FPL hosts A Conversation on India: Photography and Poetry: Wednesday, May 8 at 7pm

A Conversation on India through Photography and Poetry: An evening celebrating the culture of India featuring photographs by Brenda Gottlieb and poems by Kathryn Lane 

This poetic and visual travel narrative is a journey of the heart and a journey of the soul. Through words and photos, Lane and Gottlieb pull readers into an intensely physical and sensual world, and then go further, into a spiritual world that is at once imaginative and real and compelling. A Conversation on India is an exceptional work of art.

—Lowell Mick White, author of That Demon Life 

Poems and photos are from Kathryn Lane and Brenda Gottlieb's book A Conversation on India.

Rangoli

An older woman drawing art

at her doorstep says

it is auspicious,

a daily ritual, to paint

floor art, wall art,

decorating courtyards, doorways---

a colorful welcome for visitors.

The lines, she says, must be continuous, unbroken,  

to ward off evil spirits, appease deities,

invite all things beautiful to her home.

Rice flour is an offering to Lakshmi,

and serves to feed ants and ravens.

For festivals, Rangoli is painted at sacred spots 

where prayer is practiced.

Geometrical patterns, Lakshmi’s footprints,

a lotus flower, coconut and mango leaves,

designs of elephants or horses, eagles and swans,

all embraced in a circle, finger paintings,

using natural dyes --- tree bark, rose petals, indigo,

or simple chalk lines, folk art, I can bring home

to welcome family, friends and even deities.

Taj

I stood in both sunlight and moonlight,

watching brightness and counterglow

play the marble, change the mood,

a cool breeze flirting with a symbol

enduring beyond Mughal rule.

At sunset, from the banks of the Yamuna river,

I saw its golden glow, through polluted air

and the smoky haze of funeral pyres,

echoing ghosts of a thousand elephants who hauled

slabs of marble, baskets of onyx and white clay for mortar.

I rose before sunrise to see the dome

awakening, radiant, symmetrical,

surrounded by four silent sentries,

and gardens --- so lush, to shield

squalor beyond sandstone walls.

By moonlight I witnessed silvery shadows

obscuring seductive curlicue script, floral designs

in turquoise, sapphire, lapis and carnelian.

Shooting past the dome, a falling star flew by ---

falling just for you.