Sunny Rain-n-Snow - U Atreya Sarma: Reviewed by: Jaydeep Sarangi

Sunny Rain-n-Snow, U Atreya Sarma, Partridge, 2016, Pp 139
Reviewed by: Jaydeep Sarangi
U Atreya Sarma
Vibrant debut collection by a seasoned writer Atreya, Sunny Rain-n-Snow is veritable image gallery of life. This collection stands apart from many other we read every day. It portrays life’s acts in different forms and shades: dusted, cleaned and bright. An anthology of 63 poems is a package of experiences:
“God turned
All hardness
Into Hills.” (‘Hills’, p. 15)

Poems in this collection trace  joy of living and loving. Poetry is not a deliberate exercise, but, as John Keats very appropriately put it, “ That if poetry comes not as naturally as the leaves to a tree, it had better not come at all”, what in Urdu is known as Aamad. For Atreya , poetry is expression of  supreme joy, a  mind clearing act.There is the pleasure in the recognition of a shared moment followed by a heightened awareness and anxiety. Atreya’s   poems can be read, studied, thought about and  reveal deeper meanings of life’s acts:
“They hint, they suggest
They welcome, they speak (.)” ( ‘Lip-lapping’, p. 69)

Poetic flight moves through emotional snapshots to reach his inner serenity. Atreya Sarma  keeps us hooked. The tone of many poems in this collection is funny and playful:
‘So promised
The invisible rainbow
That would be 
The Holi of Wednesday.” (‘Holi Voice’, p. 121)

Sunil Sharma, a noted poet-academic anchored in Mumbai, writes in the Foreword, Atreya’s poems become ‘anthem for the greens.’ 
“Green leaves
Gazing at red flowers
Turn green with envy ...” (‘A riot of Colours!’, p. 77)
Many poems in this timely collection open the gates for green studies and environmental consciousness. 

The fret that simmers on our brow is a veil. The poet registers  his faith, hope, dreams, and memories. Nothing charges the imagination more actively than a good book of poems. Literature has always been a  ‘portal into another place’, says Catherine Cole, a famous poetess from Australia in a recent interview with Jaydeep Sarangi. Atreya explores that unknown planet:
“You’ll be happy, and regain
The light of your colours(.)”  (‘Holi Voice’, p. 121)

The world seems to be going crazy so a book of poems  can reach out and pull us away from the edge.  Atreya’s sunny poems forecast sunrise in the world where ‘terrorists began to speak’. That serves as a wonderful social function.

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Jaydeep Sarangi

Faculty,Dept. of English
Jogesh Chandra Chaudhuri College
(Univ. of Calcutta)
30,Prince Anwar Shah Road ,
Kolkata: 700033,WB,
Country:: India

-Ph 09477807031
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