12 English Communications Mrs Vanderbom Poems from different cultures Chinua Achebe :: Vultures 2-3 Tatamkhulu Afrika :: Nothing's Changed 4-6 John Agard :: Half-Caste 7-8 Moniza Alvi :: Presents from my Aunts in Pakistan 9-11 Imtiaz Dharker :: Blessing 12-13 Nissim Ezekiel :: Night of the Scorpion 14-15 Lawrence Ferlinghetti :: Two Scavengers in a Truck... 16-17 Grace Nichols :: Hurricane Hits England 18-19 Sujata Bhatt :: from Search For My Tongue 20-21 1
Transcript
12 English Communications Mrs Vanderbom
Poems from different cultures
Chinua Achebe :: Vultures 2-3
Tatamkhulu Afrika :: Nothing's Changed 4-6
John Agard :: Half-Caste 7-8
Moniza Alvi :: Presents from my Aunts in Pakistan 9-11
Imtiaz Dharker :: Blessing 12-13
Nissim Ezekiel :: Night of the Scorpion 14-15
Lawrence Ferlinghetti :: Two Scavengers in a Truck... 16-17
Chinua Achebe was born in Nigeria in 1930 where his father worked for the Church Missionary Society. Achebe is one of the most admired African novelists who write in English. His novels trace Africa's transition from traditional to modern ways. He writes with a mission, and he believes that any good work of art should have a purpose - an idea that stems from the oral tradition of storytelling in Africa. After university, he studied broadcasting at the BBC then worked in Lagos for the Nigerian Broadcasting Service. He married in 1961 and has four children. He became an honorary professor at the University of Nigeria in 1985.
About the poem
The poem begins with a graphic and unpleasant description of a pair of vultures who nestle lovingly together after feasting on a corpse. The poet remarks on the strangeness of love, existing in places one would not have thought possible. He goes on to consider the 'love' a concentration camp commander shows to his family - having spent his day burning human corpses, he buys them sweets on the way home.
The conclusion of the poem is ambiguous. On one hand, Achebe praises providence that even the cruellest of beings can show sparks of love, yet on the other, he despairs - they show love solely for their family, and so allow themselves to commit atrocities towards others.
Key phrases and how they fit into the theme
Key phrase Commentary
Strange...
Strange is isolated in a single-word line. This makes us dwell on the word and prepares us for the image of love settled in an evil place. By the end of the poem, Achebe shows that even the most evil people experience kindred love, but that love is not powerful enough to halt the evil.
...they picked/the eyes of a swollen/corpse...
Achebe picks the most gruesome images he can find when describing the vultures to emphasise their evil. This prepares us for the human evil he goes on to explore.
for in the very germ... is lodged the perpetuity of evil.
It is poignant that Achebe concludes the poem with the idea of the predominance of evil. Evil is lodged within love - and evil is the haunting final word of the poem.
Vocabulary
Words Descriptioncharnel-house (line 26) A vault where dead bodies or bones are piled.
Belsen Camp (line 30)
Bergen-Belsen was one of the most notorious concentration camps of the Second World War. It became a camp for those who were too weak or sick to work and many people died because of the terrible conditions. Anne Frank was interned there and died of typhus in 1945. The camp was liberated in 1945.
kindred (line 49) Related by blood, close family.
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Words Descriptionperpetuity (line 50) Going on forever.
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Chinua Achebe: Vultures
In the greyness and drizzle of one despondent
dawn unstirred by harbingers of sunbreak a vulture
perching high on broken bone of a dead tree nestled close to his mate his smooth bashed-in head, a pebble on a stem rooted in
a dump of gross feathers, inclined affectionately to hers. Yesterday they picked the eyes of a swollen corpse in a water-logged trench and ate the things in its bowel. Full gorged they chose their roost
keeping the hollowed remnant in easy range of cold telescopic eyes ... Strange indeed how love in other ways so particular will pick a corner
in that charnel-house tidy it and coil up there, perhaps even fall asleep - her face
turned to the wall! ...Thus the Commandant at Belsen Camp going home for the day with fumes of human roast clinging rebelliously to his hairy nostrils will stop at the wayside sweet-shop and pick up a chocolate for his tender offspring waiting at home for Daddy's return ... Praise bounteous providence if you will that grants even an ogre a tiny glow-worm tenderness encapsulated in icy caverns of a cruel heart or else despair
for in every germ of that kindred love is lodged the perpetuity of evil.
