The Poet by Lakdasa Wickkramasingha

                                         


                   The Poet by Lakdasa Wickkramasingha








Lakdasa Wickkramasingha


Lakdasa Wickkramasingha is a Sri Lankan poet in English. He was drowned at the age of thirty seven, while bathing in the sea. He produced five slim volumes of poetry. At the end of his first volume of poetry, he said “To write in English is a form of cultural treason …….. I have come to realize that I am using the language of the most loathsome people on earth; I have no wish to extend its life and range, and enrich its totality.” Lakdasa said in his Luster poems that he wanted to “Circumvent the cultural treason of writing in English” by making his writing “entirely immoralist and destructive.”



The Poet

Lakdasa Wickkramasingha brings out a revolutionary idea throughout his poem “The Poet”.  The  role of the poet he creates is different from the traditional conventional  role of the poet. Commonly a poet can be defined as someone who responds in verse to what happen in society. Yet here there is a complete overturn. For him a poet is a type of terrorist or an activist who purifies changes and restructures the society.

In his poem ‘The Poet’ Wickkramasingha uses very unusual metaphorical images to create the role of the poet. First we see the poet as a terrorist ‘tossing a bomb into the crowd’. The word ‘crowd’ can represents a busy public place in a town. And next a soldier who mounts a gun on a tripod most probably for a grenade attack. Then the image shifts into a camera that levels and adjusts ‘for a clear sight’ for a speaker at a public meeting. Moreover in the second stanza the narrator elaborates another function of a poet. The role of the poet is compared to an assassinator who hides and waits with the rifle till the right time comes. These different settings can suggest the different roles activities done by the poet.

Next again with the idea of terrorism the poet Lakdasa Wickkramasingha indicates the role of the poet as a guerilla preparing for an ambush in the jungle. And it is at the end of the poem the role of the poet becomes more revolutionary comparing the poet for a bomb in the city. This image suggests the uncontrollable feelings of the poet which become explosive. He is more on alert and would end up the task as a suicide bomber.

As mentioned earlier with these different images Lakdasa Wickkramasingha completely overturns the image of the traditional poet that can be seen as a commentator or a bystander. His involvement in the society is not just limited to ideological support. He needs to have an active participation. A poet can be dangerous in his passion and can burst out with uncontrollable emotions. A poet can do a change a difference in the society while creating and reforming new attitudes and aspects.                  

  

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