We present this work in honor of the Day of Dr. Ambdekar Jayanti.
Suryakant Tripathi Nirala Indian 1896 – 1961
He comes.
Making us repentant with remorseful remarks,
He comes on path.
His stomach and back seems one,
A stick in hand,
Asking for alms and grain,
To satisfy his hunger.
He spreads forward
His torn satchel,
Making us repentant with remorseful remarks,
He comes on path.
Two children with him always,
With one hand on their starved belly
Other hand raised
to attract some merciful sight,
Lips and mouth parched.
Receiving no mercy from the Maker,
Starving, can’t sob and shed tears
Busy eating decayed leftover by a roadside
Competing with stray dogs
To satiate their hunger.
In honor of Buddha Purmina, we present this work by one of modern India’s most revered poets.
Jibanananda Das Indian 1899 – 1954
Ah kite, golden-winged kite, don’t cry any more this noon
of moist clouds, as you hover around the Dhanshniri river
Your whimper reminds of her eyes dim as pale cane-fruit!
A pretty princess she has drifted afar,
leaving the Earth bereft of beauty;
Why do you call her back?
Who wants to stir up pain by digging heart?
Ah kite, golden-winged kite, stop crying this noon
of tearful clouds, while flying around the Dhanshniri river.
The fear of death is false
Victory is only for Life.
Setting up the root of Organisms
making new splendor eternally
This soul is everlasting
Victory is only for Life.
The world only gets a new life
the lifeless remains like the foolish
A seed creates a hundred plants
The creator is very kind
Victory is only for Life.
I die a hundred times over the life
Do I bury this money
If I do not use it properly
Then it is a great devastation
Victory is only for Life.
It burns
White hot are these sands;
Coils brand the body,
In crushing embrace.
Who has hurled me alive
On these burning sands?
With growing clarity
I see the strangeness of it all
And the approach of a beast of fierce resolve.
Large, wrought of fire,
With a slouch and a smothered roar,
It runs a bright flame tongue
Slowly over its ember lips.
In its gaze,
Poised for a throw
Is a thunderbolt
That would cleave my soul!
Now the beast pauses
Not close and not far!
Cry for help?
Stilled is my voice
And there is no one
Within the throw of human voice.
Has the beast put
A slow burning step forward?
Have those fearsome teeth
Splashed white liquid fire?
Yes it draws close,
Lets out a roar;
Puts out its flaming tongue
and licks those ember lips.
It bends over me.
Mercy?
There is no patch of cloud
In the spread of its wild fiery eyes
The skies catch fire
The world burns!
The beast scoops out my heart and devours
And now in one sweep
It catches
The little bird, encaged in my frame
And it growls and rolls
In awesome play.
Tonight there came a news that you, oh beloved, would come –
Be my head sacrificed to the road along which you will come riding!
All the gazelles of the desert have put their heads on their hands
In the hope that one day you will come to hunt them…
The attraction of love won’t leave you unmoved;
Should you not come to my funeral,
you’ll definitely come to my grave.
My soul has come on my lips (e.g. I am on the point of expiring):
Come so that I may remain alive –
After I am no longer – for what purpose will you come?
Distilled from all my hopes and dreams,
This Wine is yours, my Dearest Dear;
To you I proffer now the Cup
Unsullied, and the liquor clear;
Before it goes to every nation,
My House of Wine shall honour you
Before the thirsty crowd draws near.
2
Should you be thirsty, I will fire
The world, distil its sap away,
The I will lift the Cup for you
And like a handmaid dance and play.
In lavish showers of tender sweetness
I drained my life for your completeness:
Now as an offering at your feet
This world, your House of Wine, I lay.
3
Beloved, you are Wine to me
And like an empty Cup I pine,
But I am filled with you and thus,
A drinker, you your lips incline;
I am your Goblet overbrimming;
You drink me up with senses swimming;
We are together mutually
Yes, each to each a House of Wine.
4
I have pressed the Wine of images
From my emotions’ tender vine;
The poet is the Handmaid now
Who offers many a flowing line;
And in the Cup where millions drink
The Wine I press can never sink.
My readers are my thirsty Guests,
My book of Verse a House of Wine.
