International Poetry Day has been gaining popularity since it was adopted by the UNESCO in
1999. Goa itself has seen the glory of written words by known poets in
different languages and scripts. Poems related to Goa have been written in
Devanagari as well as Roman scripts of Konkani, Portuguese, English and
Marathi. To celebrate this day, this year, Dogears Bookshop, Margao has planned
an open mic poetry slam for poets to perform their original poems in any
language at 6pm. Goa University Department of Portuguese and Lusophone Studies
in collaboration with CLP-Camoes is also organising a reading session on the
theme ‘The Woman in Literature’ at the Seminar Hall, Faculty of Arts, Block B,
Goa University, Dona Paula from 10amto 1pm.
Christina Dedhai from Porvorim is a second year Arts student at
Dhempe College of Arts and Science, Miramar. She writes poems in English, which
she feels should be easy to understand for a vast audience. “I like writing
relatable poetry with topics that you feel something about but can’t put in
words. I also enjoy writing short poetries that consist of four lines only. I
upload these poems on social media like Facebook and Instagram and I do get
feedback about them through friends and family living abroad,” says Christina.
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Speaking about venues available for poetry performances in Goa,
Christina is happy that newer venues are opening up for poets through colleges.
“There are various competitions at the college level that motivate young poets.
DMC College recently had a college literary festival, called, ‘Rendezvous:
Literary Festival’, wherein a participant had to write and perform a poetry in
a sonnet form based on a novel. I had to write a poem on the main character of
the ‘Animal Farm’. Dhempe College of Arts and Science, Miramar also had a slam
poetry competition, where the students had to present their poetry, and more
recently, St Xavier’s College organised ‘Writer’s Corner’ for poets and writers
from different colleges of Goa. Also, colleges in Goa have quarterly magazines
that feature poetries by the students, which is very motivating,” adds
Christina.
Sandeep Doifode has released a book of 30 poems, ‘Silent
Whispers of the Soul’, under the scheme to provide financial assistance to Goan
authors and publishers by the Directorate of Art and Culture, Goa. He didn’t
stop with just one book and he continues writing poems on Facebook and
Instagram; he was recently the winner of Instapoets, a competition on
Instagram. “Instapoets has a wide audience and if the poem wins the
competition, it is uploaded on their YouTube channel, which has over 300,000
subscribers. Winners are announced every week,” says Sandeep, who is currently
teaching at Sunshine Worldwide School, Old Goa, where he encourages his young
students to write poetry.
“Compared to cities like Mumbai and Delhi, there is nothing much
happening in Goa in the world of poetry. In college, we study classical poems
that are deep in understanding and on philosophical topics, while contemporary
poems focus more on current topics. Slam poetry, which requires the poet to
perform the poem to express themselves, is gaining more popularity but still
more venues are required in Goa,” says Sandeep, whose poems were published in a
publication in Assam, after a delegate came across them at the Goa Literature
and Arts Festival in 2016.
Moving
beyond English poetry, Ashwariya Nair from Pilgao, Bicholim, has tried her hand
at successfully writing poetry in Konkani, Marathi and Hindi. A student of BA
and BEd at Vidya Prabodhini College, Porvorim, she won the second place after
Dattu Naik at the All Goa Konkani Poetry Writing and Recitation Competition at
Goa University. “I like to write about burning issues affecting Goa and women.
Sadly, I feel today’s generation think that poetry is of no use. There should
be younger writers and poets emerging for Konkani Literature because, compared
to Marathi and Hindi, Konkani is minute in literature. I encourage my
classmates and friends to write poems but they want to write only for
competitions or if they are getting soemthing out of those poems. I hope more
writers take up poetry in the future,” says Ashwariya.
