Initiation into Self-realization: a preamble to Sādhanā: Kiriti Sengupta (Tagore Special)

Excerpted with permission from Sadhana: the realisations of life by Rabindranath Tagore, published by CLASSIX (an imprint of Hawakal Publishers)

I was pleasantly surprised as a few weeks ago, Bitan Chakraborty expressed his keen interest to re-introduce Rabindranath Tagore’s Sādhanā: the realisation of life through CLASSIX. He wanted to disseminate Tagore’s invaluable teachings that, he thought, the world needed to acquire anew. However, I was left bemused when Bitan solicited from me a brief proem to the collection of essays, first published in London (October 1913) and then in the United States by The Macmillian Company, New York. The following few days were challenging: what can I add to this accomplished volume of essays that, as Tagore reveals in his preface, are “ideas which have been culled from several of the Bengali discourses which I am in the habit of giving to my students in my school at Bolpur in Bengal?”

Kiriti Sengupta

My approach to writing the preamble began with a Facebook update wherein I inquired:

Rabindranath Tagore was a disciplined scholar of ancient scriptural texts. He studied the Upanishads, the Geeta, the Patanjali Yogasutras, among other religious discourses. However, very little is known about the practice Tagore followed. For example, was he a supporter of the Tantric ways of realizing God? Or was Tagore an adjutant of Raj Yoga? Several researchers have investigated Tagore's spirituality, mysticism, or understanding of humanity in his works, especially lyrics and poetry. A lot is written about his seminal work Gitanjali. Are you aware of any survey that deals with Tagore's faith in religious practices other than his familial connection with the Adi Brahmo Samaj?

Among barely a handful of comments that arrived on my timeline, two deserve mention. First, Sreemati Mukherjee (Professor in the Department of Performing Arts, Presidency University, Calcutta) shared her insightful take. She wrote:

Sound was critical to Rabindranath. I remember reading in Jiban Smriti that when he was getting ready for his upanayana, his father had created a liturgy for him to learn. He referred with reverence to the practice of the Gayatri Mantra. Despite being Brahmo, Debendranath Tagore did not give up the course of upanayana—the caste privilege must have mattered to him. Debendranath paid for all Rabindranath's social responsibilities, like the marriage expenses of Rabindranath's daughters. Again, Rabindranath loved the sindoor and appreciated women wearing it. His life practices were determined by the aesthetic implications of reeti and rivaj.

Debanjan Bhowmik (Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi) emphasized his faith:

Based on the understanding I developed through my readings of Gitanjali and Tagore's other works in that genre, I would say he probably followed the path of Bhakti Yoga and Sufism to some degree, in the lines of Kabir, Amir Khusrau, or the Bauls. I don't know whether he openly talked or wrote about that influence. Still, he wrote and published the English rendering of Kabir's poetry (Songs of Kabir, translated by Rabindranath Tagore, 1915) when he released Gitanjali. I feel Kabir's works and Gitanjali have a similar essence: finding the divine through loving the beloved, Nature, and simple things of life. But of course, Tagore must have taken an interest in other modes of spiritual practice outside Bhakti and Sufi; to me, he seems to have lived the life of a balanced and dynamic person, curious about many paths and ideologies and yet not particularly biased on a specific one.

The word Sādhanā bears a spiritual connotation that refers to an austere practice leading one to realize oneself. Sādhanā is intrinsic to Yoga as propagated by ancient scriptures and the sages and monks of all ages. However, not much is known about Tagore’s initiation into Sanatana Dharma, otherwise called the eternal religion.

Looking back at Debanjan’s initial few words: “Based on the understanding I developed through my readings…” — isn’t this the most standard way of exploring an author’s work? The author’s psyche? Categorizing Tagore as just another author is a grave injustice to his illustrious life and body of work. He

played various roles—a poet, novelist, short story writer, dramatist, lyricist, educationist, environmentalist, and more. However, in all that he did, he sought the truth. Tagore was a seeker, and a tenacious one at that.

Let me probe his credos: on December 22, 1901, Tagore established a school for children in Bhubandanga, Bolpur. It’s called Brahmacharyasrama, also spelled as Brahmacharya Ashram. Later, the school was named Patha-Bhavana. Post-independence, the school flourished as Visva-Bharati. The university website (visvabharati.ac.in) claims:

Classes were held in open air in the shade of trees where man and nature entered into an immediate harmonious relationship. Teachers and students shared the single integral socio-cultural life. The curriculum had music, painting, dramatic performances, and other performative practices. Beyond the accepted limits of intellectual and academic pursuits, opportunities were created for invigorating and sustaining the manifold faculties of the human personality.

