"Terrorist He's Watching'' By Wislawa Syzmborska

Wislawa Szymborska — the Nobel laureate (1996) from Poland was born in 1923 and died in 2012 at the age of 88. As a critic has noted:

Szymborska frequently employed literary devices such as ironic precision, paradox, contradiction and understatement, to illuminate philosophical themes and obsessions. Many of her poems feature war and terrorism. She wrote from unusual points of view, such as a cat in the newly empty apartment of its dead owner. Her reputation rests on a relatively small body of work, fewer than 350 poems. When asked why she had published so few poems, she said: "I have a trash can in my home".

The modern poem “The Terrorist, He is Watching” by Wislawa Szymborska is from the collection View with a Grain of Sand: Selected Poems. The poem has 5 stanzas of varying sizes and shapes. The line lengths are not the same. In addition, there is no discernable rhyming scheme. Through that the writer seems to be trying to convey the sheer irrationality of the acts of terrorism. Looking at the title of the poem “The Terrorist, He is watching” – somebody is watching the bar across the street, and that person is a “He,” a male. This male person who is watching the bar across the street is a terrorist. Usually, things like war and terrorism are considered male prerogatives – only things largely males are capable of. Women are usually considered guardians of life – not destroyers of life. The title is about “The Terrorist” – a particular terrorist known to the poetic persona. The readers are not told who the poetic person is; however, we know he/she has complete knowledge of what is happening at the moment: s/he knows where the bomb is, who has planted it and when it is going to explode. The question is how s/he has come to know these things? S/he cannot be another terrorist as s/he identifies the person s/he is observing as “The Terrorist” which implies that s/he is not one. S/he shares what s/he sees as s/he sees it using the present and future tenses with the reader. The tone the narrative persona initially employs is quite matter-of-fact. However, her/his experience wears down the façade and his indifference disintegrates.   

The bomb in the bar will explode at thirteen twenty.
Now it’s just thirteen sixteen.
There’s still time for some to go in,
And some to come out.

The first line of the first stanza is an end-stop line. In that, the poetic persona tells the reader quite very casually that a bomb is about to explode in a bar at a particular time. In this line the poet uses the simple future tense indicating a certain sense of inevitability. Though the poetic person has access to information, s/he is not going to intervene and stop the tragedy. The readers are not told why the poetic persona is incapable of intervening. Is s/he an undercover law enforcement officer or a journalist who cannot get involved – his/her role is only to report what is happening. One gets the notion that the poetic person might be connected to the military from the way s/he records time. We are told the bomb is set to explode at thirteen twenty (1.20 p.m.). In the second line, another end-stop line, the reader is given the present time. They had just 4 minutes before the bomb would explode, but despite the brevity of the period of time so many things happen and the poetic persona notes all those incidents carefully. The constant references to time – at times down to the precise second – generate suspense and tension. The poet uses enjambment (use of run-on lines) in lines 3 and 4. In them, the poetic persona euphemistically mentions “[t]here’s still time for some to go in, / [a]nd some to come out” – those who walk in, walk into their death and those who walk out, escape death.   

The terrorist has already crossed the street.
That distance keeps him out of danger,
and what a view- just like the movies:

The second stanza is a triplet. In the first end-stop line, the poetic persona states that “[t]he terrorist has already crossed the street” and thereby safe. By crossing the street and waiting to see the result of his diabolical action, the terrorist displays himself to be insensitive, cowardly and evil. He is subjecting others to something he is not willing to experience – through this line the poetess illustrates her criticism against using terrorism as a weapon/tool in order to realize sociopolitical and economic aspirations by certain groups. Those who use terrorism as a weapon to realize their aspirations use innocent people to do so. Unlike in traditional warfare in which the victims at least get an advance warning of the impending violence, terrorists do not give their victims any warning at all. Both the poetic persona and the terrorist have full view of the scene in front of them and the poetic persona concludes that the view looks like something form a movie. The stanza ends in a semi colon indicating that an example would be forthcoming. There is no rhyming scheme; however, the line length is more uniform in this stanza.  After this stanza, the poetic persona’s complete focus is on the victims and the survivors of this act of terrorism; s/he ignores the terrorist completely.        

A woman in a yellow jacket, she’s going in.
A man in dark glasses, he’s coming out.
Teenagers in jeans, they’re talking.
Thirteen seventeen and four seconds.
The short one, he’s lucky, he’s getting on a scooter,
but the tall one, he’s going in.     

