Boki

When Steven Schroeder first talked to me about publishing my poetry, I confess, I didn’t take him too seriously. I had my reasons--I did not believe anymore in the enchantment of words on paper, I had become rabidly anti-publication and I thought that flickering poetry on a computer screen was the best kind of affirmation of beauty, love, life and any other cliché you could think of. I’m exaggerating just a wee bit, but you get the picture. This was almost exactly three years back. After three years of intense and wholehearted procrastination, the book is ready. In these three years I managed to draw/design the cover, make a few illustrations, write an acknowledgements page and read the same poems over and over again. When I dither, I dither well. Only Steven’s silent and steady editorial presence could have seen me through this phase of wondrous dawdling.

Well the book is ready to be sprung upon the world. In a week’s time, Boki will be out. And am I glad that I chose Virtual Artists Collective for my first publishing adventure! Just a look at the home page and reading what it says makes me supremely happy:

Virtual Artists Collective began as the idea of a composer (Clarice Assad) passionate about connecting audiences with music of quality. It grew in a collaboration between Clarice and a poet (Steven Schroeder) in which a poem turned into a song. We began to think about how we could make such miracles happen more often, and this led us to the idea of a virtual collective--virtual because we are widely separated geographically, though the internet makes it possible for us to be in touch at the speed of light. Why not use that, we thought, to facilitate the miraculous things that can happen when people connect around the arts we love? This takes us back to some of the things the internet did best in its earliest days, before it became a commercial venture--increasing access, exchanging ideas, bypassing the Market. And it reconnects us with the much older tradition of guilds through which artists and craftspersons provided mutual support and made themselves visible to communities that appreciated and supported art. We hope, too, that it revives and transforms a tradition of patronage that makes it possible for artists to devote attention to art. Patronage has been associated with wealth and, sometimes, elitism--as well as consumption. But we envision a patronage that is more widely distributed, in which small is beautiful, local connections are facilitated, and communities are cultivated through celebration and mutual support.

Moreover, in the Reading Room page of VAC is a poem about the reading of my poetry by Christopher Kelen. I love what it does to my own words. Do go and read it. While there, don’t forget to check out the pre-publication notice.

Here’s the front cover of the book:




















[click to enlarge]

Watch this space for information about the Delhi launch.
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