Dr Sutanuka reviews Prof Nandini Sahu’s love poems in A Song, Half and Half – exclusively for Different Truths.

A Song, Half and Half, is a selection of Nandini Sahu’s love poems written between 14^th February 2021 to 14^th February 2022. Sahu writes, “All these poems are about my moods, modes, and more. They are about the roller coaster rides that I had, and of course about the most complex human emotions”. The mood of these poems is unlike her other collections – Sita or Zero Point.

The collection’s opening poem, “A Man Like You”, professes love for her man, Sahu’s poetic personae, when she is in the best of her moods. Sahu explains the logic behind falling in love, “had I been feeling lonely, low, or blue, I would have rather gone to seek therapeutic help because a depressed mind will only transfer depression to her/ his lover. I preferred to fall in love with a man like you.” I am feeling the best of my feelings now —romantic, optimistic, positive — and I pass on these feelings to ‘you’.

You are unceasingly on my cognisance — if they call it love.
You are the man who can finish not just my sentences,
But my thoughts. Are you my Stream of Consciousness,
Or that Objective Correlative that I live in reverence?

In this collection, love poems with a twist create a new trend. “A Relationship with the Self” comes with pearls of wisdom — self-love is essential.

When life comes apart in your hands
When things seem out of control
It’s the best to love yourself.

The titular poem “A Song Written Half and Half” shows the poet at her best. Its innate flexibility allows the poet to insert words and phrases suited to a contemporary register of love poems. When applied precisely, such insertions bring new meaning to the complex emotion called love.

I am capable of an
Epic error in my character —
It’s a cerebral exercise to see the implausible,
A love, prized, cherished.

 “Ahalya’s Waiting” is a re-framing of an old mythical story in the Ramayana. Sahu provides her readers with an alternative reading of Ahalya’s character. This poem is a grim reminder of the pitfalls of the hegemonic attitude of Indian society.

My redemption lies not just in your touch
but in zero tolerance of
any marginalisation.

Humour is another trope in Sahu’s works. In “To Laugh Like You”, the poet deftly uses the pun “General-Body-Meeting”, a dreaded word in academia; however, here, it means the meeting of lovers. “A Parody of Love” is a burlesque where the pseudo-lover is highly disappointed with the cerebral woman. Memory, nostalgia, loss, despair, and let run through the poems in this collection. The poet reveals and conceals, which adds a raw charm to these poems.

I am all ears to you.
Do you know the variance between giving up and
letting go, my man?

In another poem, “An Autumnal Duet”, the mood changes and the poet writes,

I have sprung back
in vivid hues
as your love filters
deep through my soul.

Sahu also re-invents the implausible – love as a text

I shall anyway re-read you as my favourite book
                                            at different stages of my life.
The plot will never change, but my perspective of love may.
For me, love will be enough, nothing more, nothing less,

                                            just any given day!

This self-realisation is an integral part of life; the poet seems to assert that there is love beyond love to accept it because that’s the reality.

Cover image sourced by the reviewer

Dr. Sutanuka Ghosh Roy

Dr. Sutanuka Ghosh Roy is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at Tarakeswar Degree College, The University of Burdwan, India. She is a reviewer, a critic, and a poet. The titles of her books are Critical Inquiry: Text, Context, and Perspectives and Commentaries: Elucidating Poetry, Rassundari Dasi’s Amar Jiban: A Comprehensive Study, Asprishya (The Untouchables, a novel by Sharan Kumar Limbale translated into Bengali). Opera is her debutant collection of poetry.

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