5
Still more sweet Wine from my sweet thoughts
I daily press as I have pressed;
With this sweet Wine I fill the Cup,
That thirsty Cup, my heart’s unrest;
Where my imagination lingers
It lifts the Cup in magin fingers;
I drink; and lo! I am myself
The House, the Handmaid and the Guest.
6
The drinker leaves his home to find
The House of Wine, but does not know
The way, and fears achievement must
Be but for an instructed few;
And each from whom he asks the way
Has something new and strange to say;
In fact, you reach the House of Wine
By any path you may pursue.
7
Alas! how much of life has gone
Seeking the House of my intent!
But as I walk, the guides I meet
Still speak of distant merriment!
I scarcely dare pursue my yearning
But want the courage for returning;
The House of Wine is still remote
And leaves me in bewilderment.
8
Go on with endless faith, invoking
Wine honeyed, potent, sweet and clear;
The glorious Cup, and do not fear;
Imaginary Wine receiving,
Create the Saki by believing;
Press on, O wayfarer, and then
The House of Wine will soon appear.
9
When thirst itself is Wine, and when
The lips create the Cup they crave,
When reverie constructs in flesh
The long-desired Maiden-slave,
There in the pilgrim heart’s desire
The piercing pang becomes a spire;
Where is no Handmaid, Wine or Cup,
The mind sustains an architrave.
10
Listen! the gurgling in the Cups,
The sounds of drunken merriment!
The Saki moves to music, shakes
Each tinkling golden ornament.
Now we are near the destination
And hear the merry conversation;
Listen! and now we can perceive
The House of Wine, the drifting scent.
11
When two convivial Goblets kiss
We hear the chiming jal-tarang;
The Girl with tinkling ornaments
Moving creates a Veena’s twang;
Sometimes the Pakhavaj is heard
When riot earns reproachful word;
And thus the Wine can fire our hearts
Sooner amid the lively clang.
12
Studded with gems, the Cup is held
In red-stained palm; and on her head
The golden-sunburnt Maiden wears
A scarf of silk like Wine, deep red;
The Guests are bright in varied hue
In purple turbans, gowns or blue;
Here, rivalling the stormy bow,
The spectrum of the House is spread.
13
Reluctantly the Cup will come
Into your hands, and at the brink
All woman-like, the Wine retreats
Before the longing lips may drink
Often before she tilts the vial
The Saki mocks with soft denial;
Be not surprised, O traveler,
When House and Handmaid seem to shrink.
14
This Wine resembles fire, and yet
Do not refer to it as flame
Nor call the bubbles at the brim
Blisters of frustrated love and shame:
Where your dead memories serve and languish
This Wine will make you drunk with anguish;
And can a man take pleasure thus,
My House of Wine is for that same.
15
My Goblet is not cool, O Guest,
Nor is it cooling Wine within;
Refreshment dwells not here, as in
The Cups and Wine that worldlings win!
The Cup, my heart of hot desire!
My burning words, the Wine of fire!
And he is welcome to my House
Who does not fear a scalded skin!
16
Behold, the Wine is blazing now
Which we, the Guests, have seen in flow;
The Goblet will not cool your lips
But burn them with its ardent glow;
Yet give two drops! for such my yearning
I care not though my bones are burning!
The drunkards who must haunt this House
Are those who were created so.
17
He who has calcined all the creeds
With fire from his burning breast,
Who quits the temple, mosque and church
A drunken heretic, unblest,
Who sees the snares, and now comes running
From Pandit’s, Priest’s and Mullah’s cunning,
He, and he only, shall today
Be in my House a welcome Guest.
18
Who has not kissed with trembling lips
The juice of apple-tree and vine,
Who, drinking, has not felt such joy
That trembling was its outward sign.
Who has not drawn the Maiden, blushing,
Close and then closer still to crushing,
Wasting his fragile House of Life
Has never known the House of Wine.
19
The Saki seems to pray; the Wine
Seems water drawn at Ganga’s brink;
Like prayers upon a rosary
I hear the Goblets when they clink;
This is a mantra we are chanting,
“Thake this!” “take more!”—by which enchanting
Shiva incarnate moves in me,
This House his temple where I drink.
20
The temple gongs hung mute and still,
The image sat, unwreathed with rose,
And the Muezzin locked the mosque
And stayed at home for his repose;
The royal treasury and tower
Were robbed and razed by hostile powers;
The Guests were drinking in the House,
The House of Wine that would not close.
