Forest Fire Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABACDECFGHIJIKLHMGNO POQ| Of late I have begun to feel a hunger | A |
| To take in with greed like a forest fire that | B |
| Consumes and with each killing gains a wilder | A |
| Brighter charm all that comes my way Bald child in | C |
| Open pram you think I only look and you | D |
| Too slim lovers behind the tree and you old | E |
| Man with paper in your hand and sunlight in | C |
| Your hair My eyes lick at you like flames my nerves | F |
| Consume and when I finish with you in the | G |
| Pram near the tree and on the park bench I spit | H |
| Out small heaps of ash nothing else But in me | I |
| The sights and smells and sounds shall thrive and go on | J |
| And on and on In me shall sleep the baby | I |
| That sat in prams and sleep and wake and smile its | K |
| Toothless smile In me shall walk the lovers hand | L |
| In hand and in me where else the old shall sit | H |
| And feel the touch of sun In me the street lamps | M |
| Shall glimmer the cabaret girls cavort the | G |
| Wedding drums resound the eunuchs swirl coloured | N |
| Skirts and sing sad songs of love the wounded moan | O |
| And in me the dying mother with hopeful | P |
| Eyes shall gaze around seeking her child now grown | O |
| And gone away to other towns other arms | Q |
Kamala Das
(6)
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Sarah Ahmed: Her nerves eating all her desire experiences and spitting out little heaps of ash echo her shouting voice, as do her eyes licking like flames and her nerves consuming all her desire experiences and spitting out small heaps of ash. She also mentions various aspects of life, such as a baby in a pram, lovers behind a tree, and old age, to illustrate the various stages of life and the emotions that she will have to face, just like any other woman who must face the same fate in her life as the poet in a society that marginalises a perfectly normal desire to be free to express, choose, and love as one wishes.
Lark Decipher: Kamal Das, in her poem Forest Fire talks about the various aspects of female life and uses her words to provide an external outlet to her burning, internalised outrage against the various hard and fast rule that the female body and female desires are subjected to by the oppressive patriarchal society. She says that she has the longing to consume everything that she comes across, every restriction, every confinement and then leave nothing of them but heaps of ashes as an act of her defiance. She, in a subtler tone also hints at her sexual longing and her oppressed right to be an equal counterpart to men in her sexual freedom and choice. Her eyes licking like flames and her nerves consuming all the experiences of her desire and spitting out small heaps of ash (in form of her emotions and feelings in the aftermath) also echo her screaming voice for a sexual liberty.
She also talks about different walks of life ranging from a baby in the pram to lovers behind a tree and then old age (most probably speaking to her baby girl lying in the pram) to indicate the different stages of life and the emotions that she will have to go through like any other woman whose has to meet the same fate in her life as the poet in a society which marginalises a completely normal desire to be free to express, choose and love at one’s own accord.
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