I’ll explore excerpts from a few letters Tagore wrote to Bhupendranath Sanyal during his tenure as a teacher or Adhyaksha in Brahmacharya Ashram. But, before that, let’s look at how Supriya Roy introduces Sanyal (referred to as Sanyal Mahasaya by his followers later in his life) in her Makers of a Mission (Santiniketan: Rabindra-Bhavana, 2001):

Although Rabindranath started his school based on the ideal of the ancient hermitage schools, his creativity did not allow him to adhere strictly to these lines. Bhupendranath Sanyal was one of those teachers who preferred the older ideal. Before coming to Santiniketan, he ran a store for Swadeshi goods. Once on a personal visit to Santiniketan, he met Rabindranath, who had already heard about this upright man full of idealism. Rabindranath requested him to join the school, and in 1903, just after the Autumn break, Bhupendranath joined the school. He was a loving teacher and took care of the children. He would nurse a sick child so tenderly that those looked after by him remembered him for it. When Mohit Sen had to leave the asrama due to ill-health, Rabindranath asked Bhupendranath to take charge as Adhyaksha.

Supriya Roy further notes, “Bhupendranath was in Santiniketan for about seven years….”

In one of his letters (2 January 1908) to Bhupendranath Sanyal, Tagore alerted:

Our school has daily chores, teaching, cultural events, arguments on scriptural texts, etc. But, where is He? The one who is the source of all Rasa? It isn't compulsory to derive Rasa; we can work even without it. However, work isn’t the only motto. Exploring Rasa delights us. All enterprises come full circle when they bring happiness. When will that joy enlighten our students and teachers, at work and at leisure? It’s indeed meaningless to focus on our works with no attention to the results. Bhupen-babu, don’t let your mind become dry in your daily works. Let it instead sink in the boundless ocean of the world and beyond. Only then will you become free of regrets from worldly hindrance and loss. You will then feel joyous. There lies the beauty of life. And barring it, there is no prosperity.

In another letter (6 January 1908) to Sanyal, Tagore expressed his trust:

Had I succeeded in bringing a devout person amidst the teachers, I would have been thankful. There are plenty of teachers; they work to meet personal needs. I just hope they don't impede the overall welfare of the school. God-realized souls are rare. Won’t we have the believers? We want the truth; we solicit God. That’s enough — not only for the students but also for us — for our spiritual growth. I’m so happy to have you. Whenever I think about the school, I look for you. You have been instrumental in making me inquisitive about God. Now, my curiosity is even more robust, for you seek Him too.

The following letter (21 April 1903) substantially augments Tagore’s faith in Sanyal:

I have long-nurtured a desire. I want to travel with you to several parts of India, even abroad, if possible. As I read your letter, I think my wish won't be wasted. This way, I would like to conclude my worldly journey if I can secure your companionship. I didn’t write much about it in my last letter to you. But now that I've your

support, I’m speaking my mind. I don’t want to get bound with any work. It’s imperative to come out of my family life. However, it will be improper to detach me from all auspicious activities. So, I need to fill my mind—whatever I can gain from traveling around. I will carry back home for my tender children like the girls frequenting the ghat to fetch water in pots to serve their families. But this seems to be an implausible proposition. So, I will instead saturate my mind while standing at the shore of the ocean of the truth. Whom shall I associate myself with reaching the goal if not you? I won't force you, but if I'm benefited, you too will be blessed. One who is starving demands food out of acute hunger. There is this intense demand. How can you remain idle if you genuinely understand my need?

These letters offer significant insights: although Tagore was a follower of Adi Brahmo Samaj (a sect that believed in infinite singularity and denounced idol-worship and polytheism), his was an endless quest for God-realization. Second, his trust in Bhupendranath Sanyal went beyond the traditional alliance of employer and employee. Tagore looked up to Sanyal as his mentor—as a Master who inspired much interest in spirituality. Moreover, both Tagore and Sanyal were dedicated to day-to-day work; the former ensured the latter didn’t lose focus on his final goal of understanding the truth burdened with an unnecessary workload.

No wonder Tagore was formally initiated into Kriyayoga by Bhupendranath Sanyal at the age of 78. Prof. Haraprasad Ray, in his book, Kriya Yogi Bhupendranath Sanyal O Rabindranath (Howrah: Prachi Publications, 2012), reveals that Sanyal was accompanied by another yogi, Buddhadeb Bose. Both of them taught Tagore the intricate details and exercises of this stoic way to self-realization.

In his book, Prof. Ray also described when Tagore expressed his wish to Sanyal to meet an authentic Sadhu as they went out to Kashi (Varanasi). Sanyal took him to the Ranaghat premises to visit Krishnaram, one of the exalted disciples of Yogiraj Lahiri Mahasaya.

It is understood that there was no rift in their relationship even after Sanyal left the Brahmacharya Ashram. It is noteworthy that other than being the spiritual guide of Tagore, Sanyal also helped the school as he roped in Pandit Bidhushekhar Shastri (1905) and later, Pandit Kshitimohan Sen (1908). They

elevated the teaching standard and brought more students and thus eased the prevailing financial crunch.

Tagore wrote in his preface to Sādhanā, “All the great utterances of man have to be judged not by the letter but by the spirit.” As readers peruse the following chapters, I hope they will grasp that apart from the sacred Indian scriptures, contemporaries, like Sanyal, helped Tagore become, as we understand him now, a sage thinker for all time.

References:

1. Sādhanā: the realisation of life by Rabindranath Tagore

2. Makers of a Mission by Supriya Roy

3. Kriya Yogi Bhupendranath Sanyal O Rabindranath by Haraprasad Ray

Note: Sengupta has translated Tagore’s letters to Bhupendranath Sanyal, originally written in Bengali.

