Title: An Egghead’s Journal
Author: Sweta Singh
Publisher: Educreation Publishing
Genre: Poetry
First Publication: 2018
Language: English
Book Summary: An Egghead’s Journal by Sweta Singh
An Egghead’s Journal is author’s first attempt at writing. It is an amalgamation of both her experiences and imagination. Via these poems and prose, she had tried to express her emotions and feelings to the readers. Each of the poem feels like a story.
The author kept a venting journal and used to scribble her feelings post office hours to help her get away from the challenges at her workplace. This helped her in finding a refuge and reviving her sweet memories from the past, getting her thinking hat on and pouring down her emotions to know if it is worth sharing.
The book is a collection of 28 poems. About 1-3 pages each. The poems cover a wide range of topics starting with author’s own self, her friends, nostalgic memories, inspirations from humans and animals, dreams and fears and a lot more. The emotions of happiness, sadness, fear all of it are beautifully explained without using very complex words which makes it a joy to read the book.
Book Review: An Egghead’s Journal by Sweta Singh
An Egghead’s Journal is a journey through warmth and sharpness. This is such a brilliant collection, filled with heart and meaning, all in such a limited amount of words. It explores the realities of diasporic life & pain, the self-discovery, healing, celebration, and love. Simply, it was an honest and enlightening read that dealt with a plethora of subjects.
I am aware that some of these poems are rather simple, but in my humble opinion, it’s in their simplicity where their strength lies. With a few words, Sweta Singh manages to bring the house down. She manages to say everything there is to say on the subject. I’m amazed at how much Sweta Singh can communicate on a couple of lines and in a handful of words. She captures entire experiences and complicated emotions in a few lines. It left me in awe on a number of occasions.
The sequence of these poems was one of the strongest portions of this poetry collection. The sense of feeling lost, of feeling loss, and all of the emotions and experiences that Sweta Singh shared in this collection are exceptional. She is incredibly open and honest in these poems; making oneself vulnerable is an incredibly brave thing to do. There’s also this really beautiful lament, “Eve Teased”, that was so cleverly done, but it is a little long to cite here (I guess you have to pick up this collection to read it for yourself).
The poems are introspective and vulnerable and you’ll find yourself recognizing bits of your own experiences in hers. And yet, for all the emotional honesty and openness in ‘An Egghead’s Journal’, the collection never feels overdone or weighed down, partially due to playful use of language throughout the book.
Sweta Singh’s poems are evocative, relatable and masterly written. They’re simple and candor at its best. I was hooked from the start and unsurprisingly finished it in hours. The multitude and depth of emotions expressed in these few lines can only be comprehended when you give this a chance. Here is one of the poems I liked most from the collection:
The Tigress:
I don’t remember how I fell into a trench,
But I do remember leaving the forest behind
The only choice that remained,
I was found by some Human Beings
Who took me out and fixed a ring around my neck.
I knew protesting wouldn’t help a bit,
Thus, preferred to pretend as a dim-wit
As soon as I was released in the jungle,
I went back again where I wanted to;
The place where I would have been in danger
But I knew how to survive that too.
I used to roam around where the people dwell
Hiding all day behind the garbage heap
Turning into my real self in the night
Hunting down the chained cattle and the stray breeds.
This was easier than the forest;
Easy meat and easy sleep,
But I had to play smartly this game of hide and seek.
To avoid the havoc and the unrest.
I believed I was doing this well
Until I saw a man noticing me;
I realized this place wasn’t a haven for me anymore.
He must be one of my saviors I thought
Which puzzled me, ‘Was he following me the whole time?’
‘Was it something to do with the band I wore?’
It used to itch a lot
So, I decided to get rid of it.
Since then I have been doing the same
Feasting on the dogs and the naive cattle
Leaving behind no marks, no trace.
