Shyamalee

Don’t Come again...

2011-04-08T18:44:00.004+05:30

Don’t come again
Because
I will never write
I will never write for you
For the pain you have given me
The pain of invisible love
And
The sadness of being in love

But I don’t know for how long I can keep my promise

Your charm ignites the thought
Forces the words out of vain
Don’t ask me to write a poem
If anything, I want to write about happiness and not love
Melancholy of joblessness and not being separated from you
Wounds of accidents and not memory

Don’t come again….
Don’t ask me again Shyamalee…..

Happiness etcetera…

2010-07-21T14:05:00.004+05:30

Last time she came here, it was Holi, pretty colorless

Summer was yet to set.

We had planned to whitewash our house later in the year

Around September and October

This will keep the house white for a long time

till rain soaks the wall

And in the wall,

till we see our ancestors taking shape

For generations we have believed

In happiness

in whiteness

And

Kept whitewashing the walls

Year after year

Of River, Hills and Shyamalee...

2009-07-27T09:43:00.003+05:30

The river takes hundred turns here
to negotiate with the hills.
In every turn there is a mark
of memory,
a tiny flower,
small grasses,
a few stones
and a good old tree.

Only the tiny steps are missing
and
some heartfelt laughter,
little of undecipherable sounds
and
some distinct ones
she would have made otherwise.

The missing marks slowly vanish
as the river takes one more turn.

This time, the river
refuses to negotiate
with the hills... ... ...

This poem is an outcome of days when my son was not with me for a few days. I remodified the poem a bit to get a universal feeling

A Sort of Review

2009-03-07T13:14:00.002+05:30

(I was tagged by Runa to write a review on books I read in January. When started writing I was confused and ended up writing on many books that I have read so far. It is a challenge for me to write prose that are outside my field of research. I don't know she will like this or not, but I enjoyed going through the nostalgia of books I have read)

When it comes to food, watching a movie and reading a book and very specifically investing your own hard-earned money and time on these, one needs to be very careful. I for, do that. Therefore, often I keep ordering the same set of food in a restaurant, I keep watching the same set of movies in Television and rare though, I keep reading the same set of books I read. It is uncountable times that I have eaten chicken curry, Tandoori Rotis, green salad and fish fry in select restaurants, it is innumerable times that I have seen the movies like Angoor, Golmal, Choti si Baat in any of the Television Channels. When it comes to books and very specifically fictions, I rarely take chance. So, when I don’t have a recommendation from same wavelength source or a book by an author whose work has already been read by me, I end up reading a set of books already been read. In last few months, therefore, I ended up reading the Feluda series by Satyajit Ray and Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and stories of R K Narayan with same vigour and thrill as it has happened several times to me reading these books. This is the case with picking up Tintin or Twinkil or a Chandamama (or, in Oriya it is called Janhamamoon that I often read). There have been several attempts by me to complete My name is Red by Orhan Palmuk, A Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa or God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy and short stories by Ritwik Ghatak. Of these Llosa needs a special mention as his book titled Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter enthralled me throughout the reading. However, others are yet to be successful. It is the fate with Arvind Adiga’s White Tiger; but in this case, I am sure, it is just the matter of time as the book has the language of lucidity and the simplicity of narration that holds the reader. Besides, my wife is hooked into this one for which I have to wait till she completes.

It has happened several times that I have picked short stories and short fictions by Marquez and read them a dozen times (if not exaggerated) but for One Hundred Years of Solitude. No one writes to Colonel, Innocent Erendira, Of Love and other Demons and Love in the Time of Cholera that comes back to mind time and again. Autumn of Patriarch and Love in the time of Cholera are two of the titles of Marquez’s craftsmanship that have drawn attention of several authors to write several notes under this title albeit with slight modification. Then there are Siddharth by Hermen Hesse, a few regional translations like Yayati (in Mrathi) by Khandekar, Chemin (in Malayalm) by Pillai, Ramer Sumati (in Bengali) by Sarat Chandra or Ananda Matha (in Bengali) by Bankim Chandra. When it comes to Oriya, I had the privilege to read them in original language. Most of the work of Gopinath Mohanty and specifically Paraja and Amrutara Santana has the touch of awfully vivid and depth that not only touches the core but also tears one apart by reincarnating the characters in visual imagination. The biography of Madhusudan Das written by Surendra Mohanty is also one such feast to read. Tiled as Satabdira Surjya (A crude translation would mean Sun of the Century) has a wonderful crafting of language. The autobiography that I savour is ‘My Auto Biography’ by Charles Chaplin the legendary filmmaker (well known as Charlie Chaplin) whose life was of equal twists and turns as his films.