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Keywords: Rabindranath, Tagore, Spirituality, Yoga, Kriya, Bhupendranath, Sanyal, Sadhana, Realization

 

Bio: Kiriti Sengupta, the 2018 Rabindranath Tagore Literary Prize recipient, is a poet, editor, translator, and publisher. He has authored eleven books of poetry and prose; two books of translation and edited seven anthologies. Sengupta's poems have been published in The Common, The Florida Review Online (Aquifer), Headway Quarterly, Moria Online, Amethyst Review, Madras Courier, Ink Sweat and Tears, Mad Swirl, among other places. He is the founder and chief editor of the Ethos Literary Journal. Sengupta lives in New Delhi.

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Tagore Special :: Setu, May 2022

Towards a Composite Experience of Light

Book Review by: Malashri Lal

Shimmer Spring: Prose and Poetry

Presented by Kiriti Sengupta

Paintings by Pintu Biswas

Hawakal Publishers, November 2020

ISBN: 9788194853848

Pages 124

₹ 2500 INR / $ 31.99 USD 

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Shimmer Spring is a paean to luminosity—to those mysterious half-lights that suggest a range of possibilities from romance to ruination. The forty poets included in this volume—I’d like to count the editor among them—have captured the effervescence of time, the almost invisible yet inevitable changes that mark the journey of emotions. Kiriti Sengupta is inspired by Rabindranath Tagore’s lines, “Light that emanates from the core of gloom is your glow. Goodness, wide-awake among all discord, is your truth,” and he recognizes the frequency with which the principle of light governs our daily engagements as well as the flights of poesy. It’s a remarkable configuration to organize a volume, but the result is impressive, especially as Pintu Biswas’s vibrant paintings in a semi-abstract mode capture the essence of words on a page. The editor’s preface, “Sublime Submissions,” sets the tone with teasing questions: “How do we perceive light? How do we intuit its source? It can be cockcrow, it can be the candle we float in the river, it can reasonably be the lantern Ma placed at my study...” The scope is vast. From Usha Kishore’s sonorous invocation of the Gayatri Mantra to the grief of final parting as in Ranu Uniyal’s “Benediction,” light leaves that fleeting yet indelible mark on our memories.

Here are a few striking examples. Sudeep Sen’s masterly lines express the impossibility of subduing light even when one is engulfed in darkness as, philosophically speaking, each suggests the other: “Late at night, light leaks — spilling / beyond the door’s rectangle edge — // a cleaving schism, its shape — / a partial crucifix, a new resurrection” (“Hope: Light Leaks”). Such images are trans-cultural, reaching into the depths of human experience for which, perhaps, only spiritual vocabulary can provide the strongest resonance. The writers in the volume come from different locations—India, USA, UK, Norway, Pakistan, Peru, among others—but as expected of the binding theme, they offer their perception of light in multiple manifestations. But turning to the second word in the title of the volume, “spring,” we are taken to another ungraspable phenomenon—the tangible expressions of Nature’s magical blossoming, yet so transient.

A stunning sequence about this ephemeral aspect comes from Usha Akella, the founder of Matwala Festival and collective, who remembers her father singing: “The petal of flame holds steady / in the cup of the lantern’s glass, / from his shy mouth, emerge winged things— / Hindi sings testing flight in the darkness...” (“My Father Sings”). It is very likely that the most poignant moments are remembered through the play of the sun’s rays—or their absence—because the passage of time and seasons halts not even for shifts in the diurnal cycle. I turn momentarily to Katacha Diaz, a Peruvian American writer, to check if cultural variations have an impact on how one reflects about shimmers by the sea, and I find these lines in her poem, “In the Pacific Northwest,” which demonstrate that raging floods are universal though couched in distinct expressions of location:

 

“Surreal river

mirage floating in the fog

tugboat sky castles.”

      

Riverine images juxtaposed with the cityscape emerge as a recurrent pattern in the poems. Some step out enticingly, as in the words of Rochelle Potkar, whose poetry collection Paper Asylum was shortlisted for the Rabindranath Tagore Literary Prize 2020.

 

“Smoking brainwaves of an unknown city

fish skins on paper

I recall skeletons of caper

amid scuffles on a wooden settee.” (“Loafer”)

 

Elsewhere, Jagari Mukherjee associates the glistening “nets of rain” with a lost romance. Basudhara Roy equates a broken relationship with the “lining ripped off love’s kantha work,” and Neera Kashyap wonders if she is a moth “spiraling towards the radiance.” The diversity of situations and voices bring endless topics to the quest for “shimmer spring,” some of the best poetry being strongly imagistic.

A part of the volume comprises prose pieces that are somewhat lost in their search of a genre. Often poetic, occasionally narrative, but always experimental, they are written as musings rather than chiseled pieces. On the other hand, one could say they are prose poems, which transits between various forms. This, in itself, might be a powerful quest for the correct format to contain the emotions.

Joan Kwon Glass, who is a second-generation American with roots in Korea, writes of motherhood in a diary format (“Paris, June 2017”) that could be either prose or poetry:

 

“What I remember most about Paris are the pigeons

beneath the Eiffel Tower. How when my daughter

chased them, they filled the esplanade like dandelion seeds.”

