Strained Verse

"After Gujarat, I remember
the Saryu flowing
Near an ornate temple
the azaan
travels into myself....

After Gujarat, I remember
the Babri Masjid.
Its black domes
on the hillock/gaze past wire,
guns and khaki."

After Gujarat she remembers laburnums exploding from their buds:

"After Gujarat, I remember
frail Amma
at her namaaz."

In Being an Indian, she talks of her grandfather,

"a Sanskrit scholar,
composing his songs
in Braj Bhasha
and seeking pandits,
astrologers."

She can’t understand the sectarian schism.

These poems are intense, but strong feelings do not make poetry. There is an artlessness in some of Qasim’s poetry, which shouldn’t exist in a second volume. Irony and allegory would have been good weapons to use here. Some passages read like a journalist’s report on a riot-stricken town. Thankfully, in its second half, Before Gujarat, her poetry mellows.