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Tatamkhulu Afrika: Nothing's Changed
Context
This is an autobiographical poem. Tatamkhulu Afrika (1920-2002) lived in Cape Town's District 6, which was then a thriving mixed-race inner-city community. People of all colours and beliefs lived together peacefully, and Afrika said he felt 'at home' there.
In the 1960s, as part of its policy of apartheid the government declared District 6 a 'whites-only' area, and began to evacuate the population. Over a period of years, the entire area was razed to the ground. Most of it has never been built on.
The poem was written just after the official end of apartheid. It was a time of hope - Nelson Mandela had recently been released from prison, and the ANC was about to form the government of South Africa.
Tatamkhulu Afrika's life
Tatamkhulu Afrika's life story is complicated, but knowing something about it will help you to understand the feelings expressed in this poem.
Tatamkhulu Afrika was brought up in Cape Town, South Africa, as a white South African.
When he was a teenager, he found out that he was actually Egyptian-born - the child of an Arab father and a Turkish mother.
The South African government began to classify every citizen by colour - white, black and coloured. Afrika turned down the chance to be classed as white, and chose instead to become a Muslim and be classified as coloured.
In 1984, the poet joined the ANC (the African National Congress - the organisation leading the struggle against apartheid). Arrested in 1987 for terrorism, he was banned from writing or speaking in public for five years. At this point, he adopted the name - Tatamkhulu Afrika - which had previously been his ANC code name. This enabled him to carry on writing, despite the ban.
Of his own sense of identity, the poet said: "I am completely African. I am a citizen of Africa; I'm a son of Africa - that is my culture. I know I write poems that sound European, because I was brought up in school to do that, but, if you look at my poems carefully, you will find that all of them, I think, have an African flavour."
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Tatamkhulu Afrika wrote this about his poem:
Nothing's Changed is entirely autobiographical. I can't quite remember when I wrote this, but I think it must have been about 1990. District Six was a complete waste by then, and I hadn't been passing through it for a long time. But nothing has changed. Not only District Six... I mean, we may have a new constitution, we may have on the face of it a beautiful democracy, but the racism in this country is absolutely redolent. We try to pretend to the world that it does not exist, but it most certainly does, all day long, every day, shocking and saddening and terrible.
Look, I don't want to sound like a prophet of doom, because I don't feel like that at all. I am full of hope. But I won't see it in my lifetime. It's going to take a long time. I mean, in America it's taken all this time and it's still not gone... So it will change. But not quickly, not quickly at all.
What is Nothing's Changed about?
The poet returns to the wasteland that was once his home, and relives the anger he felt when the area was first destroyed.
He sees a new restaurant: expensive, stylish, exclusive, with a guard at the gatepost.
He thinks about the poverty around it, especially the working man's café nearby, where people eat without plates from a plastic tabletop.
This makes him reflect that despite the changing political situation, there are still huge inequalities between blacks and whites. Even though South Africa is supposed to have changed, he knows the new restaurant is really 'whites-only'. He feels that nothing has really changed.
The deep anger he feels makes him want to destroy the restaurant - to smash the glass with a stone, or a bomb.
Vocabulary
Words DescriptionPort Jackson trees Trees imported from Australia.bunny chow Hollowed out loaf of bread filled with curry.
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Tatamkhulu Afrika: Nothing's Changed
Small round hard stones clickunder my heels,seeding grasses thrustbearded seedsinto trouser cuffs, cans,trodden on, crunchin tall, purple-flowering,amiable weeds.
District Six.No board says it is:but my feet know,and my hands,and the skin about my bones,and the soft labouring of my lungs,and the hot, white, inwards turninganger of my eyes.