 

Raja Chakraborty’s “Joker,” Koushik Sen’s “Hands,” and Kanchan Dhar’s “Becoming the Himalayas” are bold, imagistic prose exploring the English language for its unexpected collocations, with that surprise at the end of a paragraph/stanza. Definitions break down in such writing, and Carl Sandburg comes to my mind with the words: “Poetry is a phantom script telling how rainbows are made and why they go away.” That too belongs to the drama of light.

This book is melting the boundary between poetry and prose and amalgamating painting in its endeavor towards a composite experience. The perfect blend of various elements is found in Mamang Dai’s poem “Oasis,” illustrated by Pintu Biswas.

 

“The oasis is a memory of rain.

Beloved of the sun, the long dune stretches

dreaming of a summer of splendid wilderness

chasing a river with eyes and limbs

and the visage of a god.”

 

The watercolor sketch shows a black, storm-tossed palm tree under which a woman is trying to stand but is buffeted by the high wind. Her arms outstretched, her hair streaming behind her, she is almost supplicating before the tree god. The trunk of the tree is almost in the form of another woman in earthy red as a contrast to the black fronds. Pintu’s sketches throughout the book are superb in style as well as interpretive quality.

Altogether Shimmer Spring is a joy to behold and keep. Priced on the expensive side, one may hesitate to buy, but it is worth every penny. It makes a lovely keepsake or an attractive gift.

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Malashri Lal, Department of English (retd), Delhi University, is a writer, editor, and critic based in New Delhi. She is currently a Member of the English Advisory Board of the Sahitya Akademi.

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Setu, March 2021

Book Review: Hibiscus – Poems that heal and empower

U Atreya Sarma

Hibiscus Anthology of Poems Ed: Kiriti Sengupta, Anu Majumdar, Dustin Pickering Hawakal Publishers, May 2020 | pp 205 ISBN 978-81-945273-0-5 | ₹ 500 / US $ 16.99

Reviewed by: U Atreya Sarma

Poetic power against the pandemic

Anything that can allay the unease due to the ongoing eerie pandemic is welcome, and so should be the poetry anthology Hibiscus aimed at “Healing and Empowerment,” which its chief editor Kiriti Sengupta assures, “will comfort and rejuvenate the readers to step into a world that might not allow reckless lifestyles we were used to,” and wisely cautions, “Self-restraint comes with a price,” and that the Covid-10 “has cautioned us to become sensible and diligent” (p ii).

The dynamic Kiriti, teamed up with two associate editors, says they have received poems from 153 poets from across the world, but that they have retained only the best. Finally, 160 poems by 104 poets (including 28 from outside India) with some of them contributing more than one, makes up the anthology.

The editors stipulate a 14 line cap on each poem for the sake of “concision” – based on Kiriti’s “experience of reading poetry by a wide variety of poets both young and veteran, and from various demography” for “the lack of brevity gives me endless agony” (p i) – but ultimately, they end up accepting quite a few poems that have shot up to 24 lines. And Anu Majumdar admits that they “have made an exception” in some cases and also that “Some poems have veered off the theme” as well (p vii). This judicious flexibility proves that the length of a poem, unless it is a metrical one, can’t be stymied for it depends upon the magnitude and intensity of the matter to be expressed, even as verbosity per se can’t be justified.

The editorial trio, instead of introducing the book through a joint preface, choose to mirror their respective reflections separately under the heading ‘The Silver Lining,’ in addition to Kiriti Sengupta’s exclusive ‘Hibiscus – a palliative measure.’ Thus there are four intros to the book.

The pandemic, despite the social distancing norms, should bring people emotionally and spiritually together with a unity of purpose, and that spirit of bonhomie – for charity should begin at home – infuses the three editors, Kiriti Sengupta, Anu Majumdar and Dustin Pickering who mutually quote from their poems with complaisance. And it is seen that the title ‘Hibiscus’ of the anthology is an eponym of a poem by Kiriti Sengupta quoted by Dustin.

“As the Coronavirus continues to take lives, our mission as poets and artists is to think, to heal and to dream,” envisions Dustin Pickering (from Houston), and also to “imagine what may come next” (x). And he doesn’t mind digressing into political waters by hurling innuendos at President Donald Trump in a scenario where divergent opinions could prevail.

The poems in the anthology are varied in conception, presentation and diction; in conveyance of import – from explicit to cryptic. So also the measure of healing and empowering varies. Of course, these appraisals could differ from reader to reader. While the punctuation is irregular in many poems, the font size of the text of the poems could have been slightly bigger. And the bio of Anupama Raju, one of the poets, is missing.

***

“These days, Corona rules and inspires dread – like an ageing dictator, unsure of public mood and friendly reactions towards his decrees. Everybody talks of Corona only; this transnational virus stalks, maims and kills, often in the arbitrary style of a mythical monster. It is grim scene!” Sunil Sharma sums up the situation in his prose poem ‘Covid-19 and the Art of Paper-Boat-Making.’

