The Sand Libraries of Timbuktu: Poems

‘Rohinton Daruwala’s poems unfold like a baramasa an almanac of seasons and sensations exquisite torments and explosions of delight. He essays a sensuous portraiture of place invoking torrential monsoons arid summers railway bridges at night libraries in deserts. [He] spells out a frank eroticism in the textures and flavours of fruit... at the same time [he] is entangled in the hypermodern present. He gathers traces of the loved one from residues both material and digital... [He] maps the city not only through the portraiture of human protagonists but also through the micro-ecologies inhabited by butterflies and sparrows... In Daruwala’s handling the poem can be an oblique parable a brief lamp of wisdom in the wind of distraction: light as breath yet as essential.’—Ranjit Hoskote