The Poetic Tenents Of Nissim Ezekiel Poem by Bijay Kant Dubey

What tenets can we talk of
If the field is unrecognized?
Nissim too had not been aware of
That he would be a poet
Just had been writing,
Trying to dispense and deliver
As fr as possible.

When he started, he had several things
Before him to ask and know,
Indo-English, Anglo-indian,
Indo-Anglican, indo-Anglian,
Indian poetry in English or Indian poetry in English?

Should the Indians write in English? ,
Should one in a second language,
In an alien one,
The other thing, where to get recognition from?

C.R.Mandy the Editor of the Illustrated Weekly of India
Started to publish verse in the periodical
But had not been satisfied with the quality of the verses
And Nissim too is from the same coterie,
A companion of P.Lal, Kamala Das, Shiv K.Kumar.

Nissim came to light as for his foreign education,
Bombay Univ.English department assignment,
Editing of journals and journalistic jobs,
Evolving at snail's pace.

A Jew, Maharashtrian Jew he was
An alien insider,
Suffering from the quest for identity,
Struggling with the theme of Indianness,
How far India is India English poetry?

An evolving poet of an evolving genre of literature
He was in the beginning not a minor poet
But a beginner, a writer of the first poems
And with those making a name
And later emboldening, strengthening the stance.

He became famous as for his sense of modernity,
Convent schooling,
Recreation of Bombay,
Urban life and living, city life and culture,
Parks, plazas, terminuses, malls, gyms,
Flats, skyscrapers, airports, theatres, cinema halls.

Nisim is a convent boy,
A poet of love and free expression
Comic, ironical, entertaining,
A poet of love letters, birthday parties, picnics,
Goodbye parties, tea parties.