Matwaala Tenth Anniversary
MATWAALA MEHFIL 2025
MATWAALA MEHFIL 2025 - Events for the Year
1. AWP Matwaala Virtual Panel – Multiple Registers: Matwaala Poets Assert Democracy in Difference. Usha Akella, Indran Amirthanayagam, Kasiana Singh, Zilka Joseph & Pramila V. March 27, 2025. Moderated by Pramila Venkateswaran.
2. Matwaala Spotlight: Pramila Venkateswaran &Marianela Medrano on Pramila V's book Exile is Not a Foreign Word. April 11, 2025.
3. Award to the Matwaala poet of honor Indran Amirthanayagam. (Announced in Februrary 2025 and Presented on Aprill 11, 2025 at Beltway Cafe.)
4. Collaboration with the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-day project featuring five South Asian women poets. May 2025. Kirun Kapur, Sophia Naz, Usha Akella, Pramila Venkateswaran & Varsha Saraiya-Shah.
5. Matwaala Spotlight: Kashiana Singh & Bhaswathi Ghosh on Witching Hour &Victory Colony, 1950. May 25, 2025.
6. Matwaala Mehfil: Beltway Cafe, MLK Library, Washington D.C. Anita Nahal, Susana H. Case, Dawad Philip, Shweta Rao Garg, Sunayana Pal & Pramila Venkateswaran. Moderated by Indran Amirthanayagam
7. IWWG Matwaala Panel.: From other to center. Kirun Kapur, Meher Manda, Anota Nahal & Sara Garg.June 8th, 2025. Moderated by Usha Akella.
8. New Books Showcase. July 19th. Moderated by Megha Sood. Pramila Venkateswaran, Indran Amirthanayagam, Diya Kanduri, Yamini Pathak. Srinivas Mandavilli, Ashna Ali, Megha Sood, Feroza Jussawalla, Anita Nahal, & Usha Akella
Moderated by Megha Sood. https://youtu.be/M-AdXElexhI Facilitated by Usha Akella
9. Matwaala Mehfil: Afghan/Pakistani/Bangladeshi Poets: By Zoom. Aug 31, 2025. Tarfia Faizullah, Dilruba Ahmed, Shadab Zeest Hashmi & Sara Ghazal Ali, Sahar Muradi. Moderated by Shadab Zeest Hashmi & Marjan Naderi. Fcailitated by Usha Akella
10. Matwaala Mehfil: Tufts University. Sponsored by the Tufts Asian and Asian American Affinity Group. Pramila Venkateswaran & Arundhati Subramanian. Facilitated by Ravi Shankar.
11. Matwaala Residency: SWWIM, Florida. Sep 10-13, 2025: Featured poet: Nina Sudhakar. Facilitated by Kashiana Singh.
12. Matwaala Mehfil: Walt Whitman Birthplace Poetry, Long Island. Megha Sood, Ralph Nazareth, Prageeta Sharma & Ramya Ramana. Sep 21, 2025.Facilitated by Pramila Venkateswaran.
13. Matwaala Mehfilm: First-ever South Asian Poetry Film Fest, Hosted by South Asian Institute, Chicago. Oct 4th. Facilitated by Kashiana Singh, Usha Akella & Pramila Venkateswaran.
14. Matwaala Mehfil: Bookwoman, Austin: Usha Akella & Sunu Chandy. Nov 13, 2025. Facilitated by Cindy Huyser.
15. Mehfilm at IAAC, NYC.
16. Matwaala Anthology reading: Sing Slivered Tongue: An Anthology of South Asian Women's Poetry of Trauma. Nov 22, 2025. Facilitated by Lopamudra Basu and Feroz Jussawalla.
17. Matwaala Mool Swar: Matwaala’s Keynote finale. Dec 9, 2025: Tracy K. Smith Dec 14, 2025: Dr. Subhash Kak. Facilitated by Usha Akella & Pramila Venkateswaran.
Matwaala’s poets-of-color series 2025:
1. Palestinian Poets. Mar 6th, 2025. Ibtisam Barakat, Sharif Elmusa, Yahya Ashour &Zeina Azzam. Facilitated by Usha Akella.
