Description
Like flowers from first love, we have pressed poems between the pages of this book. Poems of every orientation, every preference. Lean, shapely, voluptuous. Poems shaped like an hourglass. Those that look like pears. And those that are thin enough to disappear on paper. Poems proud, brash, loud, silent and shy. Those that have come out of the closet and those that do not even know about the existence of the closet. Poems that shout their intent from rooftops and those who gently nudge you. Now they are ready to meet the world. You hold them in the curve of your palm.
Some of the finest contemporary poetic voices from Bangladesh, Canada, India, Israel, Italy, Mexico, Portugal, Scotland, the UK, and the USA make a compelling case for the pursuit of pleasure, for the excitement of the erotic. When explored in a space of consent, the erotic is a formidable force. It is not an easy animal to fathom. Often misunderstood and mistreated, it is trivialised, confused with pornography, considered taboo, too bold or risqué. It is sometimes greeted with a whiff of disapproval and embarrassment and sometimes, even dismissed. This erotic anthology celebrates sex and desire unabashedly. But it also seeks to makes a case for permission, for the celebration of all bodies, genders, and orientations. When it is from a place of consent, even a salt shaker passed across the table is erotic. Finding the erotic in the mundane is an often surprising, and always thrilling experience. That draught of water on a warm afternoon. The silence of snowfall. The anticipation. The gratification. That delight.
SRIVIDYA SIVAKUMAR is a poet, teacher, columnist and speaker. She has two collections of poetry, The Blue Note and the critically-acclaimed The Heart is an Attic. Her weekly column, Running on Poetry, appeared in The Hindu’s MetroPlus for twenty-two months. Her column, Srividya Speaks Poetry currently appears in the online literary magazine, Narrow Road. Srividya is a Best of the Net nominee (2018), and was shortlisted for the WE Kamala Das Poetry Awards 2020.
Poet, artist and editor PARESH TIWARI has been extensively published, especially in the sub-genre of Japanese poetry. A Pushcart Prize nominee, he has two widely acclaimed collections of poetry. His collection of haibun, Raindrops Chasing Raindrops is the recipient of the ‘Touchstone Distinguished Book Awards – 2017.’ He is the co-editor of the International Haibun Anthology, Red River Book of Haibun, Vol 1, and the serving haibun editor of the online literary magazine Narrow Road.
The Poets
Aakriti Kuntal ⁋ Abha Iyengar ⁋ Aditya Pandya ⁋ Ajinkya Shenava ⁋ Alina Velazco-Ramos ⁋ Amit Shankar Saha ⁋ Ammar Aziz ⁋ Arundhathi Subramaniam ⁋ Arya Gopi ⁋ Astha Mittal ⁋ Babitha Marina Justin ⁋ Baisali Chatterjee Dutt ⁋ Basudhara Roy ⁋ Bhaskar Pitla ⁋ Bob Lucky ⁋ Bryan Rickert ⁋ Carole MacRury ⁋ Chandramohan S ⁋ Chuck Brickley ⁋ Dibyajyoti Sarma ⁋ Durga Prasad Panda ⁋ Ellen Bass ⁋ G Akila ⁋ Gayatri Lakhiani Chawla ⁋ Harriot West ⁋ Hoshang Merchant ⁋ Jhilmil Breckenridge ⁋ Kala Ramesh ⁋ Kashiana Singh ⁋ Kavita Ezekiel Mendonca ⁋ Keki Daruwalla ⁋ Kinshuk Gupta ⁋ Kunhhi Kuttan ⁋ Kunjana Parashar ⁋ Madhu Raghavendra ⁋ Malini Bhattacharya ⁋ Meera Nair ⁋ Menka Shivdasani ⁋ Mrinalini Harchandrai ⁋ Mustansir Dalvi ⁋ Nabina Das ⁋ Namrata Kartik ⁋ Namrata Pathak ⁋ Neera Kashyap ⁋ Neha R Krishna ⁋ Nikita Parik ⁋ Oscar Luparia ⁋ Pamela A Babusci ⁋ Pooja Ugrani ⁋ Prathami ⁋ Preetinicha Barman ⁋ Pris Campbell ⁋ Ra Sh (Ravi Shanker N) ⁋ Raamesh Gowri Raghavan ⁋ Rati Saxena ⁋ Rebecca Haque ⁋ Rebecca Vedavathy ⁋ Rich Schilling ⁋ Rochelle Potkar ⁋ Rohini Bannerjee ⁋ Sabreen Ahmed ⁋ Sanjeev Sethi ⁋ Sanket Mhatre ⁋ Shalini Pattabiraman ⁋ Shikhandin ⁋ Smita Sahay ⁋ Somrita Urni Ganguly ⁋ Sudeep Pagedar ⁋ Sudeshna Rana ⁋ Sufia Khatoon ⁋ Sukrita ⁋ Sunil Bhandari ⁋ Susan Nordmark ⁋ Tali Cohen Shabtai ⁋ Terri L French ⁋ Thushara Reddy ⁋ Tuhin Bhowal ⁋ Uttaran Das Gupta ⁋ Vinita Agrawal ⁋
