MANSI TEJPAL@poetry

Drizzling Dreams is a collection of poetry by Mansi Tejpal. Tejpal is a seventeen-year-old poet who has been writing since early childhood in both Hindi and English, and this collection promises a full range of emotional discovery with uplifting undertones. There are a total of twenty- nine poems, arranged alphabetically rather than thematically, and the style ranges from alliterative and rhyming techniques to more free verse expressions. The volume’s foreword promises a unique perspective and a voice with maturity, and I believe that’s definitely what Tejpal delivers in this short collection of ideas.

 

Mansi Tejpal achieves a natural sounding grace with her words, and her fluid style of expressing both images and a progressing narrative really resonated with me. I was gripped by the end of An Ode to Dear Ms. Love, which expresses subtle passions amid extremes of dark, light, life and death, and found myself thoroughly impressed with the thematic depth that Tejpal combines with such beautifully arranged words.

 

Whilst I don’t always enjoy poets who feel the need to explain their work, the very short italicized moments that contextualize many of Tejpal’s poems gave just enough insight without overpowering the poems themselves. Partition, for example, really benefited from this device to put readers in mind of the pain and terror of political separation before the poem expresses the writer’s deep views.

 

Overall, I’d say that Drizzling Dreams was an unexpected gem from a promising young talent, whose work I would definitely seek out and read again in the future. 

 

Reviewed by K.C. Finn for Readers' Favorite®