a ray out of the sun

This expression gives us the essence of the poem. Sunlight was rare before a poet became a poet. She reminds us poems free your mind. A poet’s freedom in her thoughts and through the expressions in the poems break loose the restrictions institutions including the institution of family and the society impose. Poetry and art are genres where the imagination has no limit and readers feel within the pulsating freedom.

This poem breaks down the typical format of a poem. It’s even far ahead of free verses or modern verses. This liberty and versatility of the genre only makes it superior to other genres. This poem is a model for exploring the possibilities in the genre and the freedom for the creator it offers.