Poetry: Seema Bashir

Research Scholar, Department of English, University of Kashmir

1.
Resting snug between two calloused fingers
And a blackened thumb,
The dull needle of memory is pulled,
With brute force ; a silken thread
the colour of smoke,
 Lurks behind, like a serpent
coiling at familiar creases,
 Of time.
The rapid motion, the stabs and pulls,
Weave paisleys into,
 Mad anarchy!



2.
 Time,
(that series of infinitesimal presents
 In a perpetual line, of recurring pasts
 In a closed loop, and circular futures
 In a warped space )
 Is illuminated, in all its entirety,
In the arch of your brow,
that I decipher,
In the cracks of an inverse mirror.



3.
A lump of angular coal,
 sharp on all its edges,
is pressed between the cold fingers .
A thin curtain of delicate skin gives way
 to a reluctant gathering of wary pilgrims,
trickling down the rugged slopes.
A few, stray into the unknown crevices,
illuminating the faint lines
Of fate.



4.
A thousand and a hundred days
is a long time, to turn a woman
to dust and a man to stone,
or the other way around
(in the grave of a heart and the heart of a grave).
The April sun, cloaking
the chilly gusts of wind,
shines (unaffected) in spite of everything.
Albeit it pierces through the skin
more violently,
rummaging the deserted interiors,
to conjure up the hollow ghosts
of an empty past.



5.
Graveyards are intriguing.
Vertical people, horizontal now.
Names in exquisite calligraphy,
and the epitaphs, hustled together,
 to fit onto the rectangular headstones
 (twelve by twenty four)
 How do you fit a life into a marble slab?
 (Do you plant the life in the wet soil and,
helplessly, watch the wild flowers grow,
in its life blood?)

Setu, August 2019

The Geeta and Shelley's Adonais

B S Tyagi

B. S. Tyagi

    Hegel-the great German thinker, said, ‘A poet should make his life poetry.’ The remark is true of no other English poet as of P B Shelley. At once spontaneous, passionate and impulsive Shelley is a great genius, ever pursuing his quest for truth or intellectual beauty. His poetry is the testimony to his belief. Like a metaphysical thinker he looks upon the worldly impressions on man as imperfect shadows of a higher world. He conceives of a Supreme Power prevailing through nature as well as human life. In Adonais he says:

    That Light whose smile kindles the universe,

    That beauty in which all things work and move, (Stanza 54)

The more Shelley thinks over life, the more he grapples with the questions related to it. He sets about finding their possible solutions like other thinkers. And it makes him a persistent seeker of truth. His serious speculation over life and its purpose sets him apart from other romantic poets.

    Interestingly enough like a student of the Vedanta philosophy Shelley ponders over the serious questions- where do we come from? Why do we come in the world? What is this world where we play our destined roles? Is there any worth seeking in life?

    Where are we, and why are we? Of what scene

    The actors or spectators? Great and mean

    Meet massed in death. Who lends what life must borrow. (Stanza 21)

Further Shelley thinks about soul and its nature. Does the soul perish with the body? Do our dreams end with death? Is it all illusion-maya in life? These perplexing questions leave all thinking humans upset. Arjuna is also greatly perturbed at the mind-boggling questions. Then Lord Krishna comes to his rescue and tells him:

    Avinasi tu tad viddhi yena sarvam idam tatam

    Vinasam avyayasya na kascit kartum arhati (2. 17)

      That which pervades the entire body you should know to be indestructible. No one is able to destroy that imperishable soul.

Again:

    Antavanta ime deha nityasyoktah saririnah

    Anasino prameyasya tasmad yudhyasva bharata (2. 18)

      That material body of the indestructible, immeasurable and eternal living entity is sure to come to end; therefore, fight, O descendant of Bharat.

Lord Krishna further explains that soul does not perish even when the body perishes. Man must understand the real nature of soul to attain peace. It cannot be destroyed by any material weapon. What is destroyed or supposed to be destroyed is the body only.

      Ya enam vetti hantaram yas caiman manyate hatam

      Ubhau tau na vijanito nayam hanti na hanyate (2.19)

     Neither he who thinks the living entity the slayer nor he who thinks it slain is in knowledge, for the self slays not nor is slain.

