Prerna Kashyap – Winner of the 21st Century Emily Dickinson Award

“Yours and Mine” – A Winter Love Story Woven in Verse

Some books speak loudly. Others whisper their way into your heart, lingering in quiet corners long after the last page. Yours and Mine, a collection of twenty-one poems by Prerna Kashyap, belongs to the latter. It doesn’t rush. It doesn’t shout. It simply unfolds—like snow settling gently on familiar ground.

Awarded the 21st Century Emily Dickinson Award, Yours and Mine invites the reader into a winter world where love is both chill and comfort, both solitude and togetherness. Each poem in this debut collection stands alone, yet all are part of a single emotional landscape—one that reflects the many shades of human connection.

Set against the quiet melancholy of winter, the collection plays with contrasts: snow that blankets both sorrow and serenity, relationships that are full of presence and absence, and the intimacy of doing “nothings” together. From a shared bench to a shared silence, Prerna captures those unassuming moments that define a love story not in declarations, but in pauses.

“Winters have a sort of cleansing effect on life,” Prerna reflects. Her poems explore that truth. In Yours and Mine, He sees snow as a nuisance; She, a marvel. He reaches for a cigarette; She, a corn cob. That juxtaposition forms the backbone of their story—a love shaped as much by difference as by affection.

A seasoned reader and lover of literature, Prerna draws from a deep well of storytelling traditions. Her voice, however, is distinctly her own. She writes not to impress, but to preserve. “Poems have a way of speaking to the heart,” she says. “Unassumingly, in my case.” And so, the experiences of a life quietly observed melt into words and memories.

The collection doesn’t shy away from the shadows that love casts either. Poems like The Wait, Disgruntled, and Confused explore longing and dissonance, while Come to Me and No Holding Back celebrate vulnerability and closeness. It’s a full-bodied love story, with its frictions and fires intact.

But beyond romance, there is resilience. The poems carry a subtle commentary on navigating the scrutiny of society, of forging your own path in love even when it means withstanding the chill of disapproval. As one of her characters reminds us: love isn’t measured in time but in presence. In courage. In choosing each other over and over again.

Prerna Kashyap, based in Chandigarh, weaves poetry out of the everyday—the glances, the pauses, the simple gestures. Her strength lies in magnifying the ordinary, in giving language to feelings we often leave unnamed. She is, in her own words, a sponge-hearted observer who believes there is beauty in having someone by your side—and beauty even in standing alone.

Yours and Mine is a love story, yes. But more than that, it is a meditation on seasons—of the year, of the heart, and of selfhood. It reminds us that poetry, like love, doesn’t always have to be grand. Sometimes, it just has to be true.

📖 Book Title: Yours and Mine
🏆 Award: 21st Century Emily Dickinson Award
📍 From: Chandigarh, India
📸 Instagram: @prerna.kashyap_