2. Jewish Poets. Nov 6th, 2025. Hila Ratzabi, Leslie Neustadt, Rhonda Rosenheck, Richard Michelson, Barbara Ungar, Sharon Dolin, Joy Ladin, Richard Newman & Zilka Joseph. Facilitated by Zilka Joseph.
Matwaala special sections in Literary Journals:
SETU: Guest Editor Anita Nahal. May 2025: https://www.setumag.com/2025/04/setu-special-edition.html
MUSE: www.museindia.com: Guest Editor Yamini Pathak. Sep/Oct issue, 2025.
Media Links, 2025:
https://nripulse.com/matwaala-marks-10-years-of-amplifying-south-asian-diaspora-voices-through-poetry/ https://www.newindiaabroad.com/english/indian-diaspora-community/matwaala-poetry-festival-to-mark-decade-of-elevating-diaspora-voices
https://www.newindiaabroad.com/english/news/matwaala-marks-10-years-with-inaugural-south-asian-poetry-film-festival
Special note on Poetry Film Fest, South Asia Institute, Oct 4th, 2025 by Usha Akella
Matwaala (www.matwaaal.com) launched the first ever South Asian Poetry Film Fest on Oct 4th, at the stunning space of the South Asia Institute, Chicago (saichicago.org). The event was branded under a playful neologism MEHFILM, as a significant addition to the 18 events to amplify diasporic South Asian poetry that mark Matwaala’s tenth anniversary in 2025. While poetry-film as a creative medium has been around for a while, the project was significant as it was the first time poetry films by South Asian diaspora poets were synthesized in one event. Poetry films are very short films made in response to a poem in a range of visual languages and treatments such as photo-journalistic, expressionist, illustrative, and animative. Four of the films were created with AI software.
Kashiana Singh reflecting on the event commented, “The collaboration between Matwaala, the South Asian Diaspora Poetry Collective and SAI highlighted their shared mission to promote cross-cultural dialogue, artistic exchange, and representation of underrepresented voices in the arts. The Mehfilm event brought together poets, filmmakers, and audiences for an afternoon of 29 poetry films, poetry readings, and reflection, underscoring the transformative power of creative collaboration.”
SAI has distinguished itself as the only independent South Asian arts institute in Chicago to promote South Asian arts which it has done so dedicatedly since its incorporation with a wide spectrum of programming. Haoshu Sascha Deng from SAI also contributed to the festival with her poetry film featuring Kirun Kapur’s poem ‘From the afterlife’. Applauding the initiative, Shireen and Afzal Ahmad shared their thoughts: “As the founders of South Asia Institute we are very proud to have presented the recent Poetry Film Festival, in partnership with Matwaala. The collaboration exemplified our mission to support innovative platforms and underscored our dedication to fostering cross-disciplinary artistic exchange and advancing the visibility of South Asian creativity. We congratulate Matwaala on organizing the event where poetry and visual storytelling converged to inspire dialogue, deepen cultural understanding, and celebrate the richness of contemporary South Asian expression. We look forward to future collaborations.”
The Matwaala team- Pramila Venkateswaran, Kashiana Singh & Usha Akella curated the films over the span of a year as well as submitted their own poetry films created for the event. Poetry films by South Asian as well as poets who had participated in Matwaala’s poets-of-color series were featured such as African American poet Keisha-Gaye Anderson, and Palestinian poet Yahya Ashour.
Usha Akella was inspired by the Reel Poetry Fest in Houston to initiate the project. In her opening remarks she commented “Poetry film is an osmosis between two genres propelling the written word into a wholistic sensory experience. This kind of reverse ekphrasis i.e. poems inspiring the visual medium—is a magical alchemy pushing poetry far out to be rediscovered in a new way.” She was especially thrilled to see young creatives such as Sharanya Banerjee, Haoshu Deng, Anannya Akella and Anjali Pulim showcase their talent in film making.
Pramila Venkateswaran’s poetry film ‘Satyagraha’ explores the resilience of the late John Lewis and the African-American civil rights struggle inspired by Gandhi’s satyagraha and non-violence, and incorporates footage of her own participation in political rallies. She shared her perceptions on the genre and the event, “The moving image of film capturing a poetic line is not simply mimesis, or using the camera to capture an image equating it to a line in the poem; the filmmaker’s interpretation of the poem in order to create a set of images is a creative activity that complements the poem. Matwaala film poetry festival is unique in bringing together this collaboration of filmmakers and poets and establishing filmpoems as a recognized genre. This festival has also captured the diversity of South Asian culture with its various themes. The 29 short films presented at the festival captivated the audience with its imaginative synergy of images and words, offering a rich amalgam of cultural knowledge and visual drama.”