Shelley says:

    Like incarnations of the stars, when splendor

    Is changed to fragrance, they illumine death

    And mock the merry worm that wakes beneath

    Nought we know dies: shall that alone which knows

    Be as a sword consumed before the sheath

    By sightless lightning? The intense atom glows

    A moment, then is quenched in a most cold repose. (Stanza 20)

      Thus Shelley believes in the immortality of soul. It hardly matters if body is destroyed. God is the creator of this universe; and all things after death go back to Him for eternal rest. Noble souls shine through various objects of nature. Their pure radiance can be felt. Their sacredness is all palpable.

    God dawned on chaos. In its stream immersed.

    The lamps of heaven flash with a softer light;

    All baser things pant with life’s sacred thirst.

    Diffuse themselves, and spend in love’s delight. (Stanza 19)

Lord Krishna tells Arjuna:

      Anta kale ca mam eva smaran muktva kalevaram

      Yah prayati sa mad-bhavam yati nasty atra samsayah (8. 5)

      And whoever, at the end of his life, quits his body remembering Me alone at once attains My nature. Of this there is no doubt.

Again:

      Yam yam vapi smaran bhavam tyajaty ante kalevaram

      Tam tam evaiti kaunteya sada tad-bhava-bhavitah (8.6)

      Whatever state of being one remembers when he quits his body, O son of Kunti, that state he will attain without fail.

Further Shelley looks upon nature as possible origin of man’s life and vital significance of death which is not terrible or frightening at all. It ends all worldly evils which eat our body away day and night and weaken it. Nothing can destroy soul. It is ever unaffected. It is eternal and a perennial source of bliss. The Geeta says:

      Nainam chindanti sastrani nainam dahati pavakah

      Na cainam kledayanty apo na sasayati marutah (2.23)

     The soul can never be cut to pieces by any weapon, nor burned by fire, nor moistened by water, nor withered by the wind.

Again:

      Acchedyo ’yam adahyo ’yam akledyo ’sosya eva ca

      Nityah sarva-gatah sthanur acalo ’yam sanatanah (2.24)

      This individual soul is unbreakable and insoluble and can be neither burned nor dried. He is everlasting; present everywhere, unchangeable, immovable and eternally the same.

    Shelley is wholly aware of the fact that soul being the part of the Eternal is awakened, clean and eternal source of bliss and on the way to mingle with Him. Therefore, there is no reason to mourn the death of Keats who has become one with the Eternal. Nothing can tease or tire him. Death can do no harm to him.

    Peace, peace! He is not dead, he doth not sleep!

    He hath awakened from the dream of life.

    ‘Tis we who, lost in stormy visions, keep

    With phantoms an unprofitable strife, (Stanza 39)

Again:

    He lives, he wakes-’tis Death is dead, not he;

    Mourn not for Adonais-Thou young Dawn,

    Turn all thy dew to splendor, for from thee

    The spirit thou lamentest is not gone! (Stanza 41)

The Geeta says:

      Na jayate mriyate va kadacin nayam, bhutva bhavita va  na bhuyah

     Ajo nityah sasvato ’yam purano, na hanyate hanyamane sarire (2. 20)

      For the soul there is neither birth nor death at any time. He has not come into being, does not come into being, and will not come into being. He is unborn, eternal, ever-existing and primeval. He is not slain when the body is slain.                          

Lord Krishna forbids Arjuna to mourn the death of his kith and kin because it is body (and never the soul) that dies. He must understand this fact of life and try hard to come out of this great illusion that keeps man ever so low. Due to this illusion he mistakes body for the divine spark.

     Avyakto ’yam acintyo ’yam avikaryo ’yam ucyate

     Tasmad evam viditvainam nanusocitum arhasi (2. 25)

     It is said that the soul is invisible, inconceivable and immutable. Knowing this, you should not grieve for the body.

Again:

      Atha cainam nitya-jatam nityam va manyase mrtam

      Tathapi tvam maha-baho nainam socitum arhasi (2. 26)

     If, however, you think that the soul (or the symptoms of life) will always be born and die forever, you will have no reason to lament, O mighty-armed.

Shelley says:

    He is made one with nature. There is heard

    His voice in all her music. (Stanza 42)

The Geeta says:

      Avyaktadini bhutani  vyakta-madhyani bharata

      Avyakta-nidhanany eva tatra ka paridevana (2.28)

      All created beings are unmanifest in their beginning, manifest in their interim state, and unmanifest again when annihilated. So what need is there for lamentation?

