Ajay Shankar

All You Need Is

2021-03-23T21:55:00.003+01:00

It sits by itself in a corner
Undemanding, yet a tad perturbed
Because, while it once ruled over all
It finds its powers now strangely curbed

It held sway over daily schedules
Held people transfixed in its full sweep
And now it comes a distant second
To warm baths or extra hours of sleep

Weekend trips were in its repertoire
Spur of the moment was once its thing
Now, packing light is quite unheard of
Alone time has an unfamiliar ring

Surprises are, well, inconvenient
Big gifts now take up far too much space
Where once we welcomed it and its mess
We'd prefer, now, each thing in its place

Perhaps the slog, drudgery of life
Has trampled o'er it willy-nilly
And the simple buying of flowers seems
Now insufficient, therefore silly

We take it for granted; play set roles
But Relationships hard work require
Especially so, when other things
and the big events in life transpire

But we must make time for love; with it
we’re well-behaved, even open doors
We're much better versions of ourselves
Spontaneously; not keeping score

And Love expects and deserves better
Appreciates an effort, with style
We must bring that effort-taker back
For they brighten days and make us smile

And love is always sharing the load
Staying patient while the other breathes
Allowing time away for oneself
And space to follow passions and needs

No ‘kids’, ‘work’ or other excuses
You know that it simply will not do
So make some time for conversation
Try and find yourselves an hour or two

In this our ‘I-can’t-and-won’t-stop’ world
It seems we can work on love some more
That is, perhaps, of all of the things
The one we ought to be fighting for

Heart Image courtesy: Jude Beck

The Titular Inspiration

2021-03-23T21:34:00.001+01:00

So, why is 'The Elephant and The Peanut' so titled?

Written for my children, the elephant is in the story to set it in India and is a way of telling them where we're from.
But what about the peanut?
While it is a riff on the supposed fascination that elephants have for peanuts, the peanut's raison d'être lies elsewhere.

It can perhaps be explained by this poem, written in August 2014, six months after my first child was born:

It seems like it was yesterday

When you, tiny peanut, were born

But I realize with a shock

That six months have, somehow, just gone

Flown by in a crowd of events

Mixed with colds, coughs and runny nose

Monthly cupcakes and photographs

Vitamin D; Colic-Aid dose

While not worried about hiccups

Thoughts still arise when you complain

Are you teething; hungry maybe?

Have you now sufficient weight gain?

I see you just 4 hours a day

Else I'm at work or you're asleep

And so I watch you in your crib

As you lay quietly counting sheep.

I'm petrified, anxiety-filled

Wondering if you will perceive

That your dear father is the one

With the songs and lines up his sleeve

Many nervous moments are spent

The bell rung and waiting a while

D'you know the man behind the door?

Will you then greet him with a smile?

I've loved the time that has "whoosh"-ed past

Morning baths, and songs at nap time

Your gurgling and excited kicks

Your squeals that almost are in rhyme

Your drool that splashes on my shirts

Your worm-like, winding, tumbling crawl

Penchant for chewing everything

Your awesome, right-side, dimple small

Eyes that shine with the light of youth

Eager fingers that fly to mouth

A cute tummy that produces

Thundering sounds from the deep South.

These sights and sounds that form my days

Long may they ever continue

And I'm fortunate, blessed to have

A tiny peanut, just like you.

On reaching 100!

2021-03-21T10:53:00.021+01:00

On World Poetry Day, and considering my previous post on rhyming meters, this is a little throwaway rhyme, an attempt to write in IAMBs, this one in Iambic Tetrameter. Enjoy.

Today is World Poetry Day
And so, we must all speak in rhyme.
It’s just like Punch-the-Clock day is
For us to keep a track of time,
And Talk-like-a-Pirate-Day means
That all speech must contain an ‘Arrrrrr’,
And Beer Day, April 7th, means
We all head right down to a bar.

But more than this, I’d like to say
To all of those who said “Well Done!”
For ‘cause of you and all your love
I’ve now reached a cricketing ton.
In 30 days of total sales
We’ve shipped 100 copies out.
So “Thanks!” to everyone of you.
Y’all are the best, there is no doubt!

Early retirement’s far away
But I, with hope, will write on still,
That when the rhymes stand out, make sense,
Encourage me again you will.
And drop other activities
Snap out of any current funk
And line up to watch what happens
When “The Elephant packs a Trunk”.

