Writing poetry is not everyone’s cup of tea. I know that. But it’s even more difficult to write prose that when read, feels like reading poetry. I love it when that happens! I know few authors who do, and I can almost say with a hundred percent certainty that that expectation will be met even before I read the book.
I remember reading An Inch of Sky a few years back, and some of the haiku in it are memorable. I could even quote them. My struggle with this review (if you can call it that) is that at times, I’m at a loss of words to express the joy I feel after reading a haibun from the collection.
Forget the book for a moment; let’s start with the title, and there’s a poem there too. Raindrops Chasing Raindrops. It’s an observation that many of us might have made, but not put that way. It just paints a scene for me, of a rainy July afternoon, where I look at the rain and see one drop chasing the next in a race to see which will be the first to plop on the earth and release the scent of petrichor. I kid you not, that just gave me goosebumps.
I read the haibun titled “Moon… three quarters”, and that sends me into a trance. The prose is so dream-like and brings images like the rain, one image chasing the one before it. The haiku makes me nod understanding the relation between the prose, the haiku and a moment in life. That’s just “WOW”. I know I’ll be searching… and yes, I’ve returned to read this particular haibun multiple times.
Another one I thought I’d mention is the one titled “Sundown”. Here the images are familiar, painful like a speck of salt has fallen on a wound that I thought had healed. It brings a memory from within, and it’s vivid. I remember the footprints and the prayers, though I can only imagine the snow. If I could quote it in its entirety, I would, but that’s a spoiler, and it wouldn’t be right to deny a reader that experience.
I’ve not explored the form of haibun much, and when I read it, I usually look at the beauty of the haiku in it. Paresh’s works in this book make me contemplate the beauty of the prose laced with poetry. It makes me imagine the experience, place myself in the shoes of some of the points of view from which they are written, and slip slowly away into that world. It makes me want to write, but wonder if I can.
This isn’t a book every reader might understand, or experience in the same way I did. Then again, that’s the beauty of the book. For now, I lay down my pen, and return to the world penned by imagination… to the snow, to coffee rings left somewhere, and to the window, watching raindrops chasing raindrops.
| Book Details | |
|---|---|
| Title: Raindrops Chasing Raindrops | |
| Author(s): Paresh Tiwari | Genre: Poetry |
| ISBN/ASIN: 9788192935584 | Publisher: iWrite Imprint |
No payment was taken for this review. The views expressed here are mine, and they remain uninfluenced and unbiased.
(© Vinay Leo R. @ A Bookworm’s Musing
17th February 2018)
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