In the third stanza the poetic persona offers us a description of the “movie” that is unfolding in front of his/her eyes. The first thing s/he notices is that “[a] woman in a yellow jacket, she is going in.” Here, the poet uses parallelism. The structure of the title is repeated whenever a person is mentioned – noun, noun + verb. Yellow is a colour associated with cheerfulness and hope. Why did she wear that colour that day? Who did she go in to meet? However, the woman is almost certain to die in the explosion. This generates a sense of pathos. In the next line a man wearing dark glasses comes out of the bar which spares his life. Both the man and the woman are grow-ups. Next he notices two teenagers “talking” in front of the bar. He checks time as if to see how close they are to death. Then he sees the “short one” “getting on his scooter” and moving away – he is going to be safe. The poetic persona concludes that it was luck that had saved him – the use of the word “lucky” indicates the sense of relief felt by the poetic persona. At the beginning the poetic persona was an uninvolved observer. However, by the third stanza s/he is becoming emotionally involved with the fates of the people in front of him/her. Then he sees “the tall one” walking into the bar. By walking into the bar he is walking into his death. All the victims of the explosions are unknown to the poetic persona and the terrorist as indicated by the use of “a woman,” “a man” and “teenagers”. The terrorist makes use of these unknown people to make a political statement – he doesn’t seem to have any regard for their lives. For him these people are just a means to an end.

Thirteen seventeen and forty seconds.
That girl, she’s walking along with a green ribbon in her hair.
But then a bus suddenly pulls in front of her.
Thirteen eighteen.
The girl’s gone.
Was she that dumb, did she go in or not,
we’ll see when they carry them out.
Thirteen nineteen.
Somehow no one’s going in.
Another guy, fat, bald, is leaving, though.
Wait a second, looks like he’s looking for something in his
pockets and
at thirteen twenty minus ten seconds
he goes back in for his crummy gloves.

The forth stanza has fourteen lines. The line lengths are quite uneven indicating the tenseness of the moment and its results on the mental state of the poetic persona. The poetic persona checks time four times within the course of the stanza. The stanza begins with the poetic persona checking time. Within the course of three stanzas one minute and forty seconds has passed. Only one minute and twenty seconds is remaining for the bomb to explode. Time is passing rapidly and the poetic persona is conscious of that. Every second decides life and death. Repeated references to the passage of time heightens tension. As soon as s/he has taken his/her eyes off the watch, s/he notices a girl, possibly someone very young, “with a green ribbon in her hair. Green as a colour stands for life and youth. The poetic persona’s view is of the girl being obstructed by the bus that stops in front of the bar. S/he is not sure whether she has gone into the bar or got on the bus. S/he almost callously states that both the reader and s/he would know “when they carry them out.” What s/he means here is that s/he would learn whether the girl has gone in or not when the bodies of the victims would be brought out after the explosion. The poetic person refers to the bodies of the victims as “they” – euphemism. Once again s/he checks time. Twenty seconds has passed and within that short time a person’s fate has been sealed. With a sense of relief, the poetic persona notices that no one goes in. In addition s/he notices “[a]other guy, fat, bald” walking out of the bar with relief and then becomes angry that he should sacrifice his life  with just twenty seconds to spare for the sake of getting his “crummy” gloves. The use of “crummy” to describe the gloves and “dumb” to describe girl illustrates the poetic persona’s concern for the safety of the man and the girl. He is frustrated to see these people walking into their death – and irrationally holds them responsible, ignoring the fact that they are unaware of what is going to happen soon. The anger of the poetic persona could be rooted in her/his inability to save them.  All the people the poetic persona sees are quite ordinary people who are in no way responsible for the grievances of the terrorist. They have to pay with their lives for the aspirations of the terrorist. The poet is raising a valid question about using violence to achieve sociopolitical objectives. Does one have the right to take away another person’s most fundamental right – the right to life – in order to realize his ambitions?  

Thirteen twenty exactly.
This waiting, it’s taking forever.
Any second now.
No, not yet.
Yes, now.
The bomb, it explodes.  