Brash with glass,name flaring like a flag,it squatsin the grass and weeds,incipient Port Jackson trees:new, up-market, haute cuisine,guard at the gatepost,whites only inn.
No sign says it is:but we know where we belong.
I press my noseto the clear panes, know,before I see them, there will becrushed ice white glass,linen falls,the single rose.
Down the road,working man's cafe sellsbunny chows.Take it with you, eatit at a plastic table's top,wipe your fingers on your jeans,spit a little on the floor:it's in the bone.
I back from theglass,boy again,leaving small mean Oof small mean mouth.Hands burnfor a stone, a bomb,to shiver down the glass.Nothing's changed.
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John Agard: Half-Caste
The context of the poem
John Agard came to England from Guyana in 1977. Like many people from the Caribbean, he is mixed race - his mother is Portuguese, but born in Guyana and his father is black. One of the things he enjoys about living in England is the wide range of people he meets: 'The diversity of cultures here is very exciting'.
However, one of the things he doesn't like is the view of racial origins, which is implied in the word 'half-caste', still used by many people to describe people of mixed race. The term now is considered rude and insulting.
What is 'Half-Caste' all about?
The speaker in the poem ridicules the use of the term 'half-caste' by following the idea through to its logical conclusion:
Should Picasso be seen as second-rate because he mixed a variety of colours in his paintings? Should the English weather be scorned because it is full of light and shadow?Should the music of
Tchaikovsky, be seen as inferior because he used both the black notes and the white notes on the piano?
Is someone who is called a 'half caste' only half a person?
The poet asks the listener to begin to think in a more open-minded way.
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John Agard: Half-Caste
Excuse mestanding on one legI’m half-caste.
Explain yuselfwha yu meanwhen yu say half-casteyu mean when Picassomix red an greenis a half-caste canvas?explain yuselfwha yu meanwhen yu say half-casteyu mean when light an shadowmix in de skyis a half-caste weather?well in dat caseengland weathernearly always half-castein fact some o dem cloudhalf-caste till dem overcastso spiteful dem don’t want de sun passah rass?explain yuselfwha yu meanwhen yu say half-casteyu mean tchaikovskysit down at dah pianoan mix a black keywid a white keyis a half-caste symphony?
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Explain yuselfwha yu meanAh listening to yu wid de keenhalf of mih earAh looking at yu wid de keenhalf of mih eyean when I’m introduced to yuI’m sure you’ll understandwhy I offer yu half-a-handan when I sleep at nightI close half-a-eyeconsequently when I dreamI dream half-a-dreaman when moon begin to glowI half-caste human beingcast half-a-shadowbut yu must come back tomorrowwid de whole of yu eyean de whole of yu earan de whole of yu mind.
an I will tell yude other halfof my story.
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Moniza Alvi: Presents from my Aunts in Pakistan
Context
Moniza Alvi was born in Lahore in Pakistan, the daughter of a Pakistani father and an English mother. She moved to Hatfield in England when she was a few months old. She didn't revisit Pakistan until after the publication of her first book of poems - 'The Country over my Shoulder' - from which this poem comes.
The poet says:
Presents from My Aunts...was one of the first poems I wrote. When I wrote this poem, I hadn't actually been back to Pakistan. The girl in the poem would be me at about 13. The clothes seem to stick to her in an uncomfortable way, a bit like a kind of false skin, and she thinks things aren't straightforward for her.
I found it was important to write the Pakistan poems because I was getting in touch with my background. And maybe there's a bit of a message behind the poems about something I went through, that I want to maybe open a few doors if possible.
What is 'Presents from my Aunts in Pakistan' about?
The speaker in the poem, who is of mixed race, describes the gifts of clothes and jewellery sent to her in England by her Pakistani relatives.
She is drawn to the loveliness of these things, but feels awkward wearing them. She feels more comfortable in English clothes - denim and corduroy.
She contrasts the beautiful clothes and jewellery of India with boring English 'cardigans/from Marks and Spencer'.
