Pure Silence, Like A Solitary Petal

When the Nepal earthquake hit, The London Magazine carried a Haiku by poet Sudeep Sen on the tragedy: Gods came tumbling down/ in Bhaktapur. Everest/ churned—snow, debris, death.

The haiku is not in the present collection, but it captures something of the talents of a poet who is rapidly becoming the best-known Indian poetic voice of his generation working in English. It was written quickly, published within days of the quake: the sort of command performance one expects from a poet laureate. It is short, effective, evocative. There is no elaborate drawing out of imagery, no dazzling turns of phrase. Sen is spare, understated, deceptively simple in his clarity.