Something That You Forget

The poems in Anika Aditi’s debut collection again and again articulate the anguish of a sensitive soul having to contend with rejection or disappointment in love. Poem after poem express imaginatively the frustration of unrequited love. The poems she writes are sentimental, sad, and, on occasion, even morbid. Loneliness and a feeling of disquiet make the narrator of her poems unable to express delight even when nature appears beautiful to her. Indeed, there is not much hope in the world depicted in these poems. At times, the images Anika comes up with can even border on the surreal, as in this extract: “The moon enshrouded/With its own story/The night’s eye/Closed tight/Shall be back tomorrow/To shine/Maybe a bit brighter than/This very dark night” (A Midnight’s Story). As the lines quoted above suggest, Anika writes feelingly. Her poems leave their mark on the reader because they convey strong emotions with conviction and sincerity. Her poems can move one in their very simplicity as when she writes about, “the hell I’m still surviving in to/Burn my skin even more” (Burn My Skin Even More). They are also easily read and perceived, for she conveys her emotions in clear language and compelling rhythms. Readers will surely take to Anika’s poems because of the way she presents strong feelings in simple but poetic forms. They will no doubt also be struck by the imaginative and expressive qualities of the works of this collection. I hope that Anika will continue to write poetry and eventually take on other themes and experiment a lot more to produce poems for the next stage of her life. Fakrul Alam Professor, Department of English, University of Dhaka