On the metaphysics of alienation

In metaphorical terms, alienation stems from a lack of place or disavowal of community. Kalpna Singh-Chitnis communicates this alienation with grace and sincerity.

- DUSTIN PICKERING

In metaphorical terms, alienation stems from a lack of place or disavowal of community. Kalpna Singh-Chitnis communicates this alienation with grace and sincerity. In the words of Candice Louisa Daquin from the introduction, Singh-Chitnis "has gravitas but also, immediacy and tender familiarity." It may come as odd that alienation could be communicated with "tender familiarity." However, Trespassing My Ancestral Lands achieves this with astounding brevity and form.

To define alienation, its etymology comes from the Latin meaning "belonging to another." Kalpna Singh-Chitnis, an immigrant to the United States from India, will know what it means to enter an unfamiliar land while belonging to another. This breach from one's motherland is poetically rendered in three sections of the book: Trespassing My Ancestral Lands, Blood and Water and The Dance of the Century. The opening section reveals the importance of culture and rootedness; the second section concerns war, refugees, and humanitarian crises; and, the final section is poems about the Covid-era. Singh-Chitnis devises language that is reflective and culturally challenging. She writes with impressive reflection on cultural matters that are likely foreign to the readers, instructing the readership with occasional atonal grace.