For all the poems in this Two Sylvias Press Advent Calendar challenge for 2023, visit my musings here.
Prologue: This is a 31 day event that helps poets and authors all over to pen down 31 new poems in the month of December (2023). Every day we can open the calendar for that day to read about the prompt for that day. Then let your imagination fly to infinity with your thoughts and voice.
For Day 24 the Prompt given to us was to write a poem an emotional performer of any art where the performer reveals what they feel through their act. I picked the dying art of Burra Katha and the performers are almost non-existent.
Burra Katha is an oral storytelling technique, unique to the villages situated in present-day Andhra Pradesh and Telangana states of India. This performance art usually involves only three artistes — a narrator, a wise analyst and a jester. It was a popular medium to narrate the Hindu mythological stories. It is now an almost dying art sadly.
Prompt 24: The Distressed Oral Storyteller
He walks onto the podium with bright colorful outfits
And his old and worn tambura, hanging on his arm.
Yet he has a forlorn expression; feeling hopeless.
Audience is string thin for who wants to listen to
An Oral Storyteller when one has Audible at their fingertips
On their smart phones; or listen to audio books on their car stereos.
He braves ahead and begins the story of an Oral Storyteller
While the few present are immersed in their smart phones
Viewing or watching reels of Thumak Thumak performed by strangers.
His story tells of a dying tradition – Burra Katha – a medium to narrate Hindu
Mythological stories; he laments at the loss of his partners – the Wise Analyst
And the Jester; for he is left-alone to carry the torch.
He plays a triple role on stage while sharing the perils of hanging
On to an art form that is almost non-existent.
He spins the tale of the Oral Storyteller mixing with sad endings
Of Mahabharata and Ramayana and other epics.
He ends the saga of the Oral Storyteller describing his life;
His basic needs that are dependent on this gig; about his family
Looking up to him to provide for them; with a jerk of the string
He falls down on the stage and breathes his last just like the
Dying art of Burra Katha.
Galavant Reflections 