She tries to remember what it was like for her family to travel to England.
Her knowledge of her birthplace, which she left as a baby, comes to her only through old photographs and newspaper reports.
She tries to imagine what that world might be like.
Vocabulary
Words Meaningsalwar kameez Loose trousers and tunic, traditionally worn by Pakistani women.sari The traditional dress worn by women in India and some parts of Pakistan.mirror-work Asian clothing is often decorated in lots of tiny round mirrors.prickly heat Severe itching caused by the heat.
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Words MeaningLahore The poet's birthplace in Pakistan.fretwork Decorative panelling, with cut-outs so you can partly see through it.Shalimar GardensAn ornamental park in Lahore.
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Moniza Alvi: Presents from my Aunts in Pakistan
They sent me a salwar kameezpeacock-blue,and anotherglistening like an orange split open,embossed slippers, gold and blackpoints curling.Candy-striped glass banglessnapped, drew blood.Like at school, fashions changedin Pakistan –the salwar bottoms were broad and stiff,then narrow.My aunts chose an apple-green sari,silver-borderedfor my teens.
I tried each satin-silkentop –was alien in the sitting-room.I could never be as lovelyas those clothes –I longedfor denim and corduroy.My costume clung to meand I was aflame,I couldn't rise up out of its fire,half-English,unlike Aunt Jamila.
I wanted my parents'camel-skin lamp –switching it on in my bedroom,to consider the crueltyand the transformationfrom camel to shade,marvel at the colourslike stained glass.
My mother cherished herjewellery –Indian gold, dangling, filigree,But it was stolen from our car.The presents were radiant in my wardrobe.My aunts requested cardigansfrom Marks and Spencers.
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My salwar kameezdidn't impress the schoolfriendwho sat on my bed, asked to seemy weekend clothes.But often I admired the mirror-work,tried to glimpse myselfin the miniatureglass circles, recall the storyhow the three of ussailed to England.Prickly heat had me screaming on the way.I ended up in a cotIn my English grandmother's dining-room,found myself alone,playing with a tin-boat.
I pictured myBirthplacefrom fifties' photographs.When I was olderthere was conflict, a fractured landthrobbing through newsprint.Sometimes I saw Lahore –my aunts in shaded rooms,screened from male visitors,sorting presents,wrapping them in tissue.
Or there were beggars,sweeper-girlsand I was there –of no fixed nationality,staring through fretworkat the Shalimar Gardens.
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Imtiaz Dharker: Blessing
Context
Imtiaz Dharker lives in Mumbai in India where, during the dry season, the temperature can reach 40 degrees. The poem is set in a vast area of temporary accommodation called Dharavi on the outskirts of Mumbai, where millions of migrants have gathered from other parts of India and there is always a shortage of water because it is not an official living area.
In an interview, the poet says:
But when a pipe bursts, when a water tanker goes past, there's always a little child running behind the water tanker getting the bits of drips and it's like money, it's like currency. In a hot country in that kind of climate, it's like a gift. And the children may have been brought up in the city and grown up as migrants, but the mothers will probably remember that in the village they came from, they would have to walk miles with pots to get to a well, to the closest water source. So it really is very precious. When the water comes, it's like a god.
What is Blessing about?
The poem starts with a simple statement: 'There is never enough water', and shows what it is like to be without water.
When the poet imagines water, it is so special it is compared to a god.
When a water pipe bursts, we are shown how the community responds: they collect as much water as possible.
The children enjoy the water and play in it.
Key phrases and how they fit into the theme
Key phrase Commentary
The skin cracks like a pod.
This image of the effect of drought refers to the skin of the earth, which cracks when dry and becomes useless for growing things, and the skin of a seed-pod, which dries up and becomes brittle once it has fallen to earth. But it also reminds us of the pain we feel when our own skin splits...
silver crashes to the ground...
The rushing water, shimmering in the bright sun, shines like silver; but the word also suggests its value to the villagers - like an outpouring of precious metal, which will make them rich.
