Prayag Ray

Asst. Prof., English @ St. Xavier's U, Kol. PhD, QUB Belfast. Formerly JNU, Jadavpur. Writing in @poetryireland @thetangerinemag @The_Lifeboat @SpringerNature

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

“I too, have ropes around my neck, I have them to this day, pulling me this way and that, East and West, the nooses tightening, commanding, choose, choose ... Ropes, I do not choose between you ... I choose neither of you, and both.” - Salman Rushdie.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

Horrible experience with @flyspicejet — my Delhi–Kolkata flight (PNR MJ6QPH) was arbitrarily preponed by 14+ hrs (9:45 PM → 7:30 AM)! Their own policy allows refund or alternate flight, but after multiple mails, zero action. Never flying SpiceJet again!

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

@jk_rowling This is from Harari's "Sapiens." I grieve that an author whose books I love so much should be so lacking in historical understanding.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

https://t.co/xnwCdKChlt

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

Hallelujah (Cover) https://t.co/kRPmlQTmM5 via @YouTube - I made this, with a lot of love. Give it a listen?

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

I wrote after a long time. A found poem comprised entirely of titles of books on my mom and dad's bookshelf.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

@Donagh_Sarah It's been a while since I passed my viva, and I STILL feel like an impostor. But you'll be grand, don't worry! All the best. 😊

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

I have been away from Belfast long enough that the only bit of this gentleman's monologue that I could comprehend is the word "GoPro" 😪

https://t.co/OUZKeQ0EAu

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

Wrote after a long while. Felt cute might delete.

I would like to thank Dante, Tennyson, and a documentary of fucking walruses, for inspiration.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

🤣 Dies laughing. Irony jumped off a cliff and died.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

I know this is a cliche, but one's PhD is really the time of one's life.

I miss being a non taxpaying, non-job-holding non-adult, with a beautiful country and so many human connections to explore.

#memorylane

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

Saw a picture of a Belfast street on a friend's Instagram. Didn't recognise it. Feeling sad. 😪

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

...that said, I'm entitled to a historically-informed scorn/pessimism towards the possibility of, and the sincerity of large-scale white anti-racism. Am equally scornful of the cult of virtue-signalling woke Brahmins who celebrate subalternity with a silver spoon in their mouths.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

I hope my white friends are wise enough to understand that my criticism of certain aspects of whiteness as a structural phenomenon, or even my suspicious/scornful stance towards white anti-racism is NOT tantamount to an ad hominem attack on them as individuals.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

...I am A) extremely fond of most of you and still close to many B) not saying that you are racists as individuals. I do not have a single racist friend from Belfast. C) not trying to altogether invalidate whatever steps you're taking as individuals to fight racism atm (2/3)

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

Plague of insomnia. Let's do that next. White people wake up to their history, and they cannot sleep, for the next 100 years.

Until a gypsy comes to town and offers them a sip of anti-racism.

Suddenly it's raining flowers and everyone's a blessed virgin.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

I have been reading Marquez and I feel sufficiently equipped to write a mini novel (magic realist) about white anti-racism.

Lets see, a colonial slave ship, and suddenly a white man flies over it on a flying carpet.

[Prayag Ray @PrayagRay]

Fuck this. I'm just bitter. Let's try again. It's a Seamus Heaney poem, except instead of the bog, the bodies are buried in white guilt.