Twinkling beads
Since my childhood days, I have two brief poems haunting in my mind.
For years and years despite the fact that I had the chance of learning
longer poems and different types of poems commonly known as ballads,
romantic, realistic, sonnets, metaphysical, devotional and other
innumerable genres of well known poetry, these two little poems never
got erased or forgotten. Then came a time when the mind was enveloped in
such poems known from Japan known as Haiku, Vaka and Tanka. Though I had
the chance of reading these poems in English translation I have to be
honest that I never fully well appreciated them due to the lack of
cultural ethos connected with Japanese soil. But given the chance the
two poems I keep on recalling from time to time are as follows:
Little drops of water
Little grains of sand
Make the mighty ocean
And the pleasant land
Later on I discovered that the poem is composed by an unknown poetess
named Julia Carney. The other poem is by the well known poet William
Blake which goes as follows:
To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.
 Though written by two English poets, they had the inner content which
reflects some of our own religious susceptibilities and other nuances. I
am not sure if it is the brevity in the composition which bears a
special significance. But I feel that most memorable poems are brief
both in content and structure.
When I read the latest collection of English poems by Professor
Kamani Jayasekara of the University of Kelaniya titled as Twinkling
Beads, [Godage 2011], I found that most poems centre round factors such
as the sensitivity of being in silence, the value of being humanistic
despite all the external barriers and the ironic behaviour of
individuals which catch the sight as unrealistic etc. This type of poems
is like paintings hung in art exhibitions meant to be seen and
appreciated in isolation. In this manner it is really alarming to see
the views expressed about the very creative process of poetry.
On one side the publishers are rather reluctant to publish
collections of poems, declaring publicly that they are not sold. But the
genre called poetry survives as there are readers who like to read them
in silence. There are poetry competitions about which I really don’t
know how the value is gauged by literary judges. All these go to say
that poetry is written and they are written to be read by at least those
who like them. They are read and enjoyed without much comment.
To be honest I have to say the same about the latest collection of
poems of Kamani Jayasekara. Over the years critics have been trying to
help readers enjoy poetry of all types transcending the geographical
barriers and cultural barriers. But I feel that no definition or a class
room lesson will ever enable a teacher to help his or her student to
grasp what is poetry and how to evaluate and enjoy it in the fullest
sense of the term. A teacher can only guide his /her student to feel the
general pulse of an experience, a thought and/ or any thing else in
terms of literary evaluation by way of a humanistic ideology emerging
out of the entire work. As such poetry is in the strict sense of the
term I presume is generally unteachable. One could only say that such
and such poems are my favourites and such and such a poem did not appeal
to me at all. But the fact remains that the feelings differ from human
to human. It is the way one sees and approaches that matter. Some say
that there are agitational poems written all round the world and some
denote that the folk poems are still the best orally brought down the
centuries. Poetry has been keeping abreast with the changes in the human
evolution. The free verse or blank verse is a result of such an
evolution.
There are poems meant to be read slowly. For me still some of the
metaphysical poems of John Donne remain either misinterpreted or
misunderstood. But the fact remains that I have a sense of feeling about
the expressive experiences embedded in Donne. Similarly some of the
poems written in the orient denoted as mystical poems still remain
complex and rather unenjoyable as far as the common reader is concerned.
The poems of such poets as Tagore, Rumi, and Gibran come to my mind as
examples. However much we try to understand them, they remain to a great
extent alien. As such poetic creations are culture bound and depends for
the most part personal expressions of thought experiences and ideas
In most brief poems of Kamani Jayasekara , compiled in this
collection, a poetic persona is seen who feels and desires to be
undisturbed from turbulences reminiscent of a supreme saintly mind
urging to be meditative and serene humanistic attitude for all
creatures, may it be animals or humans or fauna and flora. The poetic
persona is a spiritual being who is trying to be uncorruptible from the
pangs and agonies of domesticity and humdrum forces of the outer world
where people crave for possessions positions and social climbing.
The poetic persona created by the poetess Kamani Jayasekara is
sometimes ironic to the extent that abhors animal sacrifices torture and
physical and mental harm etc. She is also skeptical about the various
subtleties of the marital life where individuals agree to disagree and
sometimes reticent over matters of common interest [reference could be
made to an example like ‘Indifference’ p20].
This allows the reader to gauge that the poetess is more independent
in her attitude than either romantic or metaphysical poet of the past.
Take for example the poem titled the ‘goats at the kovil’ (p11) is one
such example. Yet another example of irony lies in the poem titled
‘pious Couple’ [p.14] where the narrator sees an old couple visiting a
temple to worship jointly the statues and offer flowers and perform
other religious duties known by them. But they have their individual
wishes ‘
In this manner this collection of poems is possessive of a religious
flavor blended in a free thinking attitude which is neither metaphysical
in a deeper sense nor romantic from another point of view She has her
own way of expression which touches all sensitive areas of a particular
individual’s life structure .Reading through the pages of this poetry
collection one ought to rethink the present role of the academic field
where the poetess visualizes many a pitfall that could be rectified.
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