Ramsay explores life 'Under Basil Leaves'

Title: Under Basil Leaves

Written by: Paulette Ramsay

Reviewed by: Barbara Collash

Paulette Ramsay's debut anthology, Under Basil Leaves, is a collection of 48 poems (and one short story) that inhabit the pages with a voice and presence of their own. The poems pulsate with the rhythms of daily life; of lived experiences that the Caribbean reader easily identifies and connects with. The poems come to us from a decidedly female perspective, female sensibility, in a style and manner that is distinctly Ramsay's. At times lyrical, at times caustic; at times passionate, strident, or reflective, the poems make for good reading for the scholar, the poetry lover and the casual reader. That this is so is largely due to the naturalness and effortlessness of the style, the easy cadence of the rhythm, the auditory impact of words and phrases, and the compelling nature of the themes that so resonate with the reader. Ramsay's choice of form, the free verse, works well with the poems that read like conversational pieces. In this regard, the sense of the poems is enhanced by the absence of internal and external markers, short lines, the effective use of the repetition of articles as well of other key phrases in the initial position.

Readers will find particularly delightful, the metaphoric reaches of the well-chosen images that are a staple in the feast of words served up by the poet. The range of images adds layers of meaning to each poem and simultaneously deepens the reading pleasure. The variety of voices and tones (ironic, sarcastic; witty, humorous; playful, serious) also engages and strikes a responsive chord in the reader. In fact, one could almost say that the poems dialogue with and pull the reader into the living, breathing world of the poet.

The eight sectional headings, each aptly introduced by a thought-provoking saying, help to frame the thematic concerns of the poems. While Ramsay displays a predilection for issues relating to women and the creative energy of the word - logos - her repertoire includes an engagement with the age-long 'quarrel' with history (treated in a fresh, new way), issues of identity, blackness, and everyday matters spanning the gamut of life and death.

The titular poem, 'Under Basil Leaves' perhaps best encapsulates her thematic concerns and vision of life. It can be argued that this is a poem which not only foregrounds the woman as the creator, nurturer, and sustainer of life ("Mama grew her pot of basil", "Mama pampered her pot of basil"), but one which also speaks to the vicissitudes and vagaries of life, as well as the irony and paradox that attend life in the real world. The basil is a panacea of sorts, a "cure of all ills", yet, it too, is subjected to 'death'. It "poisoned worms" yet is brought to its demise by a "portly worm".

Taken together, the poems in the first section, 'History and Politics', constitute a fresh poetic retelling of the black tragic - the deleterious impact of the colonial encounter on the psyche of black folks. Beneath the deceptively calm and innocent surface, the poems raise haunting questions of how to cope with years of pain and shame in the wake of the atrocities visited upon colonised peoples by European imperialists; how to deconstruct misrepresentation and denigration; how best to reconstruct mangled identities and shattered images. These preoccupations locate the anthology within the overarching concerns of Caribbean literature and post-colonial discourse.

The first poem, 'A Word to History' identifies the oppressive, alien force as distinctly masculine and distinctly European ("tell him / yes him, imperialist colonialist", "Tell Mr History"). Even as the poem brings into sharp focus the pain of the colonial encounter, it simultaneously negates and abrogates the European hegemony. Indeed, the narrative voice is that of the erstwhile silenced, marginalised other, who now possesses agency and a strident voice; one who is armed with the wisdom of hindsight and foresight and so is able to unmask the oppressor and to reveal the old guiles that will no longer work. This dialogue with history speaks to Caribbean people in the here and now, warning us to be vigilant, to assume agency, and to spare no effort in resisting modern forms of imperialism.

The examination of the imperial design to distort black image and identity is carried forward into the very sardonic 'Her Majesty's Seal'. Here, the poet employs pun, concrete images, metaphor, biblical allusion and tone to bring a fresh and innovative approach to bear on an oft-treated issue. Words like 'brand' and 'beast' serve to connect the poem with the colonial practice of objectifying enslaved Africans by branding them like animals, reducing them to chattel.

The celebration of difference, which runs like an undercurrent in the first three poems, is given full expression in 'No Carbon Copies Allowed'. Here the conscious, decolonised narrator exposes the hollowness of the various European altruistic interventions, the self-interest, smugness and conceit which drove the old colonialists and which still drives the neo-imperialists.

The engagement with history appropriately ends with 'Inauguration day 2009' - a lilting, euphoric song, a chant, a hymn of praise - which enshrines the moment when all the world stood still and marked an occasion of cosmic proportion; a proud moment in the epic journey of a son of Africa from the cane field to the very bastion of the iconic new imperialists - the acme of world power. Ramsay's poetic technique here is at its best, as the poet combines images that reach into history, linking present achievement with the ancestors; with black visionaries, thinkers, poets, and artistes whose activism laid the foundation for this singular moment in which they all rightly share:


Look, see the ancestors

and leaders

of the Harlem Renaissance

believers of Negritude

believers in the wisdom of Marcus Garvey

believers in Cesaires' cultural vision

hoping

praying

singing

in a celestial choir.

Listen, hear the chant.


Ramsay assumes quite a different posture in the next section, 'Words and other Thoughts'. Here she demonstrates her versatility with and mastery of words - playing on words, playing with words, switching codes. The poet uses images and metaphors to great effect, aptly communicating to the reader the range, potency and creative energy of words. This is clearly articulated in 'Milk for the Word':

milk for babes

milk for old men

milk for pregnant mothers

milk for dry breasts

milk for old women with withered breasts


In this poem, the female narrator discovers a word - in fact "it was the word / word of words / word to the world" (emphasis mine). She appropriates and personalises this word, (wearing it like a mantra or a Chi of sorts, upon her breast) which soon becomes her raison d'êre.


I own this word

my word

my language

the word that makes me

human

woman


The identification of the word with the female principle is more clearly brought out in the next poem, 'When a Little Girl Grows up'. In this poem, Ramsay locates the discovery of word within a particular time in the experience of the female, "When a little girl grows up / and becomes a woman". The discernment of the power of words, thus requires a certain level of physical maturity, the point at which the woman is better equipped to cope with abstractions and complex ideas and to "(give) birth to new words".

'Academic Birth Pangs' picks up the idea of giving birth, this time using metaphors and images to establish significant parallel between writing and the birth process. The poem takes us into the delivery room where we are made to view the tedious process of conceiving and birthing ideas in new, interesting and thought-provoking ways. To a great extent, the poems in this section describe Ramsay's own modus operandi - how she 'plays with words'; how she rolls them "in complex multi-syllabic / multiplicities of multi-layered / meanings" and how she sometimes uses them as "sharp pointed" weapons "to stab [you] in the eyes".

Ramsay's preoccupation with women (as individuals as well as in their relationships with men) is foregrounded in the next two sections, 'Women' and 'Man and Woman', which are prefaced by sayings from Henry Adams Brooks, "The proper study of mankind is woman", and "The woman who is known only through a man is known wrong", respectively. That the first saying is the flip side of Alexander Pope's "the proper study of mankind is man", certainly underlines Ramsay's political agenda - to rewrite discourse; to look at reality from a different (albeit similarly gendered) perspective. Ramsay's representation of women in these two sections, though overridingly positive and celebratory is, nonetheless, charged with a high degree of verisimilitude. We see women as strong yet vulnerable, as deceiving as well as deceived, but always resilient and hopeful.

Ramsay presents her ideas with the astuteness that is directly related to her way with words. She employs a range of structural devices as well as apt images and metaphors, to build details and present a graphic picture. She manages to do all this and still preserves a measure of economy, leaving the reader with enough space to participate in the process of meaning making. 'These are the Women' stands out as a seminal poem in these two sections, as it intersects with almost all the other poems. Ramsay is careful to define the 'these' whom the poem eulogises, thereby suggesting she is not presenting a fit for all women. The 'these' of the title are specifically they:


who have looked

at life

around corners

through periscopes

through telescopes

through eyes

into souls …


they know life

they have lived life

they have felt life

travelled life

loved life

suffered life

endured life

and still

ask for more life


These are they who are well taught in the school of life. They have experienced all of life's possibilities, all of life's vicissitudes, and now, as composite woman, occupy a larger-than-life status as visionaries, seers, and sages, weak and vulnerable only when it comes to "things / that … touch / their inner core". They know men, they can " … safely generalise / make inductive claims / about men" thus are able to use this knowledge to trifle with men (an idea more fully developed in 'What Women Don't Always Tell Men'). They know about man's deception ("with lying lips / they perform / and well they do / the role of nice / I love you"), they know about society's biases and double standards (treated in 'There Is No Name For A Man Who Is Bad') that have their roots in Victorian ideas about women; they know that in many relationships man is but a figure-head ('A Man Lives Here') and that not all men are 'men' ('Revelation Dream') but this knowledge does not negate their need and longing for 'man-love' and their desire to be fulfilled as women:


these are the women

who know all about

rolling over in a ball

curling up

face to the wall

squeezing an infertile womb

disappointed abdomen

lonely pelvis


As is characteristic of Ramsay's poetic techniques, the terse, straightforward telling (enabled by the fluidity of the free verse), the effective repetition of key words and phrases, the imagistic style and the immediacy and intimacy of the speaking voice, all combine to make this a powerful and memorable rendering of the lived experiences of women in Caribbean societies.

Readers will find the final four sections appealing, as the issues treated touch on all facets of life in the real world - the seeming trivial and mundane, serious matters of the heart, the humorous and the hauntingly sad.

Ramsay is a singer of truths - truths about us and the way we live our lives in society, told in a manner that inspires rather than offends.