Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih is a member of a Khasi tribe and would invariably feature in the list of outstanding and rooted Shillong poets. Nongkynrih was born at Sohra, in Cherrapunjee, in the state of Meghalaya in the Northeast of India, and is known for his Khasi poems and volumes of English verse: Moments and The Sieve, both published in 1992, and The Yearning of Seeds (2011). He is prominently known as a bilingual poet -- though, he has also written short fiction in both the languages. As stated, the diversity in the Northeast is quite perplexing. There are seventeen notified scheduled tribes in Meghalaya alone, “with all of them breaking up into a complex network of sub-tribes and clans, speaking their own languages and dialects” (Dancing Earth Introduction X). Recognizing this complex web, the historical identity of the tribal clans acutely clings itself to their traditional customs and beliefs. It is formed of an identification and acknowledgement of their folklore, myths, and ethos of ethnicity. As a poet, Nongkynrih is outstanding while dwelling on ethnicity in Meghalaya, preoccupied as he is by the spirit of belongingness to a social group with a common cultural tradition. In this exercise he is similar to some other prominent poets from Meghalaya including Desmond Lee Kharmawphlang, Ananya S. Guha, Esther Syiem, Anjum Hasan and Paul Lyngdoh. Along with D. L. Kharmawphlang, Nongkynrih has contributed to English poetry for two decades. The poets have been branded as ethnic poets or even as “multi-ethnic poets” (Chandra, Das 1). The English poems of Nongkynrih explore Khasi myths, legends and folklore inherent in his native heritage. An instance is the reference to the myth of Nohkalikai. This myth “pervades the bi-lingual poetry of the poets in Shillong”. (Guha)
Another remarkable feature of his poetry is the comprehension and perception of the ecology of his place. ‘Ecology’ is used here in the sense of one’s relationship with the physical environment. The natural picture seen in all the states of the Northeast is quite similar – all of them have a similar ecosystem comprising hills, forests, rivers and varied flora and fauna. The discovered environment in Nongkynrih’s poetry, pervaded by hills, forests and streams is often mysterious in its presence and is imbued with the sacred human-nature, nature-culture interrelationship. Ecology works as a binding factor in the poet’s exploration of identity within traditional values. Images of natural environment are sometimes imaginative, and at times romantic; but are also symbolic in their representation of the poet’s emotional outburst. He expresses a concern for the wearing down of tribal values due to the intrusion of a foreign culture in “Only Strange Flowers Have Come To Bloom”. Here he uses strange wild flowers in the hills to signify foreign powers that break into native cultures:
Another remarkable feature of his poetry is the comprehension and perception of the ecology of his place. ‘Ecology’ is used here in the sense of one’s relationship with the physical environment. The natural picture seen in all the states of the Northeast is quite similar – all of them have a similar ecosystem comprising hills, forests, rivers and varied flora and fauna. The discovered environment in Nongkynrih’s poetry, pervaded by hills, forests and streams is often mysterious in its presence and is imbued with the sacred human-nature, nature-culture interrelationship. Ecology works as a binding factor in the poet’s exploration of identity within traditional values. Images of natural environment are sometimes imaginative, and at times romantic; but are also symbolic in their representation of the poet’s emotional outburst. He expresses a concern for the wearing down of tribal values due to the intrusion of a foreign culture in “Only Strange Flowers Have Come To Bloom”. Here he uses strange wild flowers in the hills to signify foreign powers that break into native cultures:
Another remarkable feature of his poetry is the comprehension and perception of the ecology of his place. ‘Ecology’ is used here in the sense of one’s relationship with the physical environment. The natural picture seen in all the states of the Northeast is quite similar – all of them have a similar ecosystem comprising hills, forests, rivers and varied flora and fauna. The discovered environment in Nongkynrih’s poetry, pervaded by hills, forests and streams is often mysterious in its presence and is imbued with the sacred human-nature, nature-culture interrelationship. Ecology works as a binding factor in the poet’s exploration of identity within traditional values. Images of natural environment are sometimes imaginative, and at times romantic; but are also symbolic in their representation of the poet’s emotional outburst. He expresses a concern for the wearing down of tribal values due to the intrusion of a foreign culture in “Only Strange Flowers Have Come To Bloom”. Here he uses strange wild flowers in the hills to signify foreign powers that break into native cultures:
Yesterday one of my people Killed one of your people And one of your people Killed one of my people. Today they have both sworn To kill on sight. (“Sundori” 2-7) The poet, in an essay, describes this condition as “the menace of the gun and terrorism that came with ethnic cleansing and the growth of militant nationalism whose demands vary from greater autonomy to outright sovereignty” (Poet as Chronicler) Thus, Poetry of the Northeast may be defined, in one way, as the poetry of “psychological and social perplexities” (Dancing Earth xii) that take account of ethnic clashes and insurgency. However, that ‘killing’ or terrorism is a political response of the tribes and not rooted in the Khasi traditional belief-system and practice, is strongly clarified in his poetry: Gestating, she warned me not to kill anything. That was what her ancestors, the old Khasis, had taught her. (“Killer Instincts” 1-4) The title of the above poem is, however, aptly justified when it comes round to assert the internal rage in today’s generation: it was maddening not to be a killer. (“Killer Instincts” 12-13)
If we analyze this traumatic condition we agree with Margaret Zama, who sums up the factors as historical and political trauma of untold suffering and marginalization (Zama xi). Within the concept of marginality, ‘identity’ and ‘difference’ are the principal elements; and the poets of the Northeast attempt at a renewal of their cultural and ethnic identity with a discernment of both. Politically, there remains a much grave recognition of how power brokers and politicians, bureaucrats and the national security lobby have made an “unmitigated mess of conditions” and impoverished the area (Hazarika, Introduction). Lines in Nongkynrih’s poetry give voice to the political negligence and the economic deprivation as in Poverty eats into the hills and squeezesa living from stones and caterpillars (“The Ancient Rocks of Cherra” 3-4)
Subramaniam emphasizes Nongkynrih’s belief that poetry must respond to the exigencies of his time and place (Subramaniam). The modes and concerns within the poet’s preoccupations, therefore, amount to an exceptional poetic sensibility when perceived as responses intrinsic to a poet of the Northeast.
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