The last stanza has only 6 lines. Like the previous stanza, this too begins with a reference to time: “Thirteen twenty exactly”. Time seems to freeze. That moment seems to stand still. “This waiting,” the poetic persona says, “it’s taking forever”. He wants the explosion to be over and done with – which can be read as insensitivity. However, I would like to think that in his inability to interfere, he feels helpless. At this point, after observing for so long s/he has become emotionally involved with the victims and survivors of this tragedy – it’s too much for him/her. S/he wants closure. The two penultimate lines signal his mind moving back and forth between hope and despair. The last line of the poem - “The bomb, it explodes” – structurally echoes the title of the poem. The poem explores the irrationality and insensitivity of terrorism, the ethicality of using terrorism as a method to realize one objectives and transience of life. Another question raised in the poem is, whether what takes place in the poem – what the terrorist and his victims do – do they happen as a result of destiny or free will?  Szymborska is trying to get the reader to realize the fragility of life and destiny, how precious life is, and how even the smallest of decisions can change everything.

Critical reading

1.      In this poem, the poet presents a common event in contemporary society. How does he/ she make the reader feel it as a common/ familiar situation? A terrorist attack –

a.      conversational tone and lack of exclamation marks drawing attention to heightened feelings – one’s feelings are heightened if one is experiencing something that is extraordinary and rare

b.      use of the “we” to include the reader in the experience

c.      use of the phrase “just like movies”

d.      Everyone in the poem is nameless ordinary people and though time is mentioned repeatedly there is no reference to a specific date – this could happen to anyone, any day. 

e.      Using an ordinary place such as a bar for the setting  

2.      Is the poet conveying the idea that terrorism/ violence has become common in modern society? Yes

3.      What view of the terrorist is conveyed? The poet seems to feel that the terrorist is evil. She conveys this feeling by making the site of the act of terrorism a bar, a place community and good cheer, the victims are all ordinary people – men, women, children and teenagers – who just happen to be in the wrong place in the wrong time and for that “crime” they have to pay with their lives, instead of leaving the sight of massacre, the terrorist positions himself in a place out of danger and continues to watch the scene like a voyeur. He seems to enjoy the fact that he had power over life and death. 

4.      Does the poet convey the idea of destiny/ fate at any point – some are saved by chance? Others rush into fate?

The poet being a western Christian, the reader has to understand the worldview the poem promotes to be that of Christianity. Christianity privileges pre-destiny or design over free will – according to the Bible not even a sparrow would fall from the sky without God knowing about it. In that sense both the instigator and the victims of the bomb attack are enacting a divine plan. This takes free will/agency away from them. It is this sense of everyone being pawns in an invisible grand design that maddens the poetic persona. Through the sense of bewilderment felt by the poetic persona the poet conveys her own idea of the utter incomprehensibility of how destiny or fate operates in our lives.         

My Womb, a Barren Land - by Nisansala Dharmasena Bertholameuze

 

Nisansala Dharmasena Bertholameuze’s My Womb, a Barren Land is an intriguing collection of poetry that resonated in my heart as a woman as well as a fellow human being. I find the book to be quite unique as the poet has made an attempt to illustrate key moments of her poetry pictographically as well. The accompanying paintings instead of becoming a distraction enrich the reading experience by providing reference points to the reader. Some of the dominant as well as recurring themes of the collection are memory, forgetting, journey, war, brokenness, home, identity, intolerance, meeting and parting.

Memory and forgetting

In “A Box Full of Memories” Nisansala explores the idea of memory, the dominant theme of the collection. While cleaning her house she comes across a boxful of things she has collected over the time and probably forgotten. After exploring the content of the box, the poetic persona asks a question I too often ask myself after going through my own numerous boxfuls of memories both literal and metaphorical:

Why do we keep such triggers of memories

Is it for the memories long gone

Recalled by time

Or is it for the feeling of being loved

Once cherished

By family

Friends.

Lovers.

Even strangers.    

Similarly, in “Did You Preserve Your Memories of Me” the poetic persona confesses that she used to press flowers given to her by her lovers as “keepsakes/ [t]o be looked upon many a time” so that she could “feel if the delicate fragrance is still there”.  She asks the reader whether there wasn’t a similarity between the preservation of flowers and memories:

Aren’t memories the same?

Pressed

Preserved

And looked upon

Many a time.

 She acknowledges that memories could be a dark place to be and that “even knowing this/ [w]e still preserve the memories of bygone days.” The poem ends with the seemingly passing question, “Did you preserve your memories of me?” However, I feel that the entire purpose of the poem is getting an answer to that seemingly rhetorical question.   

“In forgotten lands” the devastating realization that one day we all will be forgotten is explored. People we forget are compared to lost languages of which “[n]o words are ever spoken …again.”

