Uncut Poetry

Kintsugi

"She looked at the broken pieces /
of the precious teapot, /
a legacy from her ancestors, /
from ten generations back. /
 
And she looked at her trembling child, /
standing contrite, with her head down, /
waiting for an inevitability, /
already on the brink of tears." /
 
This poem starts with the idea of kintsugi which is the Japanese art of putting broken pottery pieces back together with gold.  It is built on the idea that in embracing flaws and imperfections, we can create an even stronger, more beautiful piece of art. And for most of its length, the poem lingers on how perfection does not have monopoly rights towards beauty.
 
But can everything broken be repaired?
 
There lies the conundrum - it all depends on you. A fallen autumn leaf WILL crumble, but a seed which falls down can - and will - bring forth something sparklingly good.
 
Beyond the fact of an imperfection, is the truth of what we do with that imperfection. We could build with it, around it, on it. Or we could simply sink into it - and dissolve.
 
The choice, like so many things in life, is ours.
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.
Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com
 

The Sublime in the Ordinary

So much of growing up is already burnt ground.
 
Parents are didactic and seem more of a necessary evil, the body is unruly and doesn't listen, boys don't know what to do with their large hands, and whether they should keep or cut their soft moustaches, girls are embarrassed by the uncontrollable changes in their body, and then there are boyfriend problems and the fact that someone has an active sex life and you have none.
 
Growing up then seems less a hope-filled vision and more of a car pile. Nothing ever seems to go right.
 
In this scenario, to have one's head set steady and to figure out what is right, in all the wrong one keeps blundering into,  is what sets the template for the rest of one's life.
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.
Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Fallen Flowers

Some of the most enduring love stories are often the shortest. You meet. You part. There are a million reasons why.
But what these relationships leave behind are often impressions  which are burnt into our beings. The awkward habit, the shameless bravado, the ribald sense  of utter corniness - the unflinching freedom she accorded you just by her presence.
As times go by, and we accumulate relationships like trophies or seek people as refuges, these transient lovers are the ones who, in spite of their absence, have already given life its meaning, who make sure that whatever else might happen, or not happen, in life hereinafter, there's worth they've given which will never get lost.
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Broken Ribs as A Barometer of Love

"Here we are, individuals, / codified with an oath, / learning to be together and to / break free, at the same time, / but, generally, permanently / pissed-off."
Love comes in so many different forms. So many shapes and sizes. Symptoms of love are subtle, varied. They are often, in look and feel, just the opposite of what they actually mean. That's why love demands time, space, observance.
 
It is often couched in hugs and kisses, and often in anger and aloofness. Sometimes it is unrecognizable, because it looks like clinginess, jealousy, even encroachment. You demand - I want space, leave me alone. When all that love is really asking  for is comfort, clarity, coffee together.
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Chemo: As I Battle Myself

It's startling to think how much of our life hangs on the incredibly thin thread of our breath. When illness strikes us, and there are battles to be fought, every bit of our resources - in our body, spirit, soul - fights and loses, fights and loses again. Often, a treatment like chemotherapy is itself a battle. As our skin gets parched, our hair starts to fall, as we bruise and bleed and vomit, it is easy to give up.
 
Till we look into the eyes of someone we love, and we see the despair there, we realize that our lives are never only ours. Every breath is a benediction and our lives are also a gift to those who love us.
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

I Don't Think Poetry Will Save Us. And Yet, and Yet...

I don't think poetry will save us. And yet, and yet... *
 
* Quote from Sarah Kay's letter in Airplane Poetry Movement's "A Letter A Poem A Home"
 
Why poetry? Publishers don't like it, people don't buy it, poets earn virtually nothing out if it. I can't day it better than what the amazing redoubtable poet Arundhathi Subramaniam said about "Why poetry?"
 
"Because it is the art of the murmured voice. If it raises its pitch, it distorts its own reality, compromises its own integrity. It is a reminder of the magic of the whisper, the sorcery of the hushed voice.
 