A panel discussion with poets and filmmakers, a poetry reading (featuring Zilka Joseph, Kirun Kapur, Ignatius Aloysius, Kashiana Singh, Lopamudra Banerjee, Nina Sudhakar, Pramila Venkateswaran, Vivek Sharma, Meena Chopra, Meenakshi Mohan, and Preeti Parikh) and reception highlighting a young talented baker Anagha Pashilkar followed the screening. Matwaala leadership recognized SAI founders, Shireen and Afzal Ahmad, with the Monsoon Maker Award—as vital supporters of the South Asian literary community. Usha Akella was recognized with the Matwaala founder award the same evening.
A selection of poetry films is slated to be screened at IAAC in NYC, and at the Indie Meme film fest in Austin next year. Matwaala leadership will endeavor to screen the film repertoire with other educational, cultural and film organizations in the future.
POETRY FILMS ROSTER
Mandalas. Portals of Earth and Ether. 2.14 mts. Usha Akella. (Film maker: Nirmal Raja) Seed or Tree. 1.27 mts. Usha Akella (Film maker: Ravi Akella) Conversations with Destiny I. 2.24 mts. Ignatius V. Aloysius (Film maker: Poet) Conversations with Destiny II. 6.12 mts. Ignatius V. Aloysius Fly. 1.36 mts. Keisha Gaye Anderson. (Film maker: Poet) Black is not enough. 1.19 mts. Keisha Gaye Anderson. So the war would know I am here. 2.42 mts. Yahya Ashour (Film maker: Andrew Burgess) Love poem for America. 4.02 mts. Lopamudra Banerjee. (Film maker: Sharanya Banerjee) Citizenship of mixed emotion. 7.18 mts. Ravi Chandra. (Film maker: Ravi Chandra) Shining Canada. 4.12 mts. Meena Chopra. (Film maker: Meena Chopra) Gunpowder Tea. 2.43 mts. Shadab Zeest Hashmi (Film maker: Mike Kelly & team) Chaining the ecstatic. 1.13 mts. Kavita Jindal. (Film maker: Caroline AreskogJone) From the afterlife. 2.54 mts. Kirun Kapur. (Film maker: Haoshu Sascha Deng) Still, remember me. 5.50 mts. Meenakshi Mohan. (Film maker: Shantanu Mondal) Ghazal for the diaspora. 2.40 mts. Faisal Mohyuddin. (Film maker: Eric Felipe-Barkin) Clubs, my sinful Dance Muse. 3.30 mts. Anita Nahal. (Film maker: Anita Nahal & Deepti Pradhan) Hands. 2.31 mts. Sophia Naz. (Film maker: Ger Killeen) Hands. 4.08 mts. Sophia Naz (Film maker: Amelia Mylvaganam) An exclamation. 3.29 mts. Yogesh Patel (Film maker: Poet) Sapphire Sea. 2.26 mts. Pranaya Raparla (Film maker- Anannya Akella & Cedric Tsai) Partition. 4.0 mts. Sehba Sarwar (Film maker: Faroukh Virani) Limbed. 1.34 mts. Ravi Shankar. (Film maker: Anjali Pulim) Niagara Falls. 1.18 mts. Sangeeta Sharma (Film maker: Srishti Sharma) Fog. 1.19 mts. Sunil Sharma (Film maker: Srishti Sharma) I see my world shaking. 4.21 mts. Yuyutsu Sharma (Film maker: Stephen Bookas) His own magnificent sons. 5.0 mts. Kashiana Singh (Film maker: Sanah Singh) Magritte’s Le Viol. 1.16 mts. Pramila Venkateswaran (Film maker: Neeraja Rao) Satyagraha. 2:07 mts. Pramila V (Film maker: Cliff Williford) Pachyderm Refugee. 2.23 mts. Pramila v. (Film maker: Jayashree George)
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Matwaala Spotlight
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