21
Great houses fail for heirs, until
None of their name is left to moan;
Palaces where the Handmaid danced
Stand joyless; hollow and alone;
Kingdoms collapse in anarchy
And kings may lose their destiny;
But men will always drink, and thus
My House is never overthrown.
22
Death as the Handmaid will remain
When earth and sky to crumbling quake;
The springs of feeling fail, but Wine
And poison flow, our thirst to slake;
Although there is no festive laughter,
Unknown the ways of the Hereafter,
On burning ghats and in my House
Something will still remain awake.
23
Because the Goblem moves and leaps
Like youth, the world is cold with scorn;
It hates the reckless drunken one,
Her whom bright paint and gilt adorn;
No one in harmony has seen them!
There was no love-match made between them!
The world grows old, the House of Wine
Is fresh, eternally reborn.
24
Who has not tasted Wine at all
In this my House, will mock. He raves.
But once he tastes, those lips are locked;
Rebellious once, he falters, craves
The Wine and Goblet like the others;
Rebels and slaves are then as brothers;
My House has overcome the world
And all mankind shall be its slaves.
25
The Wine-shop welcomes cheerfully;
The world is chilly outside air;
And in its fog, Muharram lowers
While here the fires of Holi flare;
Wine knows no earthly troubles, given
Direct, unstained, from highest heaven;
Plaints of Muharram fill the world
But Id is celebrated there.
In honor of Thiruvalluvar Day, we present this work by one of India’s greatest Sanskrit poets.
Kalidasa Indian c. 350
Look to this day:
For it is life, the very life of life.
In its brief course
Lie all the verities and realities of your existence.
The bliss of growth,
The glory of action,
The splendour of achievement
Are but experiences of time.
For yesterday is but a dream
And tomorrow is only a vision;
And today well-lived, makes
Yesterday a dream of happiness
And every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Look well therefore to this day;
Such is the salutation to the ever-new dawn!
In honor of Pongal, we present this work by one of the 19th century’s great Bengali poets.
Toru Dutt Indian 1856 – 1877
Like a huge Python, winding round and round
The rugged trunk, indented deep with scars,
Up to its very summit near the stars,
A creeper climbs, in whose embraces bound
No other tree could live. But gallantly
The giant wears the scarf, and flowers are hung
In crimson clusters all the boughs among,
Whereon all day are gathered bird and bee;
And oft at nights the garden overflows
With one sweet song that seems to have no close,
Sung darkling from our tree, while men repose.
When first my casement is wide open thrown
At dawn, my eyes delighted on it rest;
Sometimes, and most in winter,—on its crest
A gray baboon sits statue-like alone
Watching the sunrise; while on lower boughs
His puny offspring leap about and play;
And far and near kokilas hail the day;
And to their pastures wend our sleepy cows;
And in the shadow, on the broad tank cast
By that hoar tree, so beautiful and vast,
The water-lilies spring, like snow enmassed.
But not because of its magnificence
Dear is the Casuarina to my soul:
Beneath it we have played; though years may roll,
O sweet companions, loved with love intense,
For your sakes, shall the tree be ever dear.
Blent with your images, it shall arise
In memory, till the hot tears blind mine eyes!
What is that dirge-like murmur that I hear
Like the sea breaking on a shingle-beach?
It is the tree’s lament, an eerie speech,
That haply to the unknown land may reach.
Unknown, yet well-known to the eye of faith!
Ah, I have heard that wail far, far away
In distant lands, by many a sheltered bay,
When slumbered in his cave the water-wraith
And the waves gently kissed the classic shore
Of France or Italy, beneath the moon,
When earth lay trancèd in a dreamless swoon:
And every time the music rose,—before
Mine inner vision rose a form sublime,
Thy form, O Tree, as in my happy prime
I saw thee, in my own loved native clime.
Therefore I fain would consecrate a lay
Unto thy honor, Tree, beloved of those
Who now in blessed sleep for aye repose,—
Dearer than life to me, alas, were they!
Mayst thou be numbered when my days are done
With deathless trees—like those in Borrowdale,
Under whose awful branches lingered pale
“Fear, trembling Hope, and Death, the skeleton,
And Time the shadow;” and though weak the verse
That would thy beauty fain, oh, fain rehearse,
May Love defend thee from Oblivion’s curse.
Poets Corner 