Now that the gravity of the situation is clear, let’s us get to assess a cross-section of the contents, and begin on an auspicious note of sagely wisdom of benevolence to everyone and malevolence to none, via a sublime story, narrated by Onkar Sharma. A peripatetic sage is waylaid, manhandled and robbed of whatever little he has by a gang of thieves, and the leader challenges him “to curse him to hell” –

but the saint radiates a smile and blesses him to dwell

in a prosperous land where he doesn’t have to steal

and where he doesn’t inflict anyone for food but can heal.

(The Muni Of The Desert)

And the story ends in the cathartic remorse of the thug.

Necessity is the mother of invention. The pandemic while unsettling all of us has also brought out some of our latent talents and powers. And Levi Marinucci invokes such a strength –

I remember our resilience,

our ability to endure the most difficult.

... ... ... ...

I call upon strength I didn’t know I had,

I go through feeling the pain,

all the way into healing and renewal.

(All The Way Through)

And there are situations where people can’t contain their pent-up negative emotions, as in the poem by Gerard Sarnat  –

So bad news aside,

silver lining’s southern fat

white racists may die

(Smoke This Sickness)

Perhaps the reason for this negativity can be traced to his earlier poem ‘Inner Climate Change’ –

Being human is

a bit more intense than most

of us can handle

The prolonged lockdown has made us all homebound and in most cases, the familial bond has got further cemented, as in Nabanita Sengupta’s poem –

In the open kitchen un-modular

conversation locked down for years

broke open sluice gates

Recipes of world

exotic spices

homegrown love

sautéed melodies

healed some long time bruised hearts.

(Remedial)

While on the home front, we need to inculcate values in our children by living them ourselves. And we need to be introspective with an attitude of ‘Stop, look and proceed,’ as Usha Akella suggests –

Let us offer our children our wisdom not our greed.

Let us ask today, tomorrow and every day,

“Have I thawed at least one hard sinew in my heart?

Am I lighter when I reach the other side?”

(Bridges)

What’s empowerment as a means to healing in the current viral crisis? In my view, it’s empowering ourselves with a matrix of mental makeup and executing an action plan – uncompromisingly observing all the precautions prescribed by the state as advised by health experts; keeping physically and mentally fit;  being particular about our dietary regimen to exorcise the claustrophobic devil; increasing our levels of immunity; knowing about and emulating the gestures of the kind-hearted toward the needy & hapless; being good neighbours; loving and protecting Mother Nature with her flora and fauna; following the time tested soul-elevating practices in our respective faiths; and cultivating a broader, eclectic, holistic, spiritual, and philosophical view of things.

Coming to the Nature part of the healing matrix, let’s hear what Shernaz Wadia says –

We need to bear a solemn, sobering responsibility

towards the vague future of a metamorphosing world

Can we return to nature? At least turn to it

while we battle an invisible, till now unconquered force?

Nature’s cathartic beauty will help us retain our sanity

(Nature Our Teacher)

Despite all the precautions we observe and the grit with which we live, there could still be some casualties, as Steve Denehan apprehends –

People are candles now

twilight flickering

some will blaze again

some will burn out

long before dawn

(The Virus, April 2020)

But let’s bear in mind that none of us is immortal and it’s the way of life. We have to accept life as it comes, with a stoic moxie. What matters is not mere longevity but the salubrious quality of life that we enjoy. Hasn’t Ben Jonson put it succinctly, as under?

“It is not growing like a tree 
In bulk, doth make man better be;
Or standing long an oak, three hundred year,
To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere:
A lily of a day 
Is fairer far in May,
Although it fall and die that night—
It was the plant and flower of Light.”

So now, let’s sign off on a robustly optimistic note with Sanjna Plawat’s lyrics –

That day will come when hugs are warmer

That day will come when paths are full of laughter

That day will come when each day is a new chapter

That day will come [sic] no one is battling hunger

That day will come when home becomes a place to gather

That day will come when we live as brother and sister

(That Day Will Come)

♣♣♣END♣♣♣

Setu, August 2020

Voices Within: Kiriti Sengupta

Kiriti Sengupta is an award-winning poet, translator, editor, publisher and festival planner, based at Calcutta, India. Details at kiritisengupta.com

The Resurrection

Slumber unfolds its arms as it wakes up. The tiny particles scattered in the air absorb the sunlight; they seem to be delighted and drone the song of liberation. Sleep is now conscious like the attraction between mother and her new-born.

Flawlessly arranged, the room for hard work is yet to mark the advent of fatigue. At a distance, the mother awaits her demonstration in sweat and grime.

Rostrum

Hierarchies exist in literature.

Diplomacy holds many colors on

its sleeves. Why blame shades

for dissociation?

Poetry is hardly audible,

audience witness smiling

poets on the dais.

O’ Girl

As a woman you’re never alone—

you may not be impressed by the gazes

when you come out,

they will follow wherever you go.

‘Single mother’ is a misnomer—

you may not bear a fetus in your womb

you may not have a partner for leaning to

but then,

there is always a child to look after,

the one prior to the one in you.

Unity

Some words are best hyphenated. 

Take self confidence—

it points at composure

or its absence. 

Hyphen springs it to consciousness—

it vaunts the union. 