Shelley firmly believes:

   The One remains, the many change and pass;

   Heaven’s light for ever shines, earth’s shadows fly;

   Life, like a dome of many colored glass,

   Stains the white radiance of eternity,

   Until Death tramples it to fragments-Die, (Stanza 52)

Shelley holds that body is only a means to reach the goal. It is dust and to the dust it returns; so nothing to be proud of. Only the soul remains and it goes back to its eternal source.

    Dust to the dust; but the pure spirit shall flow

    Back to the burning fountain whence it came,

    A portion of the Eternal, which must glow

    Through time and change, unquenchably the same, (Stanza 38)

 In the Geeta Arjuna says:

      Yatha nadinam bahavo ’mbu-vegah, samudram evabhimukhkha dravanti

      Tatha tavami nara-loka-vira , visanti vaktrany abhivijalanti (11. 28)

    As the many waves of the rivers flow into the ocean, so do all these great warriors enter blazing into Your mouth.

Again:

      Yatha pradiptam jvalanam patanga

      Visanti nasaya samrdha-vegah

      Tathaiva nasaya visanti lokas

      Tavapi vaktrani samrdha-vegah (11. 29)

    I see all people rushing full speed into Your mouths, as moths dash to destruction in a blazing fire.

The soul gives up the body and mingles itself with its fountain-head. Shelley is further led to propound that the soul after liberation from the body becomes one with nature. In fact, here Shelley’s theism has come out spontaneously; otherwise he is believed to be an atheist. His theism, however, is closely akin to the Greek pantheism (i.e.-the belief that God is everything and everything is God)

    He is a presence to be felt and known

    In darkness and in light, from herb and stone,-

    Spreading itself where’er that Power may move

    Which has withdrawn his being to its own, (Stanza 42)

Again:

    He is a portion of the loveliness

    Which once he made more lovely. He doth bear

    His part, while the One Spirit’s plastic stress

    Sweeps through the dull dense world; compelling there (Stanza 43)

      Shelley believes in God’s omnipresence. It is He who is reflected in every soul. Without His presence no life can be imagined in the universe. Arjuna is overwhelmed to see Him in every object of Nature. He fell prostrate in utter blissfulness.

      Tvam adi-devah purusah puranas

      Tvam asya visvasya param nidhanam

      Vettasi vedyam ca param ca dhama

      Tvaya tatam visvam ananta-rupa (11. 38)

    You are the original Personality of Godhead, the oldest, the ultimate sanctuary of this manifested cosmic world. You are the knower of everything, and You are all that is knowable. You are the supreme refuge, above the material modes. O limitless form! This whole cosmic manifestation is pervaded by You!

    Neither life nor death has power to blot the brightness of Nature; it may veil it for a while. All human beings are the living entities of that great heavenly beauty in which all beings work and move.

…as each are mirrors of

The fire for which all thirst, now beams on me

Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality. (Stanza 54)

    The mortal attraction of flesh hampers man’s spiritual growth and inner journey toward consciousness. And we are eaten constantly by fears, desires, aspirations, attachments, avarice, hopes, lust, joys, sorrows et al like worms.

    …We decay

Like corpses in a charnel; fear and grief

Convulse us and consume us day by day,

And cold hopes swarm like worms within our living clay. (Stanza 39)

Actually man awakes after enlightenment; he realizes his true nature and meaning of life.

    He hath awakened from the dream of life.

    ‘tis we who, lost in stormy visions, keep

    With phantoms an unprofitable strife,

    And in mad trance strike with our spirit’s knife

    Invulnerable nothings. (Stanza 39)

Man’s whole life is spent in petty and worthless pursuits. It is death that frees us from all worldly bondages, weaknesses and vices which bind us to the illusionary world and its mortal things which look joyful outwardly. But in fact, this world is a constant source of sorrow and shackles.

    He has outsoared the shadow of our night;

    Envy and calumny and hate and pain,

    And that unrest which men miscall delight,

    Can touch him not and torture not again; (Stanza 40)

The Geeta says:

      Vihaya Kaman yah sarvan pumams carati nihsprhah

      Nirmamo nirahankarah sa santim adhigacchati (2. 71)

    A person who has given up all desires for sense gratification, who lives free from desires, who has given up all sense of proprietorship and is devoid of false ego-he alone can attain real peace.

