Songs of My Heart: A Young Poet from Puri Singing in Cathartic Ecstasy

Born on November 5, 1987 in Puri, her childhood days were shaped by the sacred vibes of the mystic place to which she belongs.With the strong ideologies of her mother, she has been raised by ideals of discipline and righteousness. Her mother was her class teacher who taught her to value the vitality of time and money. With the golden memories of tranquil blue beaches, she still reflects on her childhood days. Her poems often echo the melancholy of her solitary moments where she craves for her soulmate.

Currently, she is pursuing a doctoral degree in English at CVU. She made her poetic debut with The Essence of Life . In utter pain of betrayal, she tried to evoke her inner feelings on paper and her golden pen gave the readers the songs of her soul. The book, Songs of My Heart, was the outcome of this cathartic process. A foodie as she herself confesses, she takes as her pastime frequenting the local cuisine and Maha Prasad.

As a poet she is trying to unravel the hidden aspects of society and she believes, "Pen is mightier than the Sword". She is trying to create an awareness against injustice through her pen. She has written poems and articles voicing against gender discrimination, female genital mutilation, equality, and awareness regarding menstrual hygiene. All taboo and sensitive topics should be unveiled to break the patriarchal mindset of the society. Inspite of her love of the poetic world, she is also working on a science fiction. She is a crusader against injustice. She does not believe in making future plans . Present is her forte and she believes in her present actions. "Duty is God" she professes. So she works hard. She thinks that the globe needs peace instead of war. She secretly prays to the Almighty for the betterment of the whole world.

Songs of My Heart has for its content the rendezvous with divinity. She sings of the radiant sun, shadowy dreams, and the smiling ocean. It was her heartfelt tribute to the Almighty to inspire her for creating a timeless saga of her emotive state of mind in which a reader may find some similarity of the classical invocations. Sudipta has a pantheistic urge in her love of nature and the poetic tapestry woven in a tranquil ambience reflect her dedication to the Creator of the Universe. The Songs of My Heart recaptures the magnificent grace of nature elegantly . The misery of the melancholic soul is vividly painted in the volume and is transcended in a joyous ecstasy in the final round as often found in a poem of Hopkins. In the titular poem, 'The Song of My Soul' Sudipta writes, "One day You will come /Still my feverish soul claims ,/That one day you will come to my isle / In which I lonely dwell with my solitude."These lines have flashes of Tagore's Gitanjali where God is imagined as the beloved person in poem after poem. Another of Sudipta's poems, 'The Cradle of Life' is no less interesting where she imagines "Life is a fissure / Life is a journey/With so many passengers…It has been driven by many/But all of them failed to make it/By rendering priority to money". This non-materialistic approach is quite interesting from this young woman when others of her age get engaged in material pleasures and fun of life in their hour of leisure.

Sudipta can be called a born poet with a mystic strain in her thinking. Another important ingredient of her poetic make up is the elegiac element. In the poem 'Tears of the Sea' she writes spontaneously: "The sea is adorned with pearl-like tears/Nowadays, we embrace material pleasure /Sea is left without any care / Just like a wasteland , we only adhere to the sensual sphere." Sudipta is not ascetic as such but she feels the profound sorrow that eats into the vitals of modern life like a canker. Those who frequently visit the Puri seabeach for fun, can read the poems of Sudipta to discover a new meaning of the ocean. Our Sweetest Songs are those that tell of saddest thoughts. Life is seen by Sudipta in an opaque lens and the kaleidoscopic variety merges into a plaintive anthem. 'Atonement' is another poem where she prays to God for unpardonable sin "I crave for atonement to pacify my rude mind,/ Never I bow my arrogant body and ruthless soul near you./ I tread on with rebellious views, /Now I yearn to sublimate my wild actions / O God, please forgive my immature reasons." The inscrutable nature of divinity is a constant refrain in her poems and this adds a new dimension to the poetic oeuvre of Sudipta. She is basically following here the Indian tradition of spirituality. But at the same time, we see her as a love-lorn soul. She uses poems as a means of purgation of the soul from all sadness. Sometimes she sounds too philosophic to the point of quizzing for a solution as in the poem In Your Memory, "In the formless world of forms/We often vainly seek their presence / In the murmurs / In their scents/So lost /So faded/ Into the cosmic world of trance." This is a long poem and written in the same strain with the same elevated tenor showing the rise of a poet with promise. We are not the drops in the ocean but the ocean in a drop. This feeling prevails all through in the poetic volume.

Sudipta is a multi-faceted artist and dancer excelling in various fields of art and culture. She has another special feat of writing as a co-author. In fact, she has joined in the capacity of co-author for more than a hundred books. Her book, The Essence of Life is credited with the Amazon Best Seller tag. Her poems won the heart of the readers for their imagery and metaphors pregnant with aphoristic fervor. She garnered numerous accolades from International literary organisations such as Rabindranath Tagore Memorial. She is also a freelancer in newspapers voicing her ire against the injustice at all levels of society. Being a sensitive woman, it is natural that she does not brook gender discrimination and domestic violence against women. Cornel West in Black Prophetic Fire once wrote : "It is a beautiful thing to be on fire for justice… there is no greater joy than inspiring and empowering others –– especially the least of these, the precious and priceless wretched of the earth!" Sudipta's poetic manifesto contains similar vibes.

Dr Ratan Bhattacharjee,

Associate Professor and Head,

Post Graduate Dept of English Dum Dum Motijheel College 

trilingual poet may be reached at profratanbhattacharjee@gmail.com

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