In recent months when I read the book by Yann Martel titled Life of Pi, it was hilarious to begin with, however, it took serious turns as one sails through the book. Masterly written, the book reminds of Marquez’s one of the earlier work titled “The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor”.

When it comes to poetry it is difficult to ignore Neruda and his Tonight I can write the saddest line….But, there are many more to his poems as well his Memoirs. Though bought, I am yet to read his autobiography Memoirs. I was more attracted to read this, specifically after reading Marquez’s Clandestine in Chile that depicts the adventure of the filmmaker Miguel Littin in disguise to shoot a documentary twelve years after being exiled in the troubled nation of Chile followed by assassination of President Allende and beginning of dictatorship of Pinochet. This book, through its journey, rightfully renders tribute to Neruda and his popularity in Chile and rest of the Latin America as well as the rest of the World. After reading this, its logical to know what Neruda depicts about his on life.

Of late or say from last few weeks the book in my hand is Ramchandra Guha’s India After Gandhi. As the second part of the title suggests, it is the History of World’s largest Democracy. The 900 pages book not only shows the volume of work that has gone in the book but also the value and depth of work without compromising on the lucidity of writing which is expected from Guha’s style of writing and narration. It is a book that fills the gap of History of a country that somehow stopped soon at independence. The eloquence with which Guha explains the merger of states at Independence specifically the troubling one’s like Travancore, Hyderabad and not so much troubling one’s like Bhpal, Junagarh along with 500 odd feudal states reads like a fiction. The partition question, the way it was handled specifically for Punjab, the troubles relating to Kashmir and Nagaland, the foreign policy question, the way Nehru saw these problems and developed the diplomatic relation specifically with China, the then USSR and USA, making of the constitution, oppositions and its development where Dr. Ambedkar played a crucial role, the first general election and its planning, Planning of economic policies and priorities have so far been an interesting knowledge for me. Never before I read these in my history or any other classes. It is not only enlightening to read Guha but also one could very well feel what a greater aspect of our own history we are unaware of till today. The easiness and lucidity of Guha’s writing coupled with vivid and magnitude of our own nation on making and path of democracy makes the book very interesting and readable. If any complains I have about the book, it is about its volume that restricts me to carry with and hence increasing my completion time. The publisher could have thought about bringing it in two volumes for the support of readers like me who can carry the book to work or through travels.

I would stop here and get into my own readings. Perhaps, I will write a second episode of it like the soap operas in our TV Channels and bring in more reviews about books, films, food and travel. By the time I completed writing this review I also finished reading Adiga’s White Tiger. It is a splendidly written book with its raw expression of darkness and subtle humour, seeing the transiting Indian society through the lenses of a Master’s car driver.

A Tribute to Uproar of Silence

2008-12-15T12:23:00.007+05:30

All that was so clear sometime ago
seem to be opaque
As if,
someone has thrown a stone
to the still water

Unmoved by all these
she is in a trip to nostalgia
gathering a few fractured dreams

A rain would come
Perhaps…
And,
soak her
to bring her back

She will again feel shy
about her drenched semi-transparent clothes

Would also remember
many of them she knew are dead

In an uncountable steps to the Haveli in the alley
a hope perhaps would sprout

There are many more left
and a few children
who would come back running
to the river,
to the hillock
And
Bazar

Market, Death, etcetera...

2008-10-17T10:21:00.008+05:30

In my tiring thought
I have Kandhamal and Democracy

Sadness of not believing, in spite of knowing
is like,
afternoon's wall and corral of sea

Apart from naked God
and nude galaxy
I remember the woman tying her hair

They have put a big market
selling violence and terror
like a lane of red ants

putting fire is cheapest of all
then comes raping a woman

getting killed is not costly either...