    Death is not a disgusting thing; nor horrible as perceived in general. It is an inevitable phase of life. It is a gentle touch of divinity that makes us unite with the Great Spirit of the universe, annihilates the work of time, only to clothe it with Eternity. Lord Krishna advises Arjuna not to lament for the bodily change.

      Vasamsi jirnani yatha vihaya

      Navani grhnati naro ’parani

      Tatha sarirani vihaya jirnany

      Anyani samyati navani dehi (2.22)

    As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones, the soul similarly accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones.

    It is crystal-clear that Shelley was much more than Arnold’s ineffectual angel. He did speculate on the most philosophical problems of life and made them the plank of some of his most ambitious work such as Adonais. And he has discussed them threadbare in the light of his awakening. To quote Edmund, ‘No man ever preached the triumph of the spiritual over the material more eloquently than he. It is the undertone of all his poetry and in Adonais it bursts forth into a mighty symphony which voices all the warrants of our immortality in everlasting music.’

Setu, August 2019

Poetry

Shivnath Kumar Sharma

- Shivnath Kumar Sharma

Save Girls …

(An appeal by unborn baby)

Oh, my fabulous father,

Let me come out safely

I don’t wish to have a lavish life.

I’ll command what your order is

Study with my brothers’ books

If you think about my marriage,

That’s really upset you but I take a vow

That I’ll remain unmarried until

I stand by myself.

By study, I’ll be secured a job

And invest that salary to make

 Your life and poor life better

I’ll do to you more than a son can do

If you think that your daughter would do

Then you do please allow me

To come in this beautiful world

I’ll clean kitchen and cook for you

I’ll do more what a maid could do

Do not provide me branded dress.

I’ll wear used clothes and eat

Remnant rice and curry.

If think so …

Request, permit me to enter in this world.

Let me fly and fulfil my dreams…

Educate girls to agitate:

Educate girls to firmly agitate,

Raise voices against the patriarchal state.

Let them come out of the confined domain.

And allow them to know her life’s chain.

A domain of parochial thoughts,

And of conservative routes.

The time has patiently witnessed 

Women have been more exploited,

Women have been kept silent,

And imprisoned within thorny walls.

No individual identity, 

And no place or position.

Where can they express inner self?

Then where do they actually belong?

The society has entangled

For its own benefits.

Are they not capable?

To come out and stand lonely.

Yes, they are genuinely able

Some of them perform brilliantly.

Educate girls to agitate

Against the system that cull their flying wings.

Wake up girls and debunk

The power and privileges that undermine you,

Unveil your aged-old veils

And execute your dreams-plans

To determine and decorate destiny.

Just watch, everything falls at feet.  

Educate girls to firmly agitate,

Raise voices against patriarchal state.

An Elegy:

Winter seems to be unwelcome guest.

Darkness begins to loom large, the sunlight shrinks.

Silence prevails and mounting tears fall.

Dogs don’t bark, birds stop chirping.

City clubs disperse, the consciousness splits 

The wind pauses, flowing water terminates.

Everything appears to be hiatus.

A world of gloomy and uncanny rests. 

High- tides of water engulfed the budding boy.

Body gently descends in the depthness of the sea.

Friends only witnessed the saddened dance.

A dance of hopelessness boy and swirling water

Nobody dares to dream of rescuing him

All they phobic of water.

Now, he remains as a silent shadow

in the formless memory of parents.

Memory of many voices results in voiceless.

The rising ray of hope exhausts in the life’s mid-way.

Desirous and dreamful eyes corrugate forever.

He was the eyes, voice and evidence of their existence.

Can Parents’ heavy hearts be lightened?

Will there be assuage in their burning hearts?

