PROF. RAM KRISHNA SINGH : A ‘MAN LIKE MILLIONS’ AND YET UNIQUE !

Book Review: Charan Singh Kedarkhandi

Ram Krishna Singh. Knocking Vistas And Other Poems. New Delhi: Authors Press, 2024, Rs. 295/-, Pages 91. ISBN 978-93-6095-669-1

                                                   --Dr Charan Singh Kedarkhandi—

[Dr. Charan Singh Kedarkhandi is currently working as an assistant professor in Government Postgraduate College,  Joshimath, near Badrinath in Uttarakhand. He is a bilingual poet and has published three collections of poetry in Hindi and English, including the much discussed Dancing with the Moon and Other Poems.]

 

 

I don't deify poets or politicians

nor trade in faith for bread

 

I don't sell gods and goddesses

spirit is not my profession

 

nor do I give moral discourse

for life in the next world

 

I am a man like millions

who dream stugggle and die

 

and nobody mourns

my drifty silence….

( 'Here and Now,’ Knocking Vistas and Other Poems, p. 15)

The aforementioned lines best summarize the inspiration, ideology, life , light and legacy of Ram Krishna Singh, retired Professor, Indian Institute of Technology/ Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad, India and  poet, haikuist and tanka writer of global fame and recognition. He is loved and longed for across India in the poetic landscape for his soul-stirring, heart-touching and nerve-racking (psychologically) haiku and tanka,  and his poems have been translated into several languages of the world. Understandably, Prof. Singh is widely popular outside India , including the Arabic speaking countries. He is perhaps the most prolific of contemporary Indian English poets with 25 well received collections of English poems and several significant critical studies of  literary giants like the one on Sri Aurobindo's revelatory epic Savitri: A Legend and A Symbol.

Knocking Vistas and Other Poems is his latest love affair with Life through sublime, soothing and sophisticated poems, published by Authors PRESS in 2024 and written with an avowed aim of an aspiration --  '... an exploration of who we are and what we are.'(Acknowledgement)   Major themes of these 38 poems are love, sex, politics, human relationship, global crisis like war and hunger and human subterfuges and shenanigans galore. The primordial dilemma of Adam in man is also discussed at many places like in the following poem :

half of my mind on God

and the other half on sex :

etenal hunger     (Melting Elements p.52)

The poet is deeply in love with Life, the perceptible existence around and the imperceptible within or Beyond. He loves the world and that's why is concerned for and "deeply involved" in its welfare. Some lines sound like the autobiography of pain and privation, despair and dolour and,  then there is immense optimism and aspiration  in a few other lines. The poet has touched one of the oldest crises of the world --conflict between Israel and Palestine-- through his  the poem 'War In Gaza' :

cursed Gaza awaits

a miracle to rise a new phoneix

to exist with Israel

despite the devil's design

for perpetual desolation   (p.17)

To my mind, each party must search and eliminate the 'devil within’. Butchery must be seen impartially beyond barbed wire and pain must be owned.  Peace and harmony is not a one way path; the seeds of harmony, the soothing song of hope, the ardour of empathy must be expressed by both sides in each battle of the world. Until that happens, there is little that poets can achieve. Dogmatism, blind hatred and relentless rancour of both parties will lead the Gulf, and eventually the world, towards a desolate and dreary cul de sac.

Recent years have witnessed growing distress and shearing stress everywhere. New heroes, new icons , emerging eidolons, new dreams and destinations are being eulogized, endorsed and marketed by the ‘Politics of Deception’. A mighty urge, an engulfing surge is surreptitiously swallowing the salubrious symphony of Satyr. :

in the name of faith and past

bullying the masses seek

 

fresh promises renewed

enthusiasm wrapped in

 

a dream scroll mythologized

to spotlight a Trump  Modi ...

 

for divine descent to make

life happen once again     (Politics of Deception, p.18)

The prescient poet adds, in the very next poem, that something more (similar to the “something” of Frost in Mending Wall ) ferocious, forceful and subtle is changing the minds of Gen-Z and 'climate change' must not be involved in this grave matter. This 'something’ is deftly weaving the plot of pain, the drama of dolour and erecting overnight the walls of divisions which are near impossible to bridge :

they have their priorities

mission to rewrite histories

erase the past and erect

new walls of divisions

 

climate change is no excuse

to mould the minds of Gen-Z…   (Loss, p. 20)

Who will throw the gauntlet before the corridors of chasm, schism, schizophrenic hatred, horrid hubris and mean myopia of man ? One reply is the poet. Another is the prophet of change in everybody's heart . And at times there is no difference between the two.