From the huts/a congregation...
Congregation, like blessing, suggests that the outpouring of water is a kind of holy communion, a religious event - 'the voice of a kindly god.'.
Glossary
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Words Definition MunicipalProvided by the local council.
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Imtiaz Dharker: Blessing
The skin cracks like a pod.There never is enough water.
Imagine the drip of it,the small splash, echoin a tin mug,the voice of a kindly god.
Sometimes, the sudden rushof fortune. The municipal pipe bursts,silver crashes to the groundand the flow has founda roar of tongues. From the huts,a congregation: every man womanchild for streets aroundbutts in, with pots,brass, copper, aluminium,plastic buckets,frantic hands,
and naked childrenscreaming in the liquid sun,their highlights polished to perfection,flashing light,as the blessing singsover their small bones.
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Nissim Ezekiel: Night of the Scorpion
Context
Nissim Ezekiel (1924 - 2004) was born in India to an Indian Jewish family. He studied in Bombay and London.
He wrote eight collections of poetry and won the Akademi Award for a volume called 'Latter Day Psalms'. He was also a renowned playwright, art critic, lecturer and editor.
He is credited with beginning the modernist movement in India and was one of India's best known poets.
What is Night of the Scorpion about?
The poem is about the night when a woman (the poet's mother) in a poor village in India is stung by a scorpion. Concerned neighbours pour into her hut to offer advice and help. All sorts of cures are tried by the neighbours, her husband and the local holy man, but time proves to be the best healer - 'After twenty hours / it lost its sting.'.
After her ordeal, the mother is merely thankful that the scorpion stung her and not the children.
Key phrases and how they fit into the theme
Quotation Commentary
- flash/of diabolic tail in the dark room -
It is hard to know whose opinion this is - Ezekiel's or the neighbours'. Ezekiel initially sees the scorpion quite sympathetically, but, here, it is linked with the devil.
More candles, more lanterns, more neighbours,
Ezekiel seems irritated. More and more peasants are arriving with their lamps and nothing can help his mother. The repetition of more shows how frustrated he is.
Thank God the scorpion picked on me...
By using direct speech, Ezekiel shows his mother's selflessness. He chooses her simple words to end the poem to highlight his love and admiration for her.
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Nissim Ezekiel: Night of the Scorpion
I remember the night my motherwas stung by a scorpion. Ten hours
of steady rain had driven himto crawl beneath a sack of rice.
Parting with his poison – flashof diabolic tail in the dark room –he risked the rain again.The peasants came like swarms of fliesand buzzed the name of God a hundred timesto paralyse the Evil One.
With candles and with lanternsthrowing giant scorpion shadowson the mud-baked wallsthey searched for him: he was not found.They clicked their tongues.With every movement that the scorpion madehis poison moved in Mother's blood, they said.
May he sit still, they said.May the sins of your previous birthbe burned away tonight, they said.May your suffering decreasethe misfortunes of your next birth, they said.May the sum of all evilbalanced in this unreal world
against the sum of goodbecome diminished by your pain.May the poison purify your flesh
of desire, and your spirit of ambition,they said, and they sat aroundon the floor with my mother in the centre,the peace of understanding on each face.More candles, more lanterns, more neighbours,more insects, and the endless rain.My mother twisted through and through,groaning on a mat.My father, sceptic, rationalist,trying every curse and blessing,powder, mixture, herb and hybrid.He even poured a little paraffinupon the bitten toe and put a match to it.I watched the flame feeding on my mother.I watched the holy man perform his ritesto tame the poison with an incantation.After twenty hoursit lost its sting.
My mother only saidThank God the scorpion picked on meAnd spared my children.
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Lawrence Ferlinghetti: Two Scavengers in a Truck...
Context
Lawrence Ferlinghetti was born in 1919 in New York, but he is mostly associated with San Francisco as one of the main poets of the Beat movement. In 1953, he co-founded a publishing house and bookshop called City Lights, which specialised in Beat poetry and became a meeting place for poets and artists.