Setu, August 2019

Poems by Sahdev Luhar

1. “On My First Death”

I fought for years and years
Without shedding precious tears
And  I saw the puss oozing Ashwatthama
Sarcastically laughing at my blood-stained face

It was the sixteenth day of the war
I had killed those whom I loved
With my arrow-like words

Three thousand years are not yet over
I drew my sword to split-up this fear
And he made a demon’s laugh
Sprinkling the blood from his holed head

It burnt down my face and my thoughts
He taught me a lesson
And snatched away my tongue

Finally I accepted him as my lord
And had to put down my sword
He asked me to speak his tongue
And I gave a fire to my vocal cords

This was my first death
The death that killed me from within
It kills me every day and night

Now I can see thousands of Ashwatthama
Moving everywhere
And snatching of the tongues
Of those who could speak the truth.



2. “Those Predicted Days”

The sun had turned red in the sky
All looked puzzled with a question “why?”
All had gathered there to bid farewell
Noises stopped as if there was a knell

The boatman was washing His feet
He thought it as his feat
Not with waters but with tears
He also made all stop their cheers

“Dear brothers and sisters, I am blessed
Please follow my brother,” He addressed
All went back home with tears in their eyes
A group struck there feeling agonised

“Why didn’t He tell us a single word? 
Did he forget because we are third?”
They decided not to move from there
And waited for His return with eyes claire 

As if waters of Sariyu had stopped
He fought with demons to chop
Their wait was turning into tapascharya
He had killed Ravana for his bharya

Fourteen years had passed in a glace
Again all gathered up at Sariyu to dance
The boatman informed Him of this group
Who were overjoyed making whoop

He hurriedly rushed to such gems
And ask “why you did this my friends?”
“You ordered to only men and women
Eunuchs are neither man nor woman”

 He smiled at the innocence of their heart
And gave a boon for their art
“You will rule all in days to come”
All welcomed this with a bit on a drum

These are those days He predicted once
We are ruled by those who are the dunce.



3. “To the Mouths that Bite”

I stole heart from my father’s chest
And devoured it up with a zest
My eyes widened and widened my thought
It was the pleasure that dead heart had bought

I was not what I was now
Pride was roaring in me somehow
It bestowed upon me knowledge of three times
And I could hear those noises of chimes

He might have thought it against His wish
And asked for a promise with a brother’s kiss
“Don’t speak a single word unless someone asks
See everything and be a dumb are your tasks”

I consider it wise asking an eye for the eye
And claimed a promise before He says bye
“Gift a boon to us of life endless”
“Tathastu” said the fellow helpless 

I was overjoyed with two worthy prizes
Then it started giving me gloomy surprises
Where ignorance is bliss it is folly to be wise
My mind and hearts were full with some cries

I saw my elder’s ruin in the game of dice
I tried to forget all with sips of liquor thrice
I could see the forthcoming danger on my chaste wife
Though I could not speak, I had cut my tongue with knife

“Bring her; ask her to sit on my thighs”
All my pride disappeared in her sighs
I cursed my knowledge for years and years
It was a spear that continuously pierces 


What is the use of such knowledge that binds?
This is a question that everyday disturbs our minds
We all are Sahdev with a gift of foresight
But cannot speak fearing the mouths that bite.



4. “Nemesis’s Haze”

She descended into the deep cold lake
Putting off her clothes for bath’s sake
As if a lightning had fallen into the water
She attracted gazes of a silent plotter

She was a beauty all called her a nymph
He looked at her who was no more lymph
The water turned into cruel human hands
Her breasts were squeezed by unknown bands 

Before she could know what had happened
He had confirmed everything to get her trepanned
She made a heart tearing cry
She was raped and left to die

A child was born to her who looked beautiful
In his youth he made many girls pitiful
His prideful gestures invited a curse
And he fell in love with himself thus

Nemesis forced him and brought to lake’s shore
He saw himself in waters and roar
It was his mistake that made him a fool
His death dragged him into the pool

The nymph reminds me of our beloved mother
Who was looted and left to smother
We are the cursed offspring cling to self-praise
Still don’t understand Nemesis’s haze.

Setu, August 2019

Poetry: Smruti Ranjan Mohanty

Smruti Ranjan Mohanty

A LETTER TO THE ALMIGHTY

When the body betrays,

mind feels alienated,

hands and legs do not listen to what I say,

eyes see a little, ears hardly hear,

when my blood considers me as a burden,

I remain no one's concern,

my own, not prepared to take care,

hesitate to carry the person

who carried them all along,

when there is none with me except

an unknown person,

when attending me becomes a compulsion,

where remain very little feeling and emotion,

when my pain and agony is at the pick,

the attitude of others strongly prick,

distress and sorrow too much to endure.

life becomes a burden, too much to bear,

Come my Lord! touch me, be with me,

hold me, hold my hand, bring me safely ashore.

