Small Towns and the River, a poem by Mamang Dai (Introduction)

 About the poet: Mamang Dai(1957-present) is a poet and novelist writing in English from Arunachal Pradesh, India. She belongs to the Adi tribe, of Arunachal Pradesh. Her literary works include romantic poems and short stories along with provincial myths and folktales. She was  honoured with Padma Shri, in 2011.The prestigious Sahitya Akademi Award was conferred on her for her novel, The Black Hill, in 2017.Dai was corresponding with the  Hindustan Times, Telegraph and The Sentinel newspapers and later became the President, Arunachal Pradesh Union of Working journalists. She is also actively engaged with World Wide Fund for nature in the Eastern Himalaya Biodiversity Hotspots programme.

Bipin Patsani once commented on her graceful, lyrical style of writing in River Poems, that dai writes with ‘rare passion and flow, fresh and full of the essence of tribal myths, mountains and an intense emotional involvement with her land.’

Y.D. Thongchi, the president of Arunachal Pradesh Literary society once said, while Mamang Dai was being honoured with Padma Shri, that Dai ‘is firmly rooted with the soil of her birthplace.’ Her heart will always resonate with the rivers, mountains, trees. Jungles, rituals, legends, mythology, dances, villages, prayers of her ‘dear abode, Arunachal Pradesh. Her love for her homeland and indigenous lifestyle is as evident as her strong resistance against the rapid invasion of modern culture.

The poem Small towns and the River is taken from her River Poems, published in 2004. Her native town is Pasighat, which is situated in East Siang in Arunachal Pradesh. The influence of her culture,(especially of the Adi Tribe) and the environment in which she grew up is visible in the  lines of her poems, through the images of small towns, spontaneously flowing river and its timeless existence and the vast mountain valley. There is also a reminiscence of the rituals performed in the Adi community after death. To Dai, natural objects, like mountains and rivers are not mere inanimate beings but sagacious entities, and a repository of incidents they have witnessed from the dawn of civilization. Keiki Daruwalla aptly commented on Dai’s River Poems, when he remarked, River poems can only be described as. ‘old world, neo romantic in essence,’ or ‘a race of fireflies bargaining with the light.’’Her poems are, engaging with landscape and nature, through a half-animist, half- pantheistic outlook.’

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