Chequerboard and Other Poems

I've known you now for so very long, I look at you and burst into song. From the moment we digest these opening lines of Ashok Sawhny's paean of praise to London town, we capture the exuberant mood of an author determined to find beauty - and humour - in his surroundings. He may be versifying on the golf swing, the Enstrom 480B helicopter or Indian elections - 'Long live the electorate - so long as they vote for me and my mate!' - or reflecting on the sands of time against a glowing sunset. Whatever the setting, a genial cynicism and wry acceptance of the workings of fate colour and inform these hundred-plus poems. True, there is an acknowledged darker side to life, contrasting with the brightness of our days of love and laughter; hence the Chequerboard. But as the world welcomes a new US President in the White House, the author looks to mankind to respond positively. And that is what his readers are bound to do.