Poetry Session at KMB 2016 Echoes Lines of Chilean Poet Raul Zurita

KOCHI:
The Biennale Pavilion in Cabral Yard, Fort Kochi, reverberated with soulful renditions from legendary Chilean poet Raúl Zurita as he recited his early work ‘Song for His Disappeared Love’, which is both a poignant and subtly trenchant response to Augusto Pinochet’s 1973 brutal military coup in the South American nation.
He was among six poets participating in an event, ‘An Evening of Poetry with Biennale Artists’, held on the sidelines of Kochi-Muziris Biennale (KMB) 2016. Ouyang Jianghe, Sergio Chejfec, Sharmistha Mohanty, Valerie Mejer Caso and Aleš Šteger were the other artists who recited their poems during the event.
Ouyang Jianghe, a celebrated poet from China, started with one of his famous works ‘Taj Mahal Tears’. The rendition amplified the plight of the Ganga and the Taj Mahal, which is a strong and vibrant poetic reaction against modernity.
Argentinean poet Chejfec recited ‘Simple Language’. “We all are immigrants to languages. Every writer dreams to wield a simple language,” he said.
Mohanty read a poem that was in tune with curator Sudarshan Shetty’s vision for KMB 2016: ‘Forming in the pupil of an eye’.
Mejer Caso presented the nostalgic po
em, ‘From the wave the way’, with a hint of regret and longing. She later recited ‘Of the known and foretold’, which was dedicated to Zurita.
Šteger, who read out excerpts from an anthology of poetry Book of things, explained the underlying concept of the objects communicating with the human beings.
The session was moderated by Anna Deeny Morales, who also translated the poem by Zurita.