# Half Aroma Half Face

- Link: https://writersworkshopindia.com/2018/02/16/half-aroma-half-face/
- Published: 2018-02-16T21:36:33+00:00
- Author: shuktara

4.5/5 - (4 votes)

**Author:** Debashish Banerji[](https://writersworkshopindia.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Half-Aroma-Half-Face-e1518782190331.jpg)
**
Pages:** 92 **Year of Publication:** 2017 **Price:** Rs 300 / $20 **ISBN:** 978-
93-5045-161-8 (9789350451618)

_**About the Author**_
 Debashish Banerji went to school in Bombay (now Mumbai) 
and and then spent a few years at the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur,
West Bengal, before deciding to abandon his studies in Chemical Engineering and 
complete a BA in English Literature from Elphinstone College, Bombay. He started
writing poetry in English from this period. He also served for a few years as a 
freelance cultural correspondent for the _Times of India_ and _Indian Express_. 
Later, he traveled to the United States, where he completed an MS in Computer Science
and a PhD in Art History. At present, he teaches art history and Indian philosophy
at the California Institute of Integral Studies, where he holds the Haridas Chaudhuri
professorship in Indian philosophies and cultures.

_**Teaser**_

_Taj_

One sees her first afar between dream and awaking
 Courtyards of white and white
arches prepare the gaze Frames enclosing a real which teases illusion.

Dove of silence, we circle around your stillness
 Flinging our seeing’s net to capture
and ravish But you gleam like a moonrise laughing undistanced within us.

Whiteness so sheer it stuns and shames and humbles
 Shimmer and flicker and blur
of fiery wings Swifter than sight and moveless, here and elsewhere.

Jewelled simplicity, unadorned loveliness
 Mother and sister and beloved, father
and presence Love, death, immortality; Matter and Spirit.

_**Contents**_
 _Foreword_ by Andrea Moorhead / 7 _Author’s Note_ / 9 Nocturnes /
11 Meditation on Loss / 13 Metaphysical Poems / 17 Two Himalayan Poems / 20 Two 
to Durga / 22 Taj / 24 Two Japanese Poems / 25 Three Anti-Poems / 30 Voice of Silence/
33 Lullaby / 34 Ali Ahmad Hoosain / 35 Shah Jahan’s Last Letter / 37 Nikhil Banerjee
Plays Rageshree / 39 Kashmir / 41 Hipsters from Bombay / 42 Walking through Water/
44 LACMA 111909 / 45 Kumu / 49 Samarda / 52 Implosion / 55 Birthing the Posthuman/
57 Myna / 60 Makoto / 63 Picasso / 65 Two for R / 70 Technoaesthetic / 74 Phoenix/
76 Matrimandir / 80 Holding and Folding / 82 Space Time and Objects / 86