This anthology of poems in English, entitled BEYOND IMAGES, is by Elizabeth Kurian, a multilingual poetess, who is better known as “Mona”, her pen-name, to the poetry lovers of Hyderabad. Apart from English, she writes poetry in Hindi and Urdu and makes her presence felt in the literary field in these languages.

BEYOND IMAGES contains fifty poems which are flavoured with a variety of themes. They reflect the poet’s sensitively felt experiences and moods, ranging from joy, love, pain, mysterious visions and childhood fantasies. She has personified nature also in her poems and touched upon humanity’s universal trials.  She has used very simple language and appropriate words for the desired expression in her mind to express without ambiguity the mood of each poem. The words and ideas seem to flow spontaneously, thereby making the content of the poems leave their impact effortlessly. This selection of her poetry is charged with her deeply felt and subtly expressed feelings.

The twofold fascination for this book is both in its significant poems as well as in the accompanying illustrations by Sushil Thapa, a well known painter of Nepal. His pen and ink line drawings with each poem are well drawn and express with imagination and feeling the mood of the poems. The illustrations have made the book more intelligible and meaningful to the reader and at the same time, have added a distinct charm to the book.

This well designed and well produced book, I am sure, will be enjoyed, cherished and appreciated for the quality of Mona’s poems as well as for the equally fine illustrations by Sushil Thapa.

I wish that this book will leave a distinctive mark on the literary canvas of Indian writing in English.

Jagdish Mittal
Hyderabad

(Padmasri Jagdish Mittal is a world famous artist, art historian and writer. He is co-founder of The Jagdish and Kamala Mittal Museum of Indian Art, Hyderabad.)

BEAUTY

Faces, a sea of faces,
Does one come across,
Apparently with common features,
—Then why do they seem
So different from each other?

Why does one particular face appear
More beautiful than the rest?
Though in reality, it isn’t so?

Is it true that beauty
Lies in the eyes of the beholder?
Or do those blinded by Cupid’s arrow
Comprehend beauty in its true sense,
Through the eyes of the soul?