(I Used Photofunia effect to get a feel of market)

Happy Birthday to Aaditya....

2008-10-03T12:16:00.002+05:30

He turns 2 today 3rd October.....

Happiness...

2008-09-12T15:27:00.000+05:30

She wanted to say
You don’t go, let me go
But the words she whispered
It is raining outside….

I wanted to say
Let me move on now
But,
I ended up saying
Would you make some tea for me….

It was such eternal happiness to think
Returning home several times
for every thought of going out of home

He wrote and I repeat….

Her smells were ten thousand afternoons away from me

I remembered that I can forget

it is so easy………

[The first part of the poem is a trans-creation of Vinod Shukla a well know Hindi poet. I confess, I have not read this poem but listened to it recited by a friend. The italics are taken ditto from my poet friend Siddharth’s poem]

I am in Love...

2008-01-21T18:17:00.000+05:30

A non-coherent thought

Appears

Repeats

And remains…

She disbeliefs

but reflects distrust

to his words

she says

apparently uninteresting words

her acts are not harmonised

and

she hears only exclusive sets of words

Her imaginations have spread wings

unaware of earthly happenings

she is in absolute disorder

and chaos

or, perhaps

she is in love……

Just like that...

2008-01-21T18:10:00.000+05:30

In the Past

2007-08-21T15:51:00.001+05:30

In the past
cloth
use to have carcass

Long back,
Three to four thousand years' back...

Now, clothes are there
and,
remembrance of carcass
far from touches...

[This photograph was taken at Lake Balaton, Hungary and the poem is a translation from original Hindi written by my poet friend Siddharth]

In an Alien City...

2007-08-02T17:50:00.000+05:30

In an alien city
I am longing for somebody
to call my name.
This will make me happy.

Then, I can smell the leaves
falling on the path of spring
I can see the colours of flowers
blossoming after the winters

I will recognise peoples’ voice
decipher their words
and
greetings

In an alien city
free from so many things
I could have felt its fragrance
Or, the woman
who was so close to me
years ago

Distance bothered me
distance from my child
his yelling and smiling
that has his own special marks

Distance bothered me
distance from the crowd and chaos
distance from responsibility
in an alien city…

[This poem is an outcome of my initial days in Pecs, Hungary where I spent my last one month. My blogger friends:I am really sorry for not keeping up the momentum of writing, all these days]

I Prefer to be Silent...

2007-03-17T10:33:00.000+05:30

I don’t know how

time passed

and

winter was nowhere to be seen

Leaves started falling

at times one by one

at times in bulk

From nowhere

a gusty wind came

and

took away many of those

to a distance of dreams

to desert them

at the end

No explanation was given

No reason was sought

At times I feel

How will we take the views of the leaves

if words are the only medium of expression!

I prefer to be silent

I prefer to look at my child

and

his innumerable expressions

NO WORDS

I prefer to be silent

...

Nothing but Death...

2007-02-08T10:16:00.000+05:30

I wish to write a poem

about nothing

but

death

The woman in next door

walks away

through the narrow alley

The old man

beneath a unknown tree

rests

after a long walk

A boy of twenty

smokes out

in a synchronised form

while talking over a mobile phone

I chose not to write

a poem about them

I hunt for a character

like a rickshaw puller,

like a man on the street

who announces about the next movie

in nearby theatre

and

distributes leaflets,

A man who comes to our street to sell charcoal

The woman selling puffed rice

All of them are dead

Long time passing

Let me rework on my flute

and

play the melancholy…

Khalida

2007-01-25T16:12:00.000+05:30

I love you Khalida
while gathering the mat in the dawn hours

in the morning I can see the depth of an ocean in your eyes

when noise of the hand pump echoes in the slum
your looks tremble me

why you look so beautiful in this morning hours
and see, how petite is my morning

The children would be rushing
to the ice-cream vendor
in the recess time of their school

I have to reach there

Yaa.. Allah..
If there were no school in this world!!!