Voices Within - Complete List of Poets :: Setu, January 2019

Get in Love: Scott Thomas Outlar

Scott Thomas Outlar

Have you ever set your eyes upon a face that makes you instantaneously believe the future is perfect?

Have you ever heard a voice that creates goosebumps on your skin every single time it speaks, sighs, and sings?

Have you ever been completely transformed by the grace of a simple smile?

Have you ever witnessed light wash over the flesh of the woman you love as she stands up and seizes life in all its glory?

The holiday season is officially in full swing as November winds down and passes the torch off to December. Thanksgiving was celebrated last week here in the United States, and now the race toward Christmas and straight into the next year of 2018 is well underway. As the years continue to add up in life, individual moments seem more and more to flash by in the blink of an eye. Seconds spin around the clock a little quicker. The days and months fall away from the calendar pages as quickly as a new season arrives on the scene. Or so it can sometimes seem with the hustle and bustle of daily life as we go about our work.

With such in mind, I thought it would be an opportune time to take a moment during this special portion of the year and inhale a deep breath to fully absorb the wondrous spirit of what makes life truly worth living. LOVE. It has been said here and there in a song or two that such an emotion is all you really need. When the heart starts overflowing, the essence behind such a thought begins to make perfect sense.

Love for family. Love for friends. Love for pets. Love for community. Love for nature. Love for art. Love for God. Love for all those who came before us and established a path through their sacrifices that we are privileged to now journey along today. Love, even, for the entire species of humanity (despite our collective flaws which aren’t necessary to delve into right now because that might end up killing the good buzz that’s being developed).

This month, I wanted to highlight this touching letter that I came across on Facebook penned by Kiriti Sengupta for his wife, Bhaswati. This anniversary message from the fine poet reflects the notion of what is, perhaps, the most precious love of all. That which begins as romance but develops through effort, energy, trust, shared experiences, and devotion into an abiding relationship through the years. In a world where attention spans continually dwindle, it’s uplifting to know that the deep commitment of marriage still plays an important role in bonding two lives together as one.

I hope that this touching vignette will give pause to anyone who reads it, allowing them a chance to meditate for a moment on those whom they hold most dear, and, perhaps stoke the flames and rekindle the fire with their own one true love. And to those who have just recently met their soulmate, let the words shine as an example of the bright future that now awaits you. Simply stated, always cherish those that matter the most to your heart! Blessings and goodwill to all. Selah

Setu November 2017

Words of Introspection - Book Review: Manu Kurup

Reflections on Salvation

Author: Kiriti Sengupta

ISBN:  978-0996270465

Page: 48

1^st edition (Paperback): July, 2016

Published by Transcendent Zero Press, Houston, Texas

Reviewed by Manu S Kurup [PhD]

Assistant Professor of English

H&S, MLR Institute of Technology

Dundigal, Hyderabad (Telangana) India.

Spirituality has many dimensions. A few, known and discussed widely. Much more, waiting to be explored individually, based on personal experiences. As a teacher of mine once remarked, “It can’t be taught but it can be learned.” So, when Casey Dorman’s first sentence as the foreword to Kiriti Sengupta’s Reflections on Salvation reads as: “Spiriuality has always been a concept that has troubled me,” I instantly connected with it. My journey from a believer in the childhood to a doubter in the teenage and later as an atheist-Marxist in the twenties to a total materialist (in a rather philosophical way) confused at the intrinsic consumerism and blatant disregard for humane qualities of the world, has been tough. My present philosophical self hinges on my readings of Nietzsche. Yet, reading Kiriti Sengupta is a tougher choice because it sometimes requires me to flip through the pages of certain books I had purposefully left behind a long while ago. Nevertheless, it certainly is a testing situation and I enjoy one when I get it.

The concept of salvation is a tricky one. Just like the word “culture,” it is multi-faceted, thanks to the last millennia that provided us with many interpretations of it. The theoretical explanation of “salvation” in the Abrahamic religions is contrasted heavily with the more complex meanings it has in the Indic religions. If Abrahamic religions have an over-obsession with the term, Indic religions, especially Buddhism and what became Hinduism, are heavily influenced by the thought. What Sengupta, whose poetry is based on his strong philosophical foundation, portrays in this rather small book with a heavy content is the friction between the textual interpretation of “salvation” and its applications in an era that has gone too far beyond the realm of “spirituality.” In a nutshell, Reflections on Salvation is a remarkable parallel of India as a nation that is torn between its culture rooted in spirituality and life fixed in fast-paced liberalism.

The first shocker of this beautiful collection of thoughts comes in the title “Stagecraft.” Sengupta says, “Salvation is but enlightenment, achievable only by actions, and through your sensory gateways.” In the next title “Third Molar,” Sengupta evokes laughter through a witty remark to his patient who was troubled with her wisdom tooth. Just like that, Sengupta draws parallels from random day-to-day affairs of life and his understanding of scriptures and the nuances of it. In a way, he introspects the practices that a large population fervently follow and how hollow they can be if looked from the perspective of the current world. In the chapter titled “Fire,” Sengupta says that when the word yajna make you think of “liberation,” it makes him think of the amount of ghee consumed and the number of trees cut down. He points out that The Vedas did not consider malnutrition and environment, and he also wonders if The Vedas were written by a group of men who never lived on earth.

