Book Excerpt: 'Book Of Rahim' By Arvind Krishna Mehrotra

'Book Of Rahim & Other Poems' by Arvind Krishna Mehrotra

Published by Westland Books

Westland Books has launched its new academic imprint 'Literary Activism'. 'Book of Rahim' is the first book under the imprint.

Laugh Club of Gandhi Park

In lanes too narrow
for three to walk abreast,
that only peddlers

with goods to sell
from upright bicycles enter,
are modest houses,

modest only in name,
behind whose barred windows,
ornamental gates,

the spikes along the top
painted black and gold,
live family men who can

wiggle their fiery
bellies at will.
You see them

in Gandhi Park,
on opposite benches,
practising their skills,

a smokescreen
of laughter
hiding their faces.

They move in a pack
and eat sprouts
on the way out.

Mistimed
badminton shots
exploding around him,

a metal soldier
with assault rifle
stands guard

and a musical fountain
plays fountain music
in the background.

Extracted with permission from 'Book of Rahim' by Arvind Krishna Mehrotra, published under Westland - ‘Literary Activism’, the new publishing imprint of Centre for the Creative and the Critical at Ashoka University.