(In the Original in Oriya I titled this poem as “The Ice-cream Vendor”. Here I prefer it to be Khalida, such a beautiful name, isn’t it?. I know, I have failed to recreate it in English.)

A poem I did not want to write…

2007-01-09T15:23:00.000+05:30

An untold event

started roaming in the head

She,

a small little girl

till yesterday

took a few steps

towards the river

I call her Shyamalee

This poem is incomplete, if,

she does not take bath in the river

and

climb the steps in wet clothes

I wrote this again and again

I resoled to see her in my favourite colour

and thought,

her hair should be untied

I kept returning

to Kelo, my river

time and again

where

my mother’s soul is at rest

Now, when I attempt

to see her in my ways

I do not find Shyamalee

The little shop-owner

across the river

told me today,

'she committed suicide.

Post-mortem report says

she was pregnant of six month

at the time of death'.

She is buried here

by the municipality workers

somewhere near the Neem tree

adjacent to the hillock...

Happy New Year 2007

2007-01-02T20:28:00.000+05:30

Wish You a Very Happy New Year

I am running out of words in this year

Hope,

this smile will say all that I am not able to express….

The Journey Continues...

2006-12-13T16:39:00.000+05:30

Somewhere, in the corner of her thought

She feels that

He will understand

the words un-whispered

in the prolonged talk,

and will come to her

Mournful afternoon’s veranda.

In the longing desire to say

She speaks of everything to him

But, could not speak the words

She prepared herself

in the Mournful afternoon’s veranda.

Wind blows and river flows, un-waited

She remembers

all the words unspoken

in her prolonged talk

and slowly disappears in the dream

Perhaps to the silence, as much of death

Leaving behind

an unread book

Open window

And,

A few other things...

In an invisible corner of mind...

2006-11-29T14:56:00.000+05:30

I had to give her all those letters in secret, not in that sense that, while giving her nobody should see me. Rather, in the way that, her relatives should not take the words in the letters, the way as it was i.e. as open expression of my love. Therefore, all the love spread across the paper use to be like poems and I was thinking she should break the boundaries of the poem and reach to my heart. Perhaps, she was also thinking in a similar fashion and that is why her letters also use to be like poems. Hence, we unknowingly exchanged all our poems, which was actually, the condensed map of our love.

Now, when we read our own poems, it may look alien. In an invisible corner of mind, thought is spreading its wings. Everywhere I see poem,

in Newspaper

in Television Channels

in graffiti

in railway station

in blogs

so on and so forth...

From the Remains...

2006-11-13T10:01:00.000+05:30

As if, time has settled here

In green grass,

Like, she will take all the sky in her hand,

A small child runs

Truly speaking,

Not here,

We want to stop at our childhood.

We want to play hide-n-seek

Not the way, we are playing now

We want to laugh and cry too

Not the way, it is happening now.

The truth is

We are jealous of our childhood

A Disarrayed Note on Poetry

2006-10-17T19:04:00.000+05:30

[This is one of my earlier posts that I am republishing with a thought that some of my friends who missed it may feel like reading. This may be considered as an extension of the discussion on one of the Poems by David Matthews in Magna]

Now when I am no more writing poems, an abysmally void thought peeps into the mind, ‘Poetry does nothing to this world’. But somebody in the corner reminds me that it may be true that poetry may not make anything happen, but it survives. It may not help our world in a great sense, it may be fragile, but it extends in the wave of feeling, thought, and depth of relationship. Poetry may not have any practical consequence in its’ worst situation, yet it succeeds in the most difficult task of all – it “stretches the mind”.

During this dogmatic war of thoughts, two poets who instantly touch my inner breath are Pablo Neruda and Ramakanta Rath. Two great, one belonging to Chile, the Latin America and the other, native of Orissa of this subcontinent. My attempt here is not to produce an analogy of the poets. It is even true that I am incapable of putting them into the critical dissection of literary criticism. What I can do is what they do to me, i.e., stretch my mind, provoke me to feel not their words but the sculpture portrayed in these words. The cynicism of thought that words are the most inferior mode of communication