His first book was published in 1955; he has since written 17 more books of poetry, drama, prose and translation. He often writes about politics and social issues, as seen in Two Scavengers... He was named as San Francisco's first Poet Laureate in 1998.
What is 'Two Scavengers...' about?
The poem describes four people held together for a moment at a red traffic light. There are two scavengers - garbagemen 'on their way home' after their round - and two 'beautiful people', an elegant couple 'on the way to his architect's office'. The garbagemen's day ends where the young couple's begins. The poet compares the two pairs in detail, then seems to ask - at the end of the poem - whether America really is a 'democracy'.
Have a look at these quotations, and our suggestions about how they fit into this theme
Quotation Commentary...the two scavengers up since four am/grungy from their route
We are encouraged to sympathise with these garbagemen who work anti social hours and who become dirty and smelly as a result. The specific detail (four am) and the expressive word grungy make us pity them.
...the cool couple...The elegant couple are not described in as much detail as the garbagemen, as if the poet is less interested in them. He uses a cliché here, the cool couple - which is how they probably think of themselves...
'as if anything at all were possible/between them...'
It seems that the poet would like to believe that the two pairs he describes really could be friends - but the 'as if' tells us he knows that is only imaginary. He feels that democracy hasn't succeeded because communication between the rich and poor is still impossible.
Vocabulary
Words Meaningscoifed (line 13) Styled - she has a casual-looking hairdo.
gargoyle (line 22) A spout in the shape of a grotesque head, used to clear rainwater from old buildings (especially churches).
Quasimodo (line 22) The title character from Victor Hugo's novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame
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Lawrence Ferlinghetti: Two Scavengers in a Truck...
At the stoplight waiting for the lightnine am downtown San Franciscoa bright yellow garbage truckwith two garbagemen in red plastic blazersstanding on the back stoopone on each side hanging onand looking down into an elegant open Mercedeswith an elegant couple in it
The manin a hip three-piece linen suitwith shoulder-length blond hair & sunglassesThe young blond woman so casually coifedwith a short skirt and colored stockingson the way to his architect's office
And the two scavengers up since four amgrungy from their routeon the way homeThe older of the two with grey iron hairand hunched backlooking down like somegargoyle QuasimodoAnd the younger of the twoalso with sunglasses & long hairabout the same age as the Mercedes driver
And both scavengers gazing downas from a great distanceat the cool coupleas if they were watching some odorless TV adin which everything is always possibleAnd the very red light for an instantholding all four close togetheras if anything at all were possiblebetween themacross that small gulfin the high seasof this democracy
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Grace Nichols: Hurricane Hits England
Context
The context of this poem is quite complicated, because it involves the poet's own history of moving between cultures - Caribbean and English - and the wider history of both those cultures.
Grace Nichols grew up in a small country village on the Atlantic coast of Guyana, in the Caribbean. Guyana used to be a British colony, so English literature has always been part of her personal background. In the 1970s, she moved to England, and now lives on the coast of Sussex.
In 1987, the southern coast of England was hit by what was known as The Great Storm. Hurricane-force winds are rarely experienced in England, and the effect on the landscape, particularly the trees, was devastating. In the Caribbean, on the other hand, hurricanes are a regular occurrence, and Grace Nichols had experienced them during her childhood.
Grace Nichols said about the 1987 hurricane:
It seemed as though the voices of the old gods were in the wind, within the Sussex wind. And, for the first time, I felt close to the English landscape in a way that I hadn't earlier. It was as if the Caribbean had come to England.
What is Hurricane hits England about? A woman, living in England, is woken by a hurricane. Addressing the wind as a god, she asks what it is doing creating such havoc in this part of the world
(stanzas 2-5).
She then speaks of the effect the storm has on her personally. She feels somehow unchained, and at one with the world.
She feels that the hurricane has come with a message to her, perhaps to tell her that the same forces are at work in England as in the Caribbean.
Vocabularywords meaning
HuracanThe Carib Indian God of the winds. The Carib Indians were the original inhabitants of the Caribbean Islands, until they were wiped out by European settlers.