Buy, Buy, Buy

2021-03-16T09:47:00.002+01:00

'The Elephant and The Peanut' is available online.
Here are links in various geographies from where the book can be picked up...

Paperback only:

IN: https://notionpress.com/read/the-elephant-and-the-peanut
IN: https://www.amazon.in/dp/1638327297

Paperback & Kindle:

US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08XNBW8SX
UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08XNBW8SX
DE: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B08XNBW8SX
FR: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B08XNBW8SX/
ES: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B08XNBW8SX
IT: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B08XNBW8SX
JP: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B08XNBW8SX
CA: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B08XNBW8SX
AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B08XNBW8SX

Additional Kindle editions available in:

IN: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B08XJG8YZ1
AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B08XJG8YZ1
MX: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B08XJG8YZ1
BR: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B08XJG8YZ1
NL: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B08XJG8YZ1

Shakespeare and Eminem: Meter, Rhyming and more

2021-03-16T01:44:00.009+01:00

While I do like writing poetry, what I enjoy even more is reading good poetry.
There is tremendous fun in reading your kids' favourite stories and poetry in different ways, and singing them out to different tunes. There is beauty in unforced rhyme, in economy of words and most of all in the rhythm with which well-written poetry rolls off the tongue.

We may be able to sense when the rhythm of one poem 'feels' better than the rhythm of another, but is there a theory behind this feeling?

Well, there is.
And the rhythm of a poem is dictated by what is known as its Meter.

So,
What is a Meter? How does one identify the meter of a poem? and, Why does that identification help?

The process of identifying or determining the meter of a poem or any written verse, known as 'scansion', involves identifying the pattern of stressed and un-stressed syllables in a line of the verse.

Taking an example of Shakespeare's Sonnet 2:

When forty winters shall besiege thy brow,
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty’s field,
Thy youth’s proud livery, so gazed on now,
Will be a tatter’d weed, of small worth held

So, reading through the lines slowly, you may realize that the lines are meant to be read this way...

when FOR-ty WIN-ters SHALL-beSIEGE-thy BROW
and DIG-deep TREN-ches IN-thy BEAU-ty's FIELD,
thy YOUTH'S-proud LIV-erY-so GAZED-on NOW,
will BE-a TATT-er'd WEED-of SMALL-worth HELD.

The syllables in CAPS represent where the stress is made and those in 'small' represent a un-stressed syllable and the pattern appears to be 'unstressed stressed', with the hyphen separating the patterns and with the pattern repeating 5 times per line. The pattern of stresses is known as a foot and the grouping of feet in a line is the meter.

This pattern of unstressed-stressed is known as an IAMB and given than there are 5 of these in a line, this sonnet is said to be written in Iambic Pentameter.

But this entire concept of meter isn't restricted to poets and playwrights long-dead. One could argue that the rap artists of today have carried forward the tradition of Shakespeare and Wordsworth.

Here's another example:

his PALMS are SWEATy; KNEES week, ARMS are HEAVy
there's VOmit ON his SWEAter alREADy, MOM'S spaGHETti
he's NERvous BUT on the SURface he looks CALM and READy
to drop BOMBS, but HE keeps ON forGETting
what he WROTE DOWN, the WHOLE crowd GOES so LOUD
he OPens his MOUTH but the words WON'T come OUT
he's CHOKing HOW, everybody's JOKing NOW
the CLOCK'S run OUT; TIME'S up OVer BLAOH!

That is from 'Lose Yourself', by Eminem but it is clear to see that the first stanza of the song is filled with alternating unstressed and stressed syllables. There are clearly IAMBs at work and though the meter is a little harder to pin down, the identification of the 'foot' helps a great deal.

Here's another video, with tons more research done about Eminem's use of rhyme and rhyming scheme (more about that later) in this song, proving that it is stunningly well-written.

An example a little more recent:

VERsace, VERsace, MEDusa HEAD on me LIKE I'm 'luMINati
THIS is a GAted comMUnity, PLEASE get the F*** off the PROperty
RAP must be CHANging cause I'M at the TOP and ain't NO one on TOP of me
N***** be WANTing a VERSE for a VERSE, but man THAT'S not a SWAP to me
DROWNing in COMPliments, POOL in the BACKyard that LOOK like metROPolis

That's 'Versace' by Migos and Drake, using the scheme of stressed-unstressed-unstressed syllables, which is a 'foot' called Dactyl. The 'foot' is also clearly audible from how the song is rapped.
There are six of these per line, making this meter a Dactylic Hexameter.

