Minerva Alumni Book Review: Only Don’t Know by Sanchita Shekhar

As part of our Alumni Book Review Series, Alexia (Class of 2027) dives into works written by Minerva alumni and speaks directly with the authors behind them. The goal is simple: spotlight the creativity within our community and inspire others to engage with alumni-written work.

This time, the spotlight falls on a book that gleefully ignores literary rules altogether.

‍

A playful rebellion against seriousness

When Only Don’t Know began, Sanchita was juggling serious research, long-term manuscripts, and deep, collaborative work with Indigenous communities in India. Her other writing felt heavy and high-stakes—projects that demanded years of rigor and precision.

This book was different.

What started as random writing for fun, slowly grew into something more. Poem by poem, the collection expanded until one day she realized she had written 110 pieces, an entire manuscript born not from obligation, but joy.

“I just started writing random things, and I loved it so much… I had such a great time. And then eventually, I realized I have 110.”

Only Don’t Know became a creative escape — playful, experimental, and unconcerned with proving anything at all.

‍

A book for people who “hate poetry”

On the surface, Only Don’t Know is a book of absurdist, avant-garde poems. But Sanchita is quick to clarify — this is not traditional poetry. When she announced the book to friends and family, she framed it with characteristic mischief: ‍

Only buy if you hate poetry.

If you hate poetry, this is probably for you.

If you love poetry, I have complete faith you will hate me instead.‍

The book breaks with conventional linguistic structure, not just for the sake of chaos, but to provoke curiosity. Each poem functions less as a polished lyrical piece and more as a small thought experiment. What happens if we stop demanding that language “behave” and instead let it pull us into confusion, humor, discomfort, and wonder?

That tension is intentional. Each poem acts less like a polished statement and more like a thought experiment, asking what happens when language doesn’t behave the way we expect it to.

‍

‍From classroom headache to lifelong inspiration‍

The roots of Only Don’t Know trace back to Sanchita’s first year at Minerva, in the Multimodal Communications course. There, students encountered Tender Buttons by Gertrude Stein—an iconic work of experimental prose poetry.

The first encounter was, in Sanchita’s words, brutal:

She remembers finishing the reading and thinking: What does this mean? What does anything mean? It gave her “the worst headache”, and yet, something lodged in her mind. She kept coming back to it, rereading passages whenever she had a bad day.

Over time, that initial frustration transformed into fascination. If painting and sculpture were allowed to be abstract, strange, and nonlinear, why couldn’t literature be the same? Why should words be forced into strict structures just to be considered “serious” or “real” writing?

Gertrude Stein became her main literary reference point precisely because there are so few contemporary examples of truly experimental poetry. Only Don’t Know can be read as part homage, part rebellion, a continuation of that tradition of linguistic experimentation, filtered through Sanchita’s own humor and worldview.

‍

The meaning behind the title ‍

The title itself is a direct nod to another Minerva memory.

During the Seoul rotation, Sanchita’s cohort visited a Buddhist monastery for an overnight stay. There, a monk guided them through meditative practices in flawless English, repeating one phrase over and over:‍

“Only don’t know.”‍

At first, it sounded strange, almost like a linguistic glitch. But the phrase appeared everywhere: spoken aloud, written on boards, printed on walls — even embedded in the name of the temple experience itself.

Years later, when she was searching for a title that captured the spirit of the collection, that mantra resurfaced.

To her, Only Don’t Know is both a challenge and a relief. We think we know so much — about ourselves, about others, about how the world works. But do we, really? The book leans fully into that question, asking readers to loosen their grip on certainty and to sit in the discomfort of not knowing.

“Honestly, what do you know? We think we know a lot of things, but really, what do you know? This book aims to break people’s perception of what they think they know.”

‍

‍Absurdist poetry as perspective training‍

Although the book emerged as a personal release, Sanchita sees absurdist poetry as quietly powerful. 

She situates her work within a lineage of post-war experimental movements, like Dadaism, which used fragmented language and nonsensical images as a form of anti-war, anti-establishment critique. Experimental poetry has always carried political themes, she notes, even when it doesn’t read like traditional protest work.

In her view, we live in increasingly rigid bubbles of thought. People get stuck seeing the world in a single way, with little incentive or opportunity to step outside those mental patterns. Absurdist poetry acts as a subtle but powerful disruptor:

• It gives you something that feels familiar.
  
  
• Just as you settle into it, the poem refuses to cooperate.
  
  
• You’re left disoriented and forced to reconsider how you were interpreting things in the first place.
  ‍

“All of my poetry is like this,” she explains. You can anchor into a line, feel like you understand what’s happening, only for that to be broken completely in the next. That cycle of anchoring and dislodging mirrors real perspective-building: uncomfortable, confusing, but ultimately expansive.

‍

‍Writing as release, not routine‍

Unlike many authors who describe strict writing schedules, Sanchita’s process for this book was the opposite of structured.

There was no daily word count, no fixed ritual, no spreadsheet tracking progress. Instead, the poems emerged in bursts, often when she was overwhelmed by the intensity of her other projects.

She would be deep in research, surrounded by complex ideas she couldn’t fully process yet, and feel the need to break out of that mode of thinking. In those moments, she’d turn to absurdist poetry as a pressure valve: a way to step sideways, not forward.

“Oftentimes, I started writing when I was thinking about things too much. I needed a break. I needed to think differently. Those were the times when I would sit down and write. As I would write, I would just feel so much better.”

Sanchita now hopes to share that experience with others through workshops, encouraging people to write experimental poetry not to create “good” work, but to experience the mental shift that comes from letting go of rules.

‍‍

A seven-page “One-liner”‍

One standout piece in the collection is Sanchita’s favorite poem,“One-liner.”‍

The title is an inside joke and the poem runs seven pages.

Formatted like a peer-reviewed research document, it includes memos, redacted dates, and fictional reviewers.  It reads like a scholarly paper that has completely lost the plot, poking fun at the performative seriousness of academic systems while still engaging them with care.

Playful, layered, and slightly unhinged, the poem captures the spirit of the entire collection.

For anyone considering a similar leap into unconventional writing, Sanchita’s advice is simple and firm:“If you’re going to write experimental, absurdist poetry,” she says, “definitely do not look for validation.”

‍

What’s next for Sanchita‍

Only Don’t Know is just the beginning. Alongside this collection, Sanchita is actively working on two other books:

• A book on power and institutions, shaped by her work with Indigenous communities in Indian forests, examining how oppressive systems are internalized and how meaningful change might begin from within.
  
  
• A book on work, exploring why people dedicate decades of their lives to labor and how to think more intentionally about that time, especially for those who don’t have the luxury to pause and reflect.

Only Don’t Know is available internationally through major retailers, including on Amazon (India, US, UK, and other regional sites) and in Barnes & Noble (US). And, true to Sanchita’s spirit, she jokes that if none of those options work, you can always text, call, or send a pigeon—and she’ll find a way to get you a copy.

If you’re curious about poetry that breaks the rules, interested in being gently pushed outside your usual ways of thinking, or simply want to support a Minerva alum experimenting at the edges of language, pick up a copy of Only Don’t Know.

You may finish it confused, amused, or slightly annoyed, but you almost certainly won’t look at words in quite the same way again.

‍

👉 Explore the book. Support a Minerva alum. Let yourself not know.