Poetry of Keshav Malik

Art Critic and Poet, Keshav Malik received Padma Shri for his contribution to Literature and Arts by the Government of India in 1991. I have known Keshav Malik from the seventies when his poems were published in international anthologies but primarily in anthologies edited by Pritish Nandy. I remember him from Anees Jung’s Youth Times. I also remember his poem published in Strangertime edited by Nandy during that same period –

To sense what is and what is not of importance
Is of some importance.
Your double in the mirror, for instance
Has little substance
Except a double double in a doting eye’s transparence
And there rediscover self anew in a taking tense(As distinct from the mere mimicking presence).
And be broken your long sleep or trance
In your body’s ambience,
A double gives offence.

Pen Drawing of Keshav Malik by Amitabh Mitra