To draw out the alien-ness of the teachings to a generation that has travelled so far from the roots of it is not an easy job. In fact, it is an introspection in itself though there exists a layer of humor in these pieces of Flash Wisdom. Sengupta says, “Saffron adds color and flavor to certain delicacies, but when it shows up on your attire, I find you saintly pious.” The word “saffron” has a contemporary political relevance in India which is hardly pious. But what Sengupta focuses on is “renunciation” and “attachment.” He laments about the mind that is trained to accept what certain colors are associated with.

Reviewer: Manu S. Kurup

Poetry has many layers, perhaps more than that of spirituality or even philosophy. The very hybridity that is the unique style of Kiriti Sengupta is the best to chart out the questions that this book of Flash Wisdom offers. Poetry is never easy to read, especially if it questions one’s faith and beliefs. For someone who has not subscribed to any, it is even more difficult. But Sengupta’s style of writing liberates the reader from such passiveness. Instead of just prodding the reader to a question, Sengupta cunningly provides a context in which the very act of thinking a question becomes a revolution in itself. And, such thought-revolutions are the need of the hour. I have not gauged the effect of the title Flash Wisdom yet, however, it is the power of these “reflections” to make us reflect on our mundane experiences that matter to me. In that, Sengupta is a winner, as always.

Setu, July 2017

The Earthen Flute — A Flux of Contraries

Tuhin Sanyal, Asst. Prof. in English, Tufanganj College, Cooch Behar, W.B.
Email: tuhin76sanyal@gmail.com; Cell: 98302-84462

The Earthen Flute by Kiriti Sengupta

In popular belief, ‘Mysticism’ is ‘unifying with God or the absolute,’ or even unifying with the ecstatic or the altered state of consciousness. It is often given a religious or spiritual meaning vide epiphanies or revelations and inspired interpretations of the world-order and other mumbo-jumbo in relation to the Godly. But definitions change; and the mannerisms of exacting ideas and definitions, in relation to contemporariness, egg on the Human Being to search for a New Expression for Old Clichés — coherent and topical with his times. From this dialectical pattern, the new poet who is born after the death of God, starts legislating. Where the Godly ends, his Poetry begins. Devoid of the Godly authority, his legislations become the harbingers of expressions that are blinding paradoxes for innovative introspection. In that vein, the problem in relation to Mysticism and mystical experience created terrorizing tremors in the Richter Scale of human psyche ever since the death of God, and birth of Blake. Nietzsche furthered the truth about God’s death all the more with his path-breaking theories of annihilation—psychological theories, backed by the pseudo-scientific (logical-rhetorical-metaphorical) plausibility of existentialism, theories of all gods in fortuitous circumstances, and their resultant deaths accruing thereof. In such Godless times, the Romantic Blake automatically became foregrounded as the messiah or poet-prophet since he could refer to the attainment of insight in ultimate or intuitive hidden truths, and to human transformation supported by the paradoxical commonality of human experiences.

Kiriti Sengupta

I am not too much of a God-fearing man; to me God is not (m)aligned with orthodox Religion, Cult or Order, but to me ‘god’ is a way of life, ‘religion’ is anything pertaining to Humanity, and ‘cult’ is sheer Practice of the commune. And to me, all of that amount to Poetry. I am an avid reader of good poems (Pray, do not dub me value-judgmental yet!), I try my hand at writing good verses (I too am an ‘unacknowledged legislator!’), and I am always on the lookout for new books of verses that may appeal to my mind and body alike (Pray, also do not dub me a sensual, pseudo-intellectual!). The other day, while traversing and tripping through the ‘virtual’ world and its pseudo-poetic drudgery, I suddenly was able to lay my hands (not feet, since I knelt down to pick it up the moment it saw it!) on a book of ‘real’ poetry. The poet had three ‘I’s (read ‘eyes’) in his first name — K-I-R-I-T-I — Kiriti Sengupta! Two eyes are always fine; but I felt inquisitive to know if the poet truly had his third-‘I/eye’ in place, and whether he could see the Discordiaconcors of the world-(dis)orders with that Instrument of Intuition and Intention which creates a poet. Thankfully the justified ‘I/eye’-conscious in his poems did not dishearten me!

It seemed to me that much of the book was meant ‘to conceal’ than reveal flat and point-blank natural, liturgical, spiritual, and contemplative dimensions of the human cravings from poetry. It had its own crypts and cryptic codes. On making a careful scrutiny of the initial pages, I found that the poet with three ‘eyes/I’s—KIRITI—had quite audaciously dedicated the book to William Blake. Audacity? Not really! Such audacity is quite just when his poetic intuition is able to ken the “Gateway to God” (Pp.25) and yet “continue to live being frightened,” sustain life somehow, much like Rintrah in Blake’s “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.” Ironically, and yet keeping in sync with the foregone discussion, in a queer Blake-ian pattern Kiriti upholds his range of religio-rational beliefs and ideologies, related to the extraordinary experiences and states of his individual moral code, which prompt him to “Keep An Eye” (Pp.15), “the third one” in particular, “over the ages” about which “sculptors never (actually) bothered”. Unwittingly perhaps, the poet reiterates Blake’s vision of the brooding abyss of the Universe dominated by Urizen (I decode the crypt as ‘Your Reason’) who keeps vigil on the ‘contraries’ that lead to ‘progression’— a progression through contraries, which other poets and sculptors, except Blake, could not conceive of.