My Father,

I lived a life far away from You,

a life lived in guilt,

in pursuit of passion and ambition.

A life wasted in running after Your riches and spellbinding grandeur,

in gratifying my senses,

geed, ego and selfishness.

I lived in a pseudo world with pseudo people,

thought gratification of senses,

life and its privileges as the ultimate

But my Lord! You are always in thought,

not even for a minute l lost sight of You

and Your name always been on my lips,

when awake and in my senses.

Wherever I had been, heaven or hell,

I invariably took You with me and never hided anything and my sins and virtues lay bare before you.

My Lord!

I accept my omissions and commissions.

But in this world of fading colours,

my love, passion, longing and feeling for You never lost its texture and I remained,

all through a loving son of Yours.

My Father!

I am not asking for anything else

Just do me a favour.

When my soul leaves the body,

be their in front, show me the way, guide me to the destination as You have been doing all along.

Let me leave this world chanting Your name,

let me embrace what people say death with a smile on lips, looking at your resplendent glaze, slowly coming out of the haze, losing me in You, in Your infinite bliss and consciousness.

LET ME LIVE WITH LOVE AND PASSION

On the wings of love,

let me fly to the land of dreams and passion,

where not reason, but reigns emotion,

where the heart speaks, and reason keeps mum.

Let me listen to the voice of the heart,

before I miss the bus and my reason takes me miles away from the real I that I am,

not only a man of dignity and honour

but a man with feelings, love, dreams, and emotion.

Too much of rationality

made me  irrational,

Insensitive to life and its beauty, to the extent,

I fail to recognise me, my likes and dislikes,

dreams and fancies.

The more meticulous I become,

the more alienated I am from me,

my emotions and feelings.

Life has become a tedious monotony,

and me a talking parrot in the golden cage.

Let me find the real me, my soul, my dreams, likes, whims, and fancies, so far eluding me.

Let me follow these, so dear to my heart,

with all my love and passion or else I may become another machine.

I don't want to be a machine working out of compulsion, twenty-four hours without love and hatred, feelings and involvement, 

but a man doing multiple roles with feelings and emotion.

Definitely not a machine, a human being I am,

will live and die for what I love, fancy and hold high

Very difficult to endure life,

breath in an atmosphere

where everything is patterned,

love, feelings, behaviour, interaction, expectation and reciprocation with hardly any space for innovation and improvisation.

Not so easy to live with reality,

with rationality guiding you at step each.

Better to have a break,

to take a flight to the world of dreams, fancies, and fantasies.

For a change let me do something

I enjoy, which my inner being accepts,

my heart reciprocates and lets me dance in ecstasy and joy

MY DREAM IS MY REALITY

I love you!

You may not love me.

But you can't negate my love for you.

I don't need you to reciprocate.

Like me, my love is full and unalloyed,

never begs anything,

not even your love in return.

I am true to my love,

my exclusive possession.

No one, not even you,

can deprive me of my love,

my only treasure,

without which I am just a pauper.

I am happy and contented

like a bird in the golden cage,

like a king having his crown

on someone else's head.

I fancy a life with you,

a beautiful life, full of colours,

where there is no hypocrisy,

no ego, no selfishness, and vanity,

only love with all its beauty,

as pure as the silver moon,

and as fresh as early morning's dew.

Waiting for you since long.

Just look at me! I am there where I was,

playing with you, hide and seek, in your

mango orchard with the full moon overhead, running and dancing on the village road under the scorching heat of sun and pears of shower.

Look at the chemistry!

our heart and soul, body and mind

are in perfect harmony.

Smile a bit, my love!

that will be the day of my life

No regrets,

if you don’t feel me, feel my pulse,

the beats of my heart, the voice of my soul.

I will live and die in a corner,

with all my love and tear,

unseen and unheard.

You are in my dreams,

unless my dreams become reality,

let me remain in my dreams.

I will never let the night fade into morning and my dreams to harsh reality.

I will remain in my dream, which is more real than my pathetic reality.

Setu, August 2019