बच्चा जो लगभग साल भर का होगा
उसे उसकी मरी माँ सोई हुई लगती थी ।

बार बार चादर को माँ के मुर्दा जिस्म
से उठाता अपने ऊपर लपेट लेता।

वह हकीकत और अंधकार से अभी दूर,
अपनी मरी माँ से खेलने लगा।

यकीनन उसे रात को जब माँ
की गर्म आग़ोश नहीं मिलेगी तो
वह बिलख बिलख कर रोएगा।

उस बिन ओर छोर के दर्द
और हमारी हमदर्दी का फासला
हम कभी मिटा नहीं सकते।

– ज्योत्स्ना द्विवेदी

The post Hindi Poem appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

These videos are glimpses of the feeling of anxiety at the passing of time during the lockdown. Anxiety has a physical language which comes forth in the ways in which we carry ourselves.

01 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

02 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

03 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

04 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

05 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

The post Quarantine Videos appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

Remembrance attempts to express the movement of anxiety, from a place of love and safety to the place of abandonment and isolation and back again. It is a work in progress.

01 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

02 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

03 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

The post Remembrance appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

These videos are an expression of my love for the Urdu Language, Urdu Poetry and the Ganga-Jamuna tehzeeb ( confluence of two cultures- especially between hindus and muslims in Northern India)
In these videos, by the act of metaphorically dissolving or boiling the Urdu script and poetry in
water for human consumption, spreading it in the air for pollination, I try to make it immortal.

01 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

02 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

03 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

04 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

05 from Jyotsna dwivedi on Vimeo.

The post Urdu Dissemination In Nature appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

The stance is ready,
This is what we learn,
It’s not that bad.
Someone will find it ticklish- the cow’s tail morphing into a cone, then a flower and
after that a missile.
The missiles are implied.
Sometimes we can’t see the nightmare coming or becoming the real thing.
Or,
We roll up the windows, switch on the smartphones and record,
The slowly forming landscape of violence.

The post Where The Bedlines Cross appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

On Tuesday, 27th of June 2017 I was not there,
On that day a mob spent time beating her to death.
She visited me today, after a little more than a year.
She visited me via a photo on the internet.
Her eyes were looking beyond the commotion of her killing.
Her eyes were looking beyond her tattered clothes and her defenseless
fragile precious/useless body.
Her eyes were looking beyond the hundreds of crazed eyes and frenzied
hands.
Her eyes were fixed at some far off point, waiting for another visitation ,
after which all this will be forgotten ,
after which all this will be remembered ,
after which what has been done is done.
Only that which torments our soul will remain.

The post The Visiting Apparition Of Otera Bibi appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

They did not come for us.
This time we are spared.
This was to show what happens, to women like us, to men like us, to people like us.
I was thinking of the Pussy Riot girls,
Freedom to have fun- they sang.
Freedom to have fun while breathing the lethal air of being snuffed out.
DO IT!
And they don’t have to even lift a finger…
They have let loose the ARMY.

The post The Name Of The Mob appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

This is not just about me.
we have a duty to set things straight.
For the many more who will follow my footsteps.
I am not the first one to burn with desire.
But somewhere I broke ranks with all of your humankind.
I told you that I want you.
You assaulted me for that.
Perhaps you didn’t think it through because with that arrow,
the one that you disfigured my face with, you spawned many like
you.
In your image.
Maryada Purushottam.
One nose chopped, a million grew.
You became a myth at best or a legend at worst.
And, we too are here to stay, slowly strengthening our guts,
To speak what’s on our mind.

The post Shoorpanakha: Let’s Do It One More Time appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

Among the 20 snowy mountains,
Bloody hands grew like weeds to the sky,
As the blackbird glided across, silently,
The only thing moving was its dark eyes.
It should have noticed the crawling shadows that stopped
belonging to ‘people’
– ‘who belong to their own land’.
It should have noticed the fumes rising out of their
whispers,
Whimpering ‘what about us, our children, our land’.
The bruised apples that still look shiny in the far off
markets.
The pashmina that is synonymous to its geographical
indicator,
for many a territory in tasavvur.
But the blackbird glided on,
Its steady wings riding upon the air current,
To some other land,
Across some other river/mountain/valley.

The post On Kashmir appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.

It is at 4 am in the morning every other day now,
When the mob birds, mob cows, mob men, and women roam on this land.
Those birds sit on bloody bodies, bathe in their blood, feel giddy with excitement and erection.
The cows stare vaguely at the horizon, waiting to be taken away.
The men and women return to their homes to look at uncountable reflections of each other.

The post Mob Pleasure appeared first on Jyotsna Dwivedi.