From just a casual listen to rap music, it seems very obvious that the genre is very dependent on beats and rhythms. Especially when rap doesn't have the typical melody of other musical genres, it is the feet and meter of the verses that give us instructions on how to sing and give the song its rhythm and its sing-along-ability.

Having dived headlong into meters, what is the meter followed by 'The Elephant and The Peanut'? The meter is, for an amateur poet, perhaps harder to achieve and so I set out towards the simpler goal of rhyming schemes i.e. how the lines rhyme with each other. I settled for AA-BB-CC-DD (1st line rhymes with the 2nd, 3rd with the 4th, 5th with the 6th, etc.).

To bring in the rhythm and pretense of meter, I just picked a song to which the poem could be sung.

Here's presenting 'The Elephant and The Peanut', sung to 'Another One Bites the Dust'. (Note: audio doesn't play on mobile).

Listen to "Another peanut bites the dust" on Spreaker.

NOTE:

Just like IAMBs, and DACTYLs, there are other 'feet' and stress sequences in poetry.

The 'Trochee' is the exact opposite of an 'Iamb', meaning that its sequence is stressed-unstressed.

We have 'Spondee', which is stressed-stressed and 'Pyrrhic', which is unstressed-unstressed.

We have the 'Anapest', which is the opposite of the 'Dactyl', which is unstressed-unstressed-stressed.

Sources:

https://penandthepad.com/determine-meter-poetry-6763947.html
https://liberalarts.oregonstate.edu/wlf/what-poetic-meter
https://www.nosweatshakespeare.com/sonnets/2/

Ask-Me-Anything: Part 1: The Elephant and The Peanut

2021-03-14T16:37:00.026+01:00

So, along with feedback about 'The Elephant and The Peanut', and photos sent to me by WhatsApp, I started receiving some questions as well. Most of them have been from kids, who've read the stories or had it read to them.

Reading bedtime stories to children, even to those who can read for themselves, is an essential activity for parents. It allows the kids to focus on the story, rather than the words, and their unique ability to free-associate and speak without filters reveals so much about how they learn and what they think.

So I've been sent a handful of questions and I'll try and answer these in this post. Hopefully, this is as fun to read as it was to do...

Q1. Why is baby elephant looking for Mommy and not Daddy?

Q2. Why is the elephant referred to as a tusker?

Q3. Is the baby elephant a boy or a girl?

Q4. What does 'unabated' mean?

Q5. When and why do you use semi-colons in the book?

40

2021-03-07T10:36:00.004+01:00

This was a piece written in March 2020 for an inevitable and, I suppose, somewhat unfortunately milestone... turning 40!
It talks about how being 40 isn't all bad and that the 40-yr-old version of me is, in many ways, much improved.

40

His slim 32-inch waist gets paunchier day by day

His thick black mop of hair is sporting 50 shades of grey
He wakes up way too early; hates to get out of bed
He looks like he needs diets; he looked distinctly unfed

Calmness doesn’t come with age; his frustration seems to grow
One would think he’d learn to accept things beyond his control
They say with age comes wisdom, but that seems a fallacy
Despite this 'wisdom', he thinks, "the kids don't listen to me."

They frown, roll their eyes at him more than other kids he's met
“It has been 4 years, Appa. Why don’t you know German yet?”
Despite all this, the wife still loves him more than he deserves
But deals with him by dipping into her ‘patience’ reserves

His life’s a work in progress. That seems a strange thing to say
For it appears he has been here 40 years and a day
40 years have brought battles; he has many wounds to lick
He's won and lost a few but doesn’t easily unstick

There is much joy in battle, many insights to be had
And all things put together, the great war has not been bad
How does this man compare to the kid 20 years ago
After this passage, 20 years, what has he got to show?

The 20-yr old youngster, he hears voices in his head
The 40-yr-old cares less for what others did or said
The youngster's stomach butterflies, they do backflips in fear
In trouble, the 40-yr-old calmly shifts up a gear

A challenge will present itself, he’ll tell himself “C’mon”
And then the little doubting voice inside will soon be gone
Through sheer bloody-mindedness or muscle memory
He’ll drag the 40-yr-old through and feel like 23

He'll smile his dimpled smile again; the dimples have filled out
A smile of satisfaction, he's still got it, just about...
He'll sit back and realize, his achievements are not small
Awesome wife, amazing kids, he's so glad he's had this all

Life's a journey analyzed with the benefit of space
The 40-yr-old knows and does a simple fact embrace
Analysis can wait, there's still so much of life to see
The reason I know this, is 'cos that 40-yr-old's me.