The topless braless greenish women with red flowers in their hair in “As We Weep” too weep “[o]ver memories written over memories” and “bodies held and untouched” due to the “utter isolation of the[ir] soul”.

In “Sheets of Memories”, the first poem of the collection, the poet introduces the metaphor of weaving to illustrate the process of storing memories. The woman as a weaver of memories is an age old metaphor. Poets like Emily Bronte, Thomas Hardy, Christina Rossetti and Emily Dickinson have written extensively on the process of making, preserving and letting go of memories. However, the female in the poem referred to as “she” is traumatized by her memories.  Ultimately, she decides to hang herself. For that she uses a rope “[m]ade of sheets of memories”. The tree on which she is going to hang herself has some emotional associations: it was where “she played house with her former self” “once” and for that moment found “bliss”. Reality intrudes: “Real playhouse was spilling out from all corners and nooks.” So, she decides to end her life where she was the happiest. Still, it was not easy to take the final step: “She looked at the noose for a while. A long while.” Then she saw even the memories abandoning her. At that moment, she hangs herself. In a parallel sphere, her younger self finds her still hanging from the tree, “feet swaying in the wind”. Here, using a euphemistic synecdoche the poet illustrates the pathos experienced by the younger self at seeing the end of her older self. The only thing she could do to restore some dignity to the ravaged life she is yet to experience is repair the “chipped nail polish”. The foreshadowing of the inevitable cycle the younger self, too, about to experience generates within the readers’ mind a profound sense of sadness.

The last poem of the collection “Made of Borrowed Dreams”, too, is about memories. It takes the reader back to the first poem in which too memories are woven into a fabric. This time the threads of the fabric of memories come from the various experiences of the poetic persona’s life which are mostly pleasant. But even in the process of weaving the fabric of memories the poetic persona is conscious of the “borrowed” nature of her “dreams” and in extension of life itself.       

Journey

In “An Island of a Man” the female poetic persona is on a pilgrimage to “reach a certain island of a man.” The poet seems to be playing with the now-famous quote “no man is an island” from one of John Donne’s sermons. The man, “like an island,” offers “migrant birds” a momentary refuge. The poetic persona, however, wants to make the island her permanent abode; she wants to give the man-island serenity and receive serenity in return. But the journey is taking a long time: “So she travelled till seven clocks are torn apart/ Till seven walking sticks turn to dust.” So, the question the poet seems to be leaving with the reader is whether such pilgrimages are going to be ultimately fruitless.

The concept of journey is continued in “An Island of Misfit Journeys”. Here too memory plays a crucial role. Here memory makes a casket and “You” is on a pilgrimage “[l]ike a monk meditating/ [w]ith a bowed head” in search of the casket. In the course of the journey, the traveller makes dark memories which keep pace with him “[s]houlders crouching/ [w]ith a darkness unnamed” very much like the sinister presence in Eliot’s “Wasteland”. In the company of such a morbid companion the poetic persona “would look at the sky/ [a]s if looking for the seagulls” but of course it was “a land without the sea.”

Life as a journey and the importance of learning to let go gracefully is illustrated in “Stories Written on Leaves”. The poet charts the brief course of a leaf from spring to summer. When their time comes leaves fall “[n]ever hanging on/ [n]or complaining of the too short life”. They just let go so that they could “pass by breath/ [t]o the next generation of leaves”. The poet feels that the human heart that “hang on with lust and desire” should learn the art of “majestic … bravery of letting go” from a “leaf”. 

War   

Through the short poem “Through the Rubble of History” the poet offers a somewhat apocalyptic vision of a world gone mad. She repeatedly uses paradoxical phrases such as “government’s anarchy” and “flames of postwar peace” to illustrate her vision of the status quo.

In “1989” the poet explores a traumatic personal experience during the infamous Youth Uprising of 1989-90. The need to move on with life despite the tragic nature of one’s experiences illustrated by the poetic persona tentatively attempting to cross the river making use of the “broken wooden bridge” that rocked “with the weight and the wind”. However, in the attempt to cross the small child sees dead fish floating in the water which is being compared to the bodies of the dead insurgents thrown into rivers [n]ever to return home.     

