The Jungian Analyst
POETRY FORMAT, 16 Oct 2017
Sumeet Grover – TRANSCEND Media Service
Too much of herself in that
sitting room:
lines etched on a bronze metal painting;
portrait of a nineteenth century
important woman; three hundred
books on religion, on soul, on neuroses
positioned in discipline; sculpture
of a white man looking inwards;
pashmina shawl from Delhi spread
over her legs as she would have lain on the chaise:
a hundred years ago it would have been
a patient’s couch, telling her analyst
she felt guilty as she feels aroused by him.
Rough, caramel shaded leather flakes
would fall from armrest of the
sofa where I sat; I tried to
think of analysands who sat there over
forty years: many of them she must have
called neurotic, laughed with privilege, and
told them their misery is fantasy.
Too much of herself in that
sitting room: I would hear her tell me
of my rage, my hatred of people, of how
deaf to the crowds I was.
When for the last evening I went,
she hoped that the man,
that man whom I
denounced for two months in obsession,
would fade away from my memory.
“Which man?” I asked, and she
didn’t know; neither did I.
The white man, sculptured, looking
inwards in pain kept on looking.
I left.
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This poem was longlisted for the University of Kent Prize for Poet of the Year 2017.
Sumeet Grover is the founder of Global Poetry, dedicated to creativity, human dignity, dialogue and global citizenship. He is a winner of the Portico Brotherton Open Poetry Prize 2014 and was shortlisted for the Jane Martin Poetry Prize in 2014 & 2015. He has authored two books of poetry: House Arrest & Disobedience (2015) and Change (2011). Grover is a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment.
This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 16 Oct 2017.
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