How it Began

2021-03-07T09:27:00.001+01:00

I've always been writing, for as long as I can remember. Unnecessarily long sentences in English class in Junior school; embarrassing compositions in High school; short-stories traded across the seas between friends.

About 15 years ago, in the middle of an intense year in business school, exhausted and sleep-deprived, I stepped out onto the balcony of a barely furnished apartment at 2 in the morning and tried to make sense of it all.

Poetry seemed a much more expressive way to let off steam and started with that 2am poem in February 2006.
Initially, it was just a way to take stock of a year of business school, but led to poetry for birthdays, anniversaries, weddings and summaries of years that passed.

Eventually, when my first child was born, I started writing poetry about being a parent. These were initially just expressing worries and fears, excitement and the thrills of being a first-time parent.

A year in, I felt the need to write a story with my children as heroes; a tale of being empathetic, brave, unafraid and accepting of others different than us.
Staring at my first-born, covered in a faded orange swaddle cloth, small, brown and well-wrapped, the word 'peanut' popped in my head and that was where my first story had its simple roots.
A story with a boy and a peanut, both playing heroic, starring roles and an elephant in distress.

As the kids grew up in an increasingly intolerant world, the story grew as well, with elements of fear, indifference and youthful innocence added to the mix.

I'll keep these posts short and have the next one focus on transforming a simple story written on 'Notepad' and forwarded to family by e-mail into one book-worthy.

Sneak Peek

2021-03-07T09:26:00.001+01:00

Just adding in here, a few images from the final version of the book. It's interesting to see the images again, and see if the images convey the same meaning or give the same impression, even without the text.

Sent by Readers

2021-03-07T09:25:00.029+01:00

The Book Transformation - How and Why

2021-03-07T09:23:00.004+01:00

So, what goes into transforming a children's story into a published picture book, apart from many months of work?

Storyboarding

The first step is to make a storyboard of your work. During this step, you need to start thinking about breaking down your story into pages and layouts and visualizing your book in your mind.

For this, it isn't necessary to invest in any major tools or software. Any standard word processor (Google docs, Microsoft Word etc.) will let you organize your story into a book-like view.

For Microsoft Word, for example, this can be done through "View --> Side to Side".

Make sure that you think about the layout of the text across the pages but also how you will want the images across the pages, if yours is a picture book.

Images and Notes

At this early stage, you may not yet have images or pictures for your book, so to begin with, you can google for images that are a close representation of the final product you have in mind.

Make as many notes or 'Comments' as possible about this in the storyboard. If you are working with an illustrator for images, these notes and the images you choose will be vital in ensuring you convey the tone and spirit of your book as closely as possible.

Decide on publishing

Many would possibly recommend thinking about publishing options after having completed your print-ready version of the book. However, I think that it is very important to try and figure out whether you will self-publish, whether you will print-on-demand or work with a publisher to bulk-print.

Independent publishers give several more options with respect to paper quality and size of the book. However, either you, or the publisher, will need to register as a seller on Amazon and be responsible for monitoring orders and ensuring you have enough inventory of the book in stock.

Print-on-demand comes with less hassles. Amazon, or any other publisher offering print-on-demand services, typically helps with distribution, provides sales reporting and stats and helps you put up an author page and provide information about the book that will appear when customers buy it.

The reason this choice is important is that, if you do go with the print-on-demand option, you are signing on for a choice of standard book sizes and paper thickness. It also means that you will need to have images of this standard dimension and resolution available with which to make your final print-ready document.

On-demand KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) standard sizes and paper options are available here.
Note that Amazon KDP will not help you self-publish or list on Amazon.in
For this, you will need to tie-up with a publisher in India that provides print-on-demand services. There are are several such organizations and I went with Amazon KDP for geographies outside India and Notion Press for the Indian market.

Finding an illustrator

This is perhaps the most crucial step in the creation of your final print-ready manuscript. It is essential to find a professional illustrator if you are serious about having a professional-looking end product. Thankfully, professional freelance illustrators are easy to find; the tricky bit is finding an illustrator who can bring to life the images and notes from the storyboard.