Interestingly enough, Blake was a sculptor himself and he chiseled the first manuscript of Songs of Innocence with his own hand, much as a collage of glue-papyrus-metals, adding natural dyes as colors, to give it the shape of a book of apparently simplistic rhymes, which would later be telling upon the much dogmatic Christian religious order of the times. The cliché of world’s experiment with the “earthly eyes” of Durga (name of a Mother-Goddess of the Hindu pantheon), negates a sacrament in the superimposition of a living human non-entity (a sundry woman by the same name) and the lifeless Godly entity by the very appellation. To add to this, such experiment is thoughtless, audacious, marginalizing, as well as pathetic in terms of the indifference of creative artists. Kiriti challenges the hollow, pseudo-religious throe in dogmas (here, ‘experimenting’ is one such), just as Blake had challenged Swedenborg. But Kiriti chooses to express with a postmodernist’s insight, from his Indian ethos, though in a clear parallel with Blake’s displaced Jehovah and Christ as the ‘Son of God’ (not God Himself) — an oblique fling of the dogmatic Christian pantheon.

The poet of The Earthen Flute pipes to his readers very simple (though seemingly problematized), earthly—hence factual—ditties just as Blake would by juxtaposing ‘innocence’ and ‘experience’. Kiriti, like Blake, too believes in the reinstatement of contraries of good and evil side by side, since that is the inevitable actuality; and he has his “Clues to Name” (Pp.31-32). In this new world order of C.2016, he makes a clean breast of “Lust reinstated… inevitable it is…” which undergoes “Immersion via the mirror… (and bids) goodbye to the goddess”, notably, with a small ‘g’. In an accepted (Hindu) ritualistic bid the Goddess Durga, as in Kiriti’s poem, is first immersed in the liquid haze of a mirror (symbolic of water or River Ganga); lust of the male gaze is already reinstated therein, but is hinted at as if through cryptic language, until the post-consummation final ‘goodbye’ is bid to the ‘goddess’, only too fit for earthly consummation—a ‘goddess’ (diva?) with a real body to forebode issues of gender. In “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell” Blake visualizes the The Holy Bible on the library shelf of ‘The Devil’. God, for Blake, is Urizen (‘your reason’ with an imperfect ‘U’ lacking closure) and, to some extent, Jehovah, who can also be malevolent. Kiriti re-does a Blake’s in the same throe which amalgamates reason and ‘practiced’ religion in its fold, but with a difference. He does not sound prophetic, and his poems are not sermons. In a way, Kiriti speaks of a natural religion that is Man!

“Mother Water” (Pp.51) recurs in the “Nucleus” (Pp.42) of Kiriti’s poetry, and he adds ripples to it with the vibes of The Earthen Flute. “Ganga has her stories to tell… (she) listens to our prayers / Both mute and loud.” The queer ‘flux’ of ‘opposites’ wrench his expressions out from a poetic ‘fixity’ which is his own. Sometimes they are ace ironies in themselves; just as the “Womb,” for him, is akin to and reminiscent of the archetypal “earthquake.”  He is religio-rational, just like Blake’s first person narrator Rintrah, thinking aloud while visit to Hell is still on. Hell is not seen as a place of punishment, which is obviously the common association to it, but it is seen as a source of unrepressed feelings, creative energy, and personal-spiritual progression. Similarly, Kiriti’s womb — earthquake (birth — devastation) equation is an opposing and oblique, as well as a regulated and authoritarian perception of heaven-in-hell and hell-in-heaven, as if in a Blakeian bid to reiterate Milton’s and Dante’s thoughts in their great works. With this, Kiriti becomes a serious dissenter, who is permanently searching for a neo-modern, neo-mystic and neo-spiritual, practicable poetic truth by marrying off the contraries or the opposites. His The Earthen Flute, apparently a title with a low-key note, basks in the pathos of burning water (much like a romantic oxymoron) where “No ash is formed.” It gives its readers beauty, reminds them of some faraway music, the smell of the rain drenched earth, first love, the empty eve of Durga Dashami (after Goddess Durga is immersed in the river), a sexual aftermath, “gathering swallows twitter(ing) in the skies,” or, say, a “sunny pleasure dome with caves of ice,” but with a postmodernist’s expression.

Bio-note:Tuhin Sanyal is an Assistant Professor in English at Tufanganj College in Cooch-Behar, West Bengal. Apart from an academic award from Berhampore University (Odisha) and the numerous academic papers and critical writings to his credit, he has penned three books of poems titled White, Blue and Other Poems (2004) archived in the National Library, Phoenix on a Female Body and Other Poems (2009), both published by Writers Workshop, Calcutta, and The Nectar-Nook (2016), which is an English rendering of Harivanshrai Bachchan’s Madhushala, published by Chitrangi, Kolkata. 

Table of Contents, February, 2017