The Life of My Poems
Poetry has been a steady companion in Dr. Srividya Sivakumar’s life, shaped by years of reading, teaching, and lived experience.
Her work has appeared in Indian and international journals and anthologies, and she is the author of three poetry collections.
While her writing has received critical attention and recognition, poetry remains, for her, a practice of close attention—to memory, place, relationships, and the inner life.
This space brings together her poems, selected reviews, publications, and acknowledgements as part of an ongoing engagement with language.
Books
The Soundtrack of My Life - Side B (Red River Press, 2025)
“Srividya Sivakumar’s voice remains uncompromising as it explores nuanced corners of beinghood. Each of the poems is a poetic vision that is simultaneously philosophical, political, and deeply personal. One witnesses a complete surrender and immersion reading her blatant poetry of startling revelations in phrases that are uniquely hers.”
– Rochelle Potkar
– Rochelle Potkar
“Srividya’s brilliant poems shimmer with undercurrents of conflict and betrayals even as they radiate the essence of femininity and allure. Compellingly titled, this is poetry at its most poignant. Her writing has introspective luminosity and linguistic artistry. “Rain smells better as mannvasanai or mitti not petrichor”, she writes. Her lines are effulgent with some deep knowledge filtered from a profound wisdom about love, intimacy, womanhood , relationships and parting. Her poems are fierce yet vulnerable, bold but tender and filled with a cadence and rhythm that is entirely unique to her. The tactile and visceral curves in her writing are breathtaking – “The skin of this love poem is grafted on other poems” and so is the blaze of meaning that emerges from her words – “injustice in a language that does not reform “. A splendid collection!”
– Vinita Agrawal, author of Eartha.
– Vinita Agrawal, author of Eartha.
The Heart is an Attic (Hawakal, 2018) - #1 New Release on Amazon India
“Srividya Sivakumar’s poems speak of the raw indignity of desire and places of festering desolation ‘where darkness is a breathing person’, even as they explore some of the contradictions of love, including the fierce yearning to be ‘yours. enslaved. urgent. free’. Here is a book that unlocks the uncomfortable rooms of the human heart with vulnerability, courage and wry humour. A fractured house begins to turn whole again in the process, inviting the reader to a deeply human journey of self-reclamation.”
– Arundhathi Subramaniam
– Arundhathi Subramaniam
The Blue Note (Writers Workshop, 2012)
“In some of the poems she is reminiscent of Kamala Das.
Srividya certainly shows considerable promise in several poems included in this
collection. Candour and forthrightness are her forte and it is hoped that publication of
this anthology will spur her to continue her tryst and rendezvous with her muse, and
hone her skills further. While wishing her the very best, I look forward to her future
publications that would show maturing of this gifted poet.”
– GSP Rao Managing Editor, Muse India
– GSP Rao Managing Editor, Muse India
Recognitions
Shortlisted
WE Kamala Das Poetry Awards, 2020
The Deodar Prize, 2025
Winner
Architectural Poetry Competition, 5th Cycle floated by Architectural Journalism & Criticism Organisation, 2021
Nominated
Best of the Net, 2018
Reviews
The Soundtrack of My Life – Side B
Literature in the air 🡥
The skin of this love poem is grafted / on other poems’: A mixed tape of memory and defiance 🡥
Lines between love and language 🡥
Pena, Issue #8 – At The Altars of Witnessing.pdf – Google Drive 🡥
The Soundtrack of My Life – Side B: Poet Srividya Sivakumar defies traditions of women’s chastity 🡥
“Rewilding” love poetry – by aranya – Poetly 🡥
The Shape of
a Poem
Srividya Sivakumar and Paresh Tiwari Interview 🡥
Erotic Poetry at its Aesthetic Best 🡥
The Shape of a Poem – The Red River Book of Contemporary Erotic Poetry’ – Ankush Banerjee 🡥
The Shape of a Poem – The Red River Book of Contemporary Erotic Poetry’ – By Dustin Pickering 🡥
36 On the Canvas of Desire: A Review of The Shape of a Poem: The Red River Book of Contemporary Erotic Poetry 🡥
The Heart is
an Attic
Indian English Poetry of the Twenty-First Century: Trends of the New Millennium – Ethos Literary Journal (ELJ) 🡥
The Heart Is an Attic by Srividya Sivakumar | World Literature Today 🡥
The Heart Is an Attic by Srividya Sivakumar | World Literature Today 2 🡥
A little empty without you 🡥
Srividya Sivakumar reads AuthaGraph. 🡥