In this book, Madhu Kailas presents the poet’s engagement with art and creative liberation through startling imagery and innovative verse. In the title poem, ‘The Boatman of Murshidabad’, the eponymous boatman becomes a metaphor for torpor, loneliness, and the remorseless passing of time; in ‘The Day a Song Dared to Soar’, travellers return and pick new faces for rebirth; in ‘Keys Made of Sunshine’, a child grows up and learns to listen to silence; in ‘Silence of Butterflies’, golden silk strands cascade on to the green forest floor; and in ‘The Forest Sings’, the breeze preserves an arrangement of leaves and flowers in a secret language. Deeply felt and packed with insights into the human condition, The Boatman of Murshidabad is a dazzling collection of poems by an accomplished poet.