Islands in the Stream by Sonal Singh

Book Title: Islands in the Stream

Publisher: Authors Press

Language & Pages: English & 84 pages

Available On: Amazon.in, ₹ 295 (paper back)

Sonal is a multiple award-winning author, with prestigious awards like the Gitesh Biva and Prasanna Jena memorial awards for short fiction, Asian Literary Society’s award for Best Blogger and ‘Woman Achiever’ in the field of literature and the Orange Flower award for her parenting blog and runner up for her writing in the area of LGBTQ+ issues in her kitty.

She writes prose, poetry, runs an HR consultancy firm, loves to cook and bake, is a pet parent of an adorable Shih Tzu and a snooty African Grey and a human parent to two beautiful young girls. She loves to prod and encourage people around her, with more emphasis on prod, to do their best. All who meet her are in awe of all that she is able to accomplish in a day and consequently in her life.

Of all the hats she dons, her favorite by far is being a poet. For her poem is not just an interplay of words and rhythms woven into her pattern, it is an emotion, a language of the soul, so she says. And this emotion is spills over generously in her book of poetry, Islands in the Stream.

The book is divided into two sections – Nature’s Rhapsody and Life’s Foibles with twenty and twenty-eight poems in respective sections. The former is dedicated to brining out the beauty of nature and the latter a mirror of our lives, desires and follies. The book has a beautiful cover, by the renowned artist Nirmala Singh ji.

The book can be read in one go, but it is the kind of book that needs to be savored one poem at a time much like we enjoy a bite of chocolate and savor it slowly feeling the pleasure it brings us. Though I have not done what I am preaching – I did read it in one go – but I will keep coming back to the poems in the future, that will resonate with my mood at that moment, for there is a banquet of flavors to choose from.

And just like in any banquet, some flavors appeal to us more than the others, here are the poems that really touched me – Eos’s sojourn, What are day’s like?, Romance of the fireflies, By the bubbling brook, Islands in the stream, Dreams, I miss, Lost Nonage, When my heart keens, Bloom of hope, Chords of pain and Remember.

What is beautiful about her poems is the coming together of fantastic vocabulary, rhyme and rhythm, emotions and relatability. Just like the perfect dish with the precise amount of ingredients this book too serves up many wondrous poems that will stay with you long after you have put the book down.

I look forward to more books from her.