Oya and Shango
Oya and Shango are both storm gods - one female, one male - belonging originally to the Yoruban people of West Africa. When, in the 18th and 19th centuries, the people of Africa were transported to the Caribbean to be sold as slaves, they carried their religion with them. At first, the gods were worshipped secretly, but in the 20th century they emerged as symbols of the African side of Caribbean identity. 'Ogun', in Edward Kamau Brathwaite's poem, is also a Yoruban god.
Hattie Hurricanes are given names, by meteorologists, in alphabetical order. Until quite recently, these names were always female. Hurricane Hattie is one Grace
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words meaning
Nichols remembers from her childhood.
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Grace Nichols: Hurricane Hits England
It took a hurricane, to bring her closerTo the landscapeHalf the night she lay awake,The howling ship of the windIts gathering rage,Like some dark ancestral spectre,Fearful and reassuring:
Talk to me HuracanTalk to me OyaTalk to me ShangoAnd Hattie,My sweeping, back-home cousin.
Tell me why you visit.An English coast?What is the meaningOf old tonguesReaping havocIn new places?The blinding illumination,Even as you short-Circuit usInto further darkness?What is the meaning of treesFalling heavy as whalesTheir crusted rootsTheir cratered graves?O Why is my heart unchained?Tropical Oya of the Weather,I am aligning myself to you,I am following the movement of your winds,I am riding the mystery of your storm.Ah, sweet mystery;Come to break the frozen lake in me,Shaking the foundations of the very trees within me,Come to let me know,That the earth is the earth is the earth.
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Sujata Bhatt: from Search For My Tongue
Context
Sujata Bhatt was born in 1956 in Ahmedabad, the largest city in the Indian state of Gujarat, where her mother tongue was Gujarati. Later, her family lived for some years in the United States, where she learned English. She now lives in Germany.
She has chosen to write poems in English, rather than Gujarati. But a number of her poems, including this one, are written in both languages.
This poem is part of a longer poem ('Search for my Tongue'), written when she was studying English at university in America and was afraid she might lose her original language.
In an interview, she says:
"I have always thought of myself as an Indian who is outside India."
Her mother tongue is for her an important link to her family, and to her childhood:
"That's the deepest layer of my identity."
What is from 'Search for My Tongue' about? The poet explains what it is like to speak and think in two languages. She wonders whether she might lose the language she began with.
However, the mother tongue: A person's first language - the one they learn from their mother. remains with her in her dreams.
By the end, she is confident that it will always be part of who she is.
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Sujata Bhatt: from Search For My Tongue
You ask me what I meanby saying I have lost my tongue.I ask you, what would you doif you had two tongues in your mouth,and lost the first one, the mother tongue,and could not really know the other,the foreign tongue.You could not use them both togethereven if you thought that way.And if you lived in a place you had tospeak a foreign tongue,your mother tongue would rot,rot and die in your mouthuntil you had to spit it out.I thought I spit it outbut overnight while I dream,મને હુતંુ કે આબ્બી જીભ આબ્બી ભાષા(munay hutoo kay aakhee jeebh aakhee bhasha)મંે થંૂકી નાબી છે(may thoonky nakhi chay)પરંતુ રાતે્ર સ્વપ્નાંમાં મારી ભાષા પાછી આવે છે(parantoo rattray svupnama mari bhasha pachi aavay chay)ફુલની જેમ મારી ભાષા મારી જીભ(foolnee jaim mari bhasha nmari jeebh)મોઢામાં બીલે છે(modhama kheelay chay)ફુલની જેમ મારી ભાષા મારી જીભ(fullnee jaim mari bhasha mari jeebh)મોઢામાં પાકે છે(modhama pakay chay)it grows back, a stump of a shootgrows longer, grows moist, grows strong veins,it ties the other tongue in knots,the bud opens, the bud opens in my mouth,it pushes the other tongue aside.Everytime I think I've forgotten,I think I've lost the mother tongue,it blossoms out of my mouth.