Brokenness

In “My Soul, A Bombed Building” the poetic persona stands outside herself and observes the meaningless hurt her soul had been subjected to which had left it resembling “a bombed” or “ramshackle building” which “[s]tands with bits and pieces missing” or “the ruins of war”. The soul/site of devastation still carries within it “memories of not long ago”. What kind of memories are they? Little by little the shattered soul “[d]rifts away into the valley of sorrow”. This again is a poem that touched the deepest part of my heart.  

Brokenness is the theme of “How We Loved Our Broken Men”, too. The men they loved, according to the poetic persona, were broken and “their loneliness and their bitterness” was too “sour to bear”; still, women like the poetic persona loved them albeit with “a touch of despair” and a “touch of fantasy”. In the last two lines of the poem the poetic persona comes to the realization that not only their men, but they themselves were broken, too.  

Brokenness is the theme of “An Outsider Looking Inside from Time to Time”, too. This time brokenness is a result of barrenness, loss of someone who “had to pass you by”, not being held and kissed, and forgotten memories.    

Home and Identity

In “Sentimental Pieces” the poet explores what constitutes her as a being. She sees herself as a celestial being that has lost her “sense of proportion” and become a sentimental piece.

In “If You Flip Through the Pages of Me” the poet presents the first person poetic persona as an old book. The poetic person stands outside her book-self and sees someone reading the crumbling pages of the book of her life and observes the way the experience affects him/her. However, the ultimate reason for reading the book for the reader is to find the pages containing the chapter that involved him/her.    

Some men, in “Half-opened Books”, the poetic persona says are “like half-open books,” “waves that never reached the heart of the shore,” or “half-opened doors” – “[n]ever actually there/ [y]et, never actually gone.”

The poet finally reveals the secret behind her partiality to green in “No.16”. The poetic persona had been forced to leave a beloved home. Though she had said goodbye to other homes previously saying goodbye to No.16 was difficult as it was “a happy place”. Yet, inevitably “[d]arkness crept in/ [d]arkness always had a way of creeping in”; so, each one of the family members went around their home on a little pilgrimage saying goodbye to “[w]alls vibrating with memories”. In the end, the poetic persona was the last to leave locking the gate behind her. In her hand she carried “a pail turned to color green/ [a]s if too sad to leave behind even a single shade of memory.”

The poetic persona returns to one of the homes she had left behind, “[n]aked” and barefooted in “A Landscape of Loss”. She walks through the “empty shell” of the house which “used to overflow with memories” of the sorrow and laughter of its human occupants. Similarly, her body into which once her beloved “wandered in” is “now a barren land of dreams,/ a landscape of loss.” She predicts that her body that has become an “empty shell” due to her abandonment by her beloved would turn into “ashes in the end/ to be swept away by the wind into the infinite space.”           

In “Unmarked Graves in Unmarked Cemeteries” the first person poetic persona comes to the realization that she is the end product of her “ancestors dying” – something positive born out of the inevitable. The accompanying painting depicts a cemetery on a hillside. The poetic persona (?) is climbing the green-dark hill lit by the light of hundreds of fireflies or stars looking upwards at the lighter coloured sky. The simple dress, like in the previous paintings, is life-affirming red and the woman’s unbound hair waves in the breeze.

“A Ruined Train Track” offers the reader a fresh metaphor in illustrating the painfulness of waiting for a purpose to give meaning to one’s existence. The short poem is profoundly pathetic.            

Intolerance of differences

“He Arrives Sharp at Nine” with its accompanying painting of a sinister looking man who according to the poetic persona looked like “the Hunchback in Notre-Dame” seems to be about intolerance of what is termed “deviant” by society. The poet suffers for loss the “imperfections” that gives this world its various colours and shapes at the hands of the “censorship man”.       

Meeting and Parting      

“Two Hundred and Twelve Bones” with its haunting illustration is about giving up someone the poetic persona loved who has found someone new to love. In the first three lines the poet offers a shattering metaphor of the poetic persona being imprisoned in her own body:

I live in a house made of ghosts and memories

Two hundred and twelve bones

And a cracked rib cage.

 

“Old Pier by the River”, too, deals with a long ago parting. The poetic persona is revisiting the “[o]ld pier by the river” where she used to meet her beloved only to find the landscape changed beyond recognition. She sees a similarity between “the old ruins of …[their] memories” and abandoned site that is slowly being reclaimed by nature. The change has been a result of war that has left a “ruined” “bombarded world” behind it. Still, poetic persona feels that the souls who used to “breath in the river air” are floating into the place “[a]s if to greet their own memories/ [t]hrough worlds of time and compare.”      

