Poetry at Sangam
Poetry at Sangam showcases poetry in English and translations as well as essays on poetics and news of new releases.
We’re back in the black-and-white era.
In the tea gardens
stand rows of charcoal tea bushes
Birds perch on trees of charcoal
their wings caught in slippery darkness
In a charcoal forest
the cries of charcoal animals
Charcoal fishes float on the Maguri beel,
a thick-dark heat burns
The only colour is of a blood red sky
Nothing remains of Baghjan.
NOTES
Baghjan: In one of the worst tragedies that Assam has faced in recent years, a fire broke out after a natural gas blowout in Oil India’s Baghjan oil field in 2020. While thousands of locals were evacuated, the fire burnt down everything rendering people homeless. The worst affected was the nearby Dibru-Saikhowa National Park, home to a diversity of rare species of flora and fauna.
Maguri beel: The Maguri-Motapung beel is a large wetland that is part of the Lohit river and the Dibru-Saikhowa National Park in Assam’s Tinsukia district. The Baghjan oil leak turned catastrophic to the biodiversity of the Maguri beel as dead fishes surfaced and birds died in large numbers.
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