Fiverr is a website where freelancers can showcase their services and provide estimates of cost for the services they provide. It is essential that you spend several hours going through the portfolio of freelance illustrators and then picking 2 or 3, before asking them for a trial illustration.
Illustrators have multiple projects ongoing at the same time and it is essential that you have some idea of what the final illustration will look like, before committing the project to one artist / illustrator.

These are two of the sample images I received before I made my decision. As you will see, both represent the same scene in the story but are very different takes on the same scene.

I had a "focus group" of parents and kids, who had already been prepped and given a general gist of the story. Going with my gut feeling and feedback from my focus group, I picked Winna, who goes by aninozart on Fiverr.

Her illustrations and images have brought the story to life and that choice is one of the best decisions I made throughout this publishing process.

Getting a print-ready manuscript

Once you have a set of images from the illustrator that have gone through a review and revision process, you're set to start on the print-ready manuscript. Most publishers will need this print-ready document to be in a .pdf format.
Occasionally, the cover can be an image file but the manuscript itself is almost entirely expected to be in a .pdf format.

When working with your illustrator, you have a few additional elements to consider.

1. Decide on whether you would like to add in the text on top of the images yourself or whether you would like your illustrator to do this for you

2. Decide on a 'bleed' or margin. Most publishers expect a 0.125" margin on all sides during the publishing process. As a result, when you're asking your illustrator for images for an 8.5"x8.5" book, you will need the images to be 8.75"x8.75", to include the bleed

3. All images need to be a minimum of 300dpi (I'd recommend at least 600 dpi)

4. Ensure that the images that you receive from the illustrator are in a format with which you can work (depending on the tools that you have)

5. The cover image will need the back and front cover pages combined into a composite image

6. Think about Inside cover pages and filler pages while storyboarding your book

My recommendation would be that you add in the text yourself, as the possibilities of last minute text revision are very high (they were for me) and you may not want to be dependent on the illustrator for simple changes such as the addition of a comma or the changing of a single word.

You may want to invest in a few simple tools to help you with this.

I used Inkscape, available for free, to help with image modification and the addition of text.
Inkscape has numerous 'Help' videos available on YouTube for image resizing, text addition and numerous other features. One addition benefit is that Inkscape allows saving of images, with added text, as a .pdf, specifying dpi and bleed at the time of save.

Another tool you may want to use is a .pdf editor - a tool that allows you to combine multiple .pdf documents into a single .pdf and rearrange pages at will. There are freeware tools available but also websites that allow merging multiple .pdfs online.

And after that...

You're ready to go, for the most part.
All that's left is the submission of your completed .pdf manuscript and the .pdf cover on the KDP website and the nervous wait for the submission to be approved.

The Moment

2021-03-07T01:20:00.005+01:00

Originally written in February 2006, this marked my first attempt at somewhat serious poetry. Written at 2am after an exhausting first 6 weeks at business school.

The Moment

There comes a time with too much to do
When you badly need a break
When its past 2 am but you're too tired to sleep
You're restless and awake

In such a place I found myself
In the middle of week four
I was all maxed out; had done so much work
But there waited so much more

I got out of bed and scratched my head
Stumbled absent-mindedly around
Seemed like all about me, life sped by
Flying at the speed of sound

I looked about in the pitch dark night
Did life never really stop?
I stepped out onto the 14th-storey balcony
And silently surveyed the drop

Seemed like everyone was fast asleep
Though on the tennis courts below
Distant lights from the street lights
Diffused a pale, silvery glow

A sudden gust of wind blew past
Bringing temperature cold
"Let Go", said a voice inside my head,
"Just release your hold"

I closed my eyes and held my breath
Life suddenly slowed to still
Clocks, trees and birds cinematically stopped
Just held against their will

I smiled a smile of momentary peace
Work assignments melted away
There seemed infinite promise to a rising sun
And a start of another day

Things didn't seem as bad as it did first
Imaginary storm clouds cleared
And the silent voice inside my head said that
There was nothing to be feared

Time again stirred, my eyes sprung open
That moment had left my side
I'd used the moment so I turned my back
Upon the panorama wide.

I stepped back in and breathed a sigh
Life's signal changed to green
Life started to move and rushed right past
That magic moment in between.