In “You Move Music Sheets Within Me” the poet sees the meeting and getting to know one another as beautifully chaotic musical experience; “the ripples of waves/ within a silent pond” - “[a]ll rhyme and rhythm/ [m]eeting at once ”; or a “cascading fall of water”. The poet uses the word “nothing” three times in the poem with positive connotations.

“I Love the Years Within You,” once again is about meeting and the inevitable parting which leaves the poetic persona feeling “[l]onely from the thousand years within [her].”

“As Darkness Descended” takes the reader through a failed suicide attempt in which the poetic persona sees dying as descending into “bliss of nothing” which she compares to “a stone [being] thrown to silent lake” The act creates ripples on the surface while the stone itself finds peace at the bottom sheltered from the trials and tribulations of the surface life. However, the poetic persona gives into the whisper of life it seems.

In “Somewhere in December” the poet looks at a short chance meeting between two people, which had made a strong impact on her. A much older poetic persona looks back at the memory which has become only a “murmur”.

All in all, there is nothing even remotely barren about Nisansala Dharmasena Bertholameuze’s poetic womb. Contrary to the ominous sounding title, her imaginative soul shared with me some of the resonating themes and original metaphors I have read in a while.          

Phoenix: I am a Racist - by Anupama Godakanda - reviewed by Nisansala Dharmasena Bertholameuze

 

A Review: Under a Lovi Tree - by K. K. S. Perera

 

The first time I read the 13 stories of Under the Lovi Tree by K. K. S. Perera in their unedited form I knew that there was something special about them. The stories featured prominently not only people but also felines and canines as well. Thematically, the author is clearly interested in memory, aging, human ethics, and sexuality. Spatiotemporally, the collection touches almost all strata of the human world and extends to embrace parallel realities as well. The author’s refreshing use of the visual image, almost Keatsean at times, makes reading his book a memorable experience.      

“Under the Lovi Tree,” the story the collection is named after, is one of the many stories in which dogs feature prominently. The main theme of the story is the love that most of us feel for our pets and the pain of parting from them. The story begins and ends under a lovi tree. Memory also features conspicuously as a theme in the story. Throughout the story the narrator moves back and forth condensing an experience worth of “ten plus” years. Also, in the background is the narrator’s own fear of his own death. During his conversation with the vet who is treating his ten plus dog who is refusing to eat, the vet says that in human terms Blacky/Kalu-Ura would be in his mid-seventies indicating that it was his time only to realize that it was an insensitive thing to say as the narrator too was in his mid-seventies. The author also gives a critical glimpse of the preoccupation some owners have with the pedigree of their pets which they sometimes use as a way to outshine others who own the so-called pariah dogs. In addition, the author offers ample examples of his mastery over visual imaging and gentle irony in this short story:

The sun shine, greenery and the breeze conspired with each other to create an enchanting environment. Flowers on the tree were teeming with minute bee-like insects gathering honey. Their light humming played second fiddle to the sweet melodies of the magpie-robins that were singing hosannas to the dawn of another day. The tiny yellowish petals of Lovi flowers competed with the withered yellow-brown leaves to reach the ground as they came floating down in rusty golden showers.

The 10^th story of the collection “Kitten and the Old man” features cats and dogs. The narrator, awaiting anti-rabies injection for a cat bite, is having a philosophical conversation with the kitten that bit him about the ethicality of demanding indemnity, identity, life, death, etc. He sees the kitten whom he has named Rosy despite her objections to being branded bounding up onto his hospital bed. He experiences being snuggled up to and being licked by the kitten. Then he sees a girl struggling for life and sends the kitten to check on her. Throughout, the old man drifts in and out of an alternate reality. In the end he arrives at the conclusion that “[k]ittens are angels with whiskers.” Fortunately for the old man, the procedure is successfully concluded and he is discharged. On his way out he peeks into the curtained off bed where the girl was and finds her lying still covered with a white cloth deserted by the medical staff. Then, he raises a question that is thematically central to the collection: “what is LIFE?”         