Because it disrupts all those snug oppositions I otherwise live by: day and night, precision and passion, mystery and illumination, work and play, truth and beauty. Poetry is about allowing lunar concerns into my day. About bringing question marks rather than full stops into my life.
 
Because it reminds me that ideas are crunchy and things smoky. That there are passions of the mind and ideologies of the gut.
 
Because of its suddenness, its distillation, its toxic shock clarity, its verbal single maltness.
 
Because words don’t come easy. And when they do, they’re meant to be watched — not censoriously, with faith but also with caution. That’s because we don’t just use language, we’re used by it. "
 
(Read Arundhathi Subramaniam's essay in full here.)
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com
 
 

How to Hold Love as it Breaks

Showing grace under pressure is love's ultimate testing ground and testament.
There is nothing which shows intent, persistence and faith more than looking beyond the skirmish and the heartburn.
You don't have to be deep in love or in a relationship before realizing that the real engine which drives it is generosity.
Once we recognize that, it doesn't take time to realize that generosity is also what gives life its meaning.
There remains very little difference then between love and the love for life.
Today's poem is speaks of this.
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

An Epitaph Made of Light & Air

An Epitaph Made of Light & Air
 
I want to drift out of this world.
 
Maybe a Cohen playlist in the background,
or even better,
someone reciting my favourite Mary Olivers.
Let there not be pain, I pray,
and let there be a sense of reconciliation,
of everything being the way it was meant to be,
to everything being left the way it was meant to be.
Someone would crack a joke
that I was always fond of the unfamiliar
and this, my final foray into a mystery.
 
And I would wonder what it would be like
to carry my consciousness 
wherever I was meant to be,
if only to embrace old friends
who might be waiting knowingly for me.
 
I would wonder if the words I leave behind
would still ring true after me,
and there would be someone
who would continue loving me,
and think - I know 
that poem was for me.
 
Do put the cloth of my last journey
in an empty room, in the sun's trajectory,
let there be plenty of light and air,
so those who understand would say
what a wondrous poem to leave with.
 
~ Sunil Bhandari
 
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
 
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Sipping Tea in a Rumi Morning

I have so often sat down to write poetry, and all that I actually wanted to do was to sit quietly and do nothing. Sipping tea, getting into my routine, crossing a street, looking out of a window, untangling a small problem, pointing out something beautiful to a loved one.....as I sat on the edge of an evening, and watched a bird delirious in its abandonment and random flight, I knew -  even an unwritten moment could be a poem. And our life is full of poetry, if only we open ourselves to it.
 
This is Uncut Poetry's 50th episode.
 
I've been with you every week with a new poem. And it's been a journey of discovery as much for me as it has been, I hope, for you.
 
Thank you for trusting me, and returning to Uncut Poetry, week after week.....
 
I want to give you a gift, absolutely free, a beautifully designed chapbook of some my poetry. Just because you have been with me.
 
Do go to the link below for this - 
https://linktr.ee/UncutPoetry
 
There's so much still to discover.
 
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The Ageing of Love

Years go by in relationships, and sometimes we feel that this is the nook where we fit in perfectly, and then suddenly we are left bereft of  an anchor to latch onto or a bank to rest our boat against. Why is there never unalloyed comfort even in a relationship of many years? Maybe that is the way the universe ensures we don't take anything for granted. Maybe that is the way we get to know that love with a little tension attached to it ensures longevity rather than the lugubrious version of love which takes itself for granted, and then finds itself alone.
 
Lovers, the next episode will be my 50th in Uncut Poetry. 
 
I would like to thank you for being such an integral part of this journey. I am here because you are here. And I want to give a part of my heart as a gift.
 
Write to me at uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com. I have a chap book of poems which I would like to send to you.  For being with me, for being such a valuable part of my journey. Thank you.
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com