Some poems are rooted in the poet's deep humanistic empathy and love for the haves not, the less fortunate children languishing in every courtyard of the world from Arizona and Adelaide, from Somalia to Sri Lanka, from Dharavi to Dhaca. Mark the striking empathy for the poor in the poem 'Manouvering’ which is reminiscent of noted Hindu writer Munshi Prem Chand 's story

पूस की रात (Pus ki raat):

With right hand between the thighs

and left leg on the pillow

alone on bed he contorts

his body to manourvre

restlessness in his legs

 

sleeplessly suffers the  chill

for the third night in a row…(Manouvring, p. 35)

How can we sleep well unless everybody sleeps well, with dreams in eyes and food in the belly? Unfortunately,  very little has been done for the less fortunate. The penurious lot still remains plaything for developmental schemes, international debates and national elections. Despite his frail, flailing figure, the poor remains one of the most dominant topics for the pages of poetry, for the strokes of brush, for the rigmarole of politicians, and for the soft blows of chisel !

In the growing, or say deafening, clamour of cacophony , our poet is anguished and enraged for not being  able to listen to his soul, to talk to the inner self, to have a memorable rendezvous with life beyond rage and ruse, rancour and rapacity. He notices Truth being stifled at every step:

I can't hear myself

their noises erase my world

choices are denied–

questions of being wound me

courage and strength fade away

 

noises mute my voice

distract us from the truth…( Noises, p.22)

 

 

Let the world prefer meaningful silence to mean motives and meaningless noise !

 Smile, even 'frozen’,  can change the physical and intellectual temperature of this morose world and infuse life back into the maudlin flutter of Existence. The poet has written, with an unmatched dexterity, on many shades of love. In fact, love (sex included) seems his favourite topic, the very summum bonum of his poetic craft, the core of his creativity, the depth of his dreams for himself and for this world.

Silence —

her eyes word

a wine song  (Love Hides, p.56)

Love must be everybody's favourite fetish instead of hubris and hatred, hoary and gory skulduggery and suicidal swagger. My spiritual master, Sri Aurobindo, writes in the best poetic love of his sadhana , Savitri : He(Love) is still the Godhead by which all can change  (p. 397).

Despite a thousand and three reasons of disbelief, I still believe that one day love shall redeem this world from all ugliness, hideous perversion and prevarication, and open before us the dawn of empathy, oneness and ubiquitous Love. Enjoy this beautiful poem named SMILE :

I can't touch her heart

under the tan skin :

they waver behind the glass

 

hissing through clenched teeth

as I sip my drink

she gives me a frozen smile   (p.25)

One of our deepest or gravest inflictions is the sense of hollowness, the sense of meaninglessness, the never-filling inner conundrum that shears our soul, tears our joy, tramples upon our springs. We are madly after worldly economium. We run for and after the others’ stamp on our deeds and destinies, believing that 'they’ are the one who give us mojo and meaning. Just look at the mad bad race of others’ recognition on social media ! At this juncture of his life, Professor Singh has come to the realization that 'borrowed’ recognition is of no use for a person and his personality :

me and me +

making all

feel whole    (Feel Whole, p. 41)

One of the best and most important business of a poet is to witness life, the drama of Existence, the trauma of man, the awakened foster child of nature. In one of his visits to Varanasi, the eternal abode of Shiva and the elixir-blessing city, the poet sits alone and watches the dance of Death. The blazing flames of unending pyres weave a unique plot of pain, of renunciation, of dolour, of detachment. For some death is life. They feed on the remains and the offering of the pyre. This doesn't remain unnoticed in the eye of the poet:

Manikarnika :

he collects warm ashes

searching gold to live

by country liquor or bread

for starving wife and children    (Knocking Vistas, p. 64)

Worth reading and relishing is one long 'experminental’ poem that covers almost 20 odd pages in the collection. The book rightly reaches on culmination by two different versions of title poem ‘Knocking Vistas’ (three liners and five liners). Professor R K Singh evinces an enviable legacy of Light within him. All his life he has loved his work , teaching, and rendered remaining hours to the pages of Poesy. His books must be read and reflected on, he must be taught in colleges and universities. New researchers should find their oasis in the wisdom of the septuagenarian genius. This is the best that the society can do for the services of the poet and the man. The time is running out fast for us because the poet is hearing the knock of Autumn at his door :

memory full :

fail to store name and number

autumn evening    ( p. 75)

At the end of the book a readable ‘Afterword’  by Kevin Marshall Chopson, artist, poet and experimental filmmaker from Tennessee , America, is attached. It revists the life and legacy of Professor Singh and highlights his contribution to the world of the Word and his matchless mastery over haiku  and tanka, two of the ancient Japanese poetry forms.  Ram Krishna Singh is one of Mr. Chopson's "personal favourites" of poets and his love and admiration for the poet of Walking Vistas is palpable in his words. Basho must be in bliss !