The narrator of “The Perrero '' features a philosophical female dog ready to fight for her ovaries. In a dream the owner sees himself taking his female dog Lenny to the vet for ovaiohysterctomy. Lenny shoots out of the clinic and protests against the invasive procedure. The owner tries to justify his actions by pointing out he had rescued her from the streets and given her a home and a comfortable life. The lookers-on watch the interaction but do not hear what the dog says. They feel the good natured owner is being taken advantage of by the ungrateful dog and advise him to put the “haughty canine” “in her rightful place.” The dog, on the other hand, accuses the owner and the vet of humiliating her and violating her rights “by giving her painful injections to block her reproductive hormones under the pretext of administering the rabies vaccine.” She accuses the owner of ruining her body as well as …[her] future with injections and surgeries.” She asks whether “[i]t is fair to remove … [her] organs without … [her] consent.” In return the owner gives the dog an ultimatum: either comply or be ready to return to where he had rescued her from. The dog in return rejects “sympathy from humans” and says all she wants is “love and affection in return for … [her] loyalty.” In the end, the dog manages to convince the man to change his mind about the procedure. In this story too the author engages the reader in a philosophical discussion on the “artificiality” of human relations as opposed to the “naturalness” of animal relations.

In “Pets and Humans,” too, the author explores pet-human and animal-animal relations. The two pets of two neighbouring families get into a fight because of the carelessness of one of the children. The owners fight over the incident. Ultimately, the police have to get involved. While the investigation is going on the children find the two dogs attending to each other’s wounds and point that out to their parents shaming them into backing down.           

Out of the few stories that feature humans in the foreground, the first story of the collection “A Pair of Bongos” is about a pair of aged star-crossed husband and a wife. The author maintains their relationship undisclosed in this almost surreal story until the end. Major Gerald Stamboe, an ex-soldier trapped in his painful memories, lives in a dusty rundown house which he has turned into a living mausoleum. He relives his past while his wife creates things of beauty in the form of roses in order to convey her enduring love for her husband. The two boys who stumble upon the pair on their way to find their friend Brindly do not make the connection.

In “One Night’s ‘Cell’-ter”, the protagonist Don Elaris, a 62-year-old nattami of a tea factory is a gambler and drunkard like many male characters in the collection. The story takes place in a remand cell in a police station in Colombo somewhere in the 1970s.  The story offers the kind of mixed communities found in the fringes of any big city that scavenged off its castoffs. The Malay boy from whom Don Elaris used to barter tea dust for salvaged vegetables, the drunken ill-dressed tramp Elaris shared the cell with, Milly the very young woman Elaris is involved with and his first woman Thangamma who was much older than he, all fall into this category. Elaris’ mind is burdened by a petty act of theft he had committed in order to support his habit. So, in the course of the story Elaris is trying to find someone to confess his crime to but no one wants to listen to him. “I can’t hold it anymore. Help me, my dear. Please listen. It’s a matter of minutes. You must! I’m burning inside. I’m in real agony,” he says to a young man called Piyasena. Piyasena, a big onion seller by profession, who shared Elaris’ cell, was clearly unwilling to listen to him. Elaris starts relating his story to the young man despite his initial disinterest and manages to interest him despite himself. He gives a brief history of his life, especially of the women in his life in the course of which he criticises male hypocrisy in demanding virgin wives. He advises Piyasena not to try to “know, comprehend or criticise” women but to “just love them.”  Throughout Elaris suffers from debilitating chest pain and a cough which ultimately claims his life. He leaves his entire worldly wealth - twenty rupees and a gold ring - which he bequeaths to the two women he had been close to, Thangamma and Mili Nona.

The central theme of “The Sound of Light” is memory. The first person narrator Santiago metaphorically goes back in time to his childhood during the witching hour. Back in the past he joins his elder brother on an outing. The two brothers are interested in different things. The elder brother wanted to go to his university and thereafter to the races. The narrator is only interested in buying a torch bulb presumably in order to impress Mary, his sister. Like in many other stories in the collection a dog features prominently. However, unlike in others it has no apparent task to perform in order to drive the plot. The narrator exaggerates his adventures to Mary and then repents lying. He breaks the bulb while trying to show it to Mary. Heart sore, he picks the broken bulb up and hurts himself using the jagged edges. His disappointment is heartbreakingly illustrated by the writer thus:

An occasional scream would echo from the deep mid-sea cliffs. The wind wiped it up into stormy waves smashing into the beach with unchecked fury.”

The old man back in present says that his “affection for the ocean remains unaffected. While observing the ocean he notes the paradoxical “musical stillness” of the dawn. The last paragraph involves all senses of the reader. He finds that “[t]he blowing [ocean wind] carries the fragrance of the dead, the spirit of my childhood days.”          

The 6^th story of the collection, “A Stroll down the Memory Lane,” too, is about memory, aging, death and change. The story unfolds incrementally maintaining suspense on issues of the identity of the characters and their relationship to one another until the very end. At the beginning we find the narrator back in his old neighbourhood after “30-40 years” observing the changes the place has undergone. People have died and houses have been demolished. People have left and new people have moved in. The mighty have fallen to be replaced by new money – all these a lesson on the transience of everything related to human life. The narrator wants more information and looking around notes a man who looked slightly familiar. Later he finds out that Jiney, his source, was the son of Ranja, the neighbourhood thug, who had been murdered by one of his would-be-victims. Ultimately, the narrator manages to direct their conversation to the topic he is really interested in – his friend Kunarasiri whose funeral he has come to attend. He learns that his friend had become an alcoholic, lost everything and spent the last part of his life after being evicted from his house in the village temple. Even his funeral was funded by the community, according to Jiney. Later, Jiney blames Kumare’s wife for his change of fortune. She, according to him, had run away with another man and that had been the cause of the good man’s descent into alcoholism and poverty. Though it is not directly stated, the narrator seems to be the man with whom the wife had eloped with. Walking behind the hearse, he imagines the body of his friend being covered by soil by the mourners which triggers a flashback. The memory triggers a bizarre moment in which he imagines being caught naked with a woman by Jiney’s father Ranja who was wielding a sword. The story ends with the narrator appealing to Jiney for help.           

The love and compassion a brother feels for his blind sister is the theme of “Seeing, as they are”. Nuwan is an artist. His sensitive artistic soul embraces his handicapped sister and attempts to lighten her burden in the warmest possible way. He is never impatient with the many questions she asks him; one may say that he has become her eyes. Through this story the author seems to ask the reader to act compassionately towards those with special needs.     

The last story of the collection, “Petrified in Affection and Love” also deals with love. The author uses Isurumuniya, a well-known archaeological site, as the spatial setting of his story. The temporal setting moves back and forth in time. The story is about the “morality” of human relations and the beauty of setting people one loves free to be happy. The tree-god that curses Weerantha, Harideva, Suni and Harideva’s horse Pavan for the crime of the humans giving into their natural instincts 1600 years ago on the day of the Annual Water Festival stands for the voice of culture that inhibits natural desires in the name of morality and ethics. The sense of pathos generated by the tragic circumstances of the three lovers makes the reader question his/her own sense of morality.   

While “Petrified in Affection and Love” explored love and the physical expression of it in a purer form in a more refined courtly setting, “Mail Train and a Murderer” deals with the same in a more prosaic background. Perasivalam Velu Sinnathambi is a CGR man, who like several other male characters in this selection is addicted to gambling and alcohol. He is attracted to Susilawathi, a married woman who ran the café he bought his food from. Having to vacate his railway quarters, Velu visits the house of the local Madam with the hope of renting a room. Janet Carmen de Cruse, the former cabaret dancer cum courtesan is still in business for the right customer and she clearly finds Velu attractive. During the course of the visit he is introduced to Victorine, another resident whose husband had died just after their marriage under mysterious circumstances. We also learn that Victorine as a young girl had stumbled upon her mother’s extramarital affair. At present, we are told, she is sharing a room with one of the girls who disappears prompting Victorine to ask Janet to undertake a search for her. All this seems redundant information at the point of narration. This is a kind of trademark of K. K. S. Perera’s style of narration. Next we find Velu being accused of killing Janet over some money he had borrowed at a high interest rate to support his addiction. He is sent to prison for fifteen years but is pardoned after nine. Upon getting his freedom he returns to Susilawathi’s café only to find that her husband had died and she had remarried a much younger man. It is in the course of their conversation that Velu learns about the real murderer. It is interesting that Sisilawathi has not come forward on behalf of someone whom she considered special; the writer hints at the intrinsic selfishness of most human beings and the fact that we are motivated basically by self-interest. Still, they spend the night together. Throughout the course of unfolding human drama the noise of the mail train is heard as an ominous background noise.

All in all, K. K. S. Perera offers his readers a fresh look at some of the most fundamental issues human beings have been grappling with in our brief but tumultuous history. His views on love are of a wise older man who has seen much of what the world has to offer but has retained a sense of the ideal despite all that. He is compassionate towards the non-human world and open to the possibility of other realities. Most of all he has the rare ability to see the world and turn what he has seen into vivid word pictures for others to read.