In this poem, A River, AK Ramanujan makes a comparison between old and new poets, the tendency of new poets to plagiarize the old poets and their coldness and negligence towards the naked truth behind human lives and their pains.
‘A River’ by AK Ramanujan is popular poem with no specific rhyme scheme that was first published in Ramanujan’s ‘The Striders‘ in 1966.
A River by AK Ramanujan Summary
Stanza 1
In Madurai,
city of temples and poets,
who sang of cities and temples,
every summer
a river dries to a trickle
in the sand,
baring the sand ribs,
straw and women’s hair
clogging the watergates
at the rusty bars
under the bridges with patches
of repair all over them
the wet stones glistening like sleepy
crocodiles, the dry ones
shaven water-buffaloes lounging in the sun
The poets only sang of the floods.
The poem starts with a small description about river Vaigai which flows in Madurai, city of temples and poets, located in South India. The poet’s in the city used to sing about the cities and temples.
The river Vaigai dries up in every summer, leaving just a small of water in the sand, exposing the sand ribs, straw and women’s hair (which were brought by the water during monsoon) caught up at the watergates at the rusty bars of the bridge built across the river. The bars of the bridge are rusty and have patches of repair all over them because it was built very long ago.
The poet makes a comparison that the wet stones in the river glistening like sleepy crocodiles and the dry stones that look like the shaven water-buffaloes lying in the hot sun. In the last line of this stanza, the poet notes that the poets used to sing only about the floods but they didn’t write anything about what loss or pain the monsoon had brought to the people.
Stanza 2
He was there for a day
when they had the floods.
People everywhere talked
of the inches rising,
of the precise number of cobbled steps
run over by the water, rising
on the bathing places,
and the way it carried off three village houses,
one pregnant woman
and a couple of cows
named Gopi and Brinda as usual.
The second stanza of ‘A River’ starts with the word ‘he’ which refers to the speaker himself. The speaker illustrates what he himself had witnessed when there was a flood in the river. People everywhere in the village began talking about the fast rising water in the river.
The cobbled steps in the river are soon run over by water. There are bathing places here and there in the river that are drowned in the water. Not only this, reportedly the flood carried away 3 village houses, a pregnant woman and also a couple of cows named Gopi and Brinda were carried away by the river.
Stanza 3
The new poets still quoted
the old poets, but no one spoke
in verse
of the pregnant woman
drowned, with perhaps twins in her,
kicking at blank walls
even before birth.
In this stanza of ‘A River’ AK Ramanujan starts blaming the new poems. Though, the new poets wrote something convincing, they just quoted or copied the old poets. There are never willing to write about the sufferings of common people, for example.
None of the new poets speak about the pregnant woman carried off by the flood with probably twins in her womb. It is pathetic that the twins haven’t been born, but died.
Stanza 4
He said:
the river has water enough
to be poetic
about only once a year
and then
it carries away
in the first half-hour
three village houses,
a couple of cows
named Gopi and Brinda
and one pregnant woman
expecting identical twins
with no moles on their bodies,
with different coloured diapers
to tell them apart.
The river is beautiful only once a year i.e., the monsoon. But in just half an hour it carried away three village houses, a couple of cows and a pregnant woman expecting identical twins in her womb who would have no moles on their body. She also fantasized to buy different colours of diapers for each of the twins so that she can avoid dubiety or confusion.
The new poets tend to capture the beauty of the river ‘Vaigai’ and never dare to speak about its other side. The other face of the river is terrific and ugly which is unknown to the people because it’s not carried to people by the poets.
‘A River’ is a free verse which has no fixed meter or rhyme scheme. The language of the poem is straightforward and heavily depends on imagery.
A River: Poetic Devices
The poem ‘A River’ employs several poetic devices. Here is a list of important devices used in the poem:
Imagery
Imagery is a visually descriptive language used in literature to evoke a mental image. AK Ramanujan uses a number of strong imagery in this poem:
- “a river dries to a trickle in the sand, / baring the sand ribs, / straw and women’s hair / clogging the watergates”
- “the wet stones glistening like sleepy / crocodiles, the dry ones / shaven water-buffaloes lounging in the sun”
Simile
Simile is a literary devices which compares two unrelated things, a direct comparison using words “like” and “as”.
- “the wet stones glistening like sleepy / crocodiles”
Repetition
Repetition is a figure of speech where words or phrases are repeated to emphasize the key points of the poem. The following phrases repeated in ‘A River’ with a slight variation in stanza 2 and 4:
- “three village houses, / one pregnant woman / and a couple of cows / named Gopi and Brinda as usual.”
Enjambment
Enjambment is a continuation of a sentence without a pause beyond the end of a line, stanza etc to maintain the flow of the poem. Most of the lines in the poem run into the next line without a pause or punctuation. For example:
- “the river has water enough / to be poetic / about only once a year / and then / it carries away / in the first half-hour / three village houses”