Kite by Daya Dissanayake

Kite

Against the deep blue sky
the multi-coloured kite
flew
over the top of the green trees
heavy with fruit
the golden green waves
on the ripening rice fieldstared up at the
blue and red tail on the kite
at the other end of the thread
the little boy
in ragged shorts
ran along the road
trying to hold aloft
the used polythene bag
tied to a piece of tape
from a discarded video cassette
black acrid smoke
spewing out of factories
settled slowly on
rotting garbage
in blocked drains

 

Daya Dissanayake

He is a Sri Lankan novelist and poet.  He was born on 8^th March 1947 in Galle.  He worked as a teacher of science at Sacred Heart Covent, then he joined the Sri Lanka Cement Corporation in Kankesanthurai Jaffna in 1968. He joined the Nawaloka Group of companies and as a D.P. Manager at the Nawaloka Hospital.

He had shown his skill in writing during his school magazines and wrote articles for the Sinhala paper. He was a popular photographer in School.   He started his writing seriously in his forties.  His works on King Ashoka, novels in English, Sinhala and collection of poems, articles in newspapers and magazines made him well-known in the literature society of Sri Lanka.  His first work e-novel in Asia, “The Saadhu Testament” (1998), Vessan Novu Wedun (2003). He received the Sri Lankan State Literary Award for the best English novel three times and also awarded the SAARC Literary Award in 2013.  He is the first Sri Lankan to publish his work online for free access and one of the first Sri Lankan to advocates the E-book format, and Creative commons. He was described as “Five Golden Authors” by the Sunday Observer. He voiced that award ceremonies should be called off as they create “unnecessary friction, suspicion and jealousy.”

 

Summary

Kite by Daya Dissanayake is a twenty two line poem. One stanza poem which doesn’t not focus on the rhyme scheme but the length of the lines and the style of the language bring out the meaning successfully.

The poem describes a child’s effort to fly a kite in a polluted atmosphere in his town.  The poet describes the beauty of nature and the floating kite over the fruit trees and golden green field of rice. Soon the poet turns the readers to feel the condition of the town.  The small child is in ragged pair of shorts.  The kite is made of a plastic bag and the sky is covered with factory smoke.  The child is playing in the streets filled with garbage and blocked drains.

 

Detail Analysis 

“Against the deep blue sky
the multi-coloured kite
flew
over the top of the green trees
heavy with fruit
the golden green waves
on the ripening rice field
stared up at the
blue and red tail on the kite”

 

The poet begins by describing the background setting of the poem.  The kite is used by someone and it is a multicolored kite.  It flashes against the deep blue sky.  The floating movement of the multi colored kite is visible as it is against the deep blue sky. The readers could visualize it as a rainbow in the sky. The kite floats over the top of the green trees which is heavy with fruit.  The poet describes the richness of the area where one can see and enjoy not only the abundance of

nature but also the fertile of the area.  By “heavy with fruit” the poet brings out the natural rich atmosphere of the area. Again the poet moves the kite with its blue and red tail over the golden green waves on the ripening rice field.  It is ready for harvesting as the trees are ready for the fruits to be collected. The scenery is a very picturesque gives peace to our inner soul.  The feeling is calm and peaceful to visualize the description.

 

“at the other end of the thread
the little boy
in ragged shorts
ran along the road
trying to hold aloft
the used polythene bag
tied to a piece of tape
from a discarded video cassette

black acrid smoke
spewing out of factories
settled slowly on
rotting garbage
in blocked drains”

 

In this section the poet introduces the owner of the kite, a small boy in ragged shorts.  He tries to control the kite but he leaves to float freely around the sky. There is no particular description about the boy’s physical appearance. But the poet makes it clear the fact that he is from an unhealthy and not wealthy surrounding. “Wearing a ragged clothes” brings out status of the small kid, and the kite is made of polythene bag tied to a piece of tape from a thrown away video

cassette. The idea of the poet is quite clear in these lines. The child has no means to get a proper kite and he crafted the kite with the left over polythene bags. He enjoys his own craft by flying around the sky.  The happiness of the small boy is described irrespective of his clothes and his appearance or his poverty. The kite flies over the back acrid smoke.  The sky is polluted by the smoke of the nearby factories.  The little kid is not playing in a place where a child could enjoy, but he is probably playing in a dirty, polluted area. “Acrid smoke” says about the smoke which comes from the nearby factories and it is directly saying the poor condition of the people of that industrial area.  The smoke which comes from factories covers the garbage and blocking the drains.  The garbage becomes the major issue to the people who live there. It becomes out of control in the town. The trash runs down the street and blocks the drain causing major problem to the living condition of the poor people.

First part of the poem brings out the happiness of the small boy with the beauty of the nature as its background. He represents the joy of each poor child of the society. But the second half of the poem brings the real condition of the poor people who live in the industrial area. 

Literary devices.

Theme is the condition of the poor people of the industrial area.  The pollution of the area and the miserable life condition of the people.  Nature also becomes the part of the poem and makes the readers to enjoy with the visuals.

 Symbols

Kite is invading the blue sky, heavy with fruit says about the prosperity, ragged shorts represents poverty and polythene bag too says about the poor living condition of the boy. Acrid smoke too indicates the pollution that makes the living condition miserable. The Personification “the golden green waves. Stared up…..”   Implies the prosperity.

Symbolism becomes the main technique of this poem.  When the poet describes the kite which is made of polythene bad and cassette tape, he points out the polluted environment.  When the kite flies over the green trees shows that the danger of pollution is nearing it.  Colors are played a prominent place in the poem. Every color speaks condition of the place. “Green tree, green waves and the ripening rice” all these expressions imply the prosperity.  But the boy with ragged shorts says the poverty of the people of the area.

Thus the poet shows cleverly through symbols and images the condition of the people.  A social awareness is made in this poem to the society to realize how a part of the world suffer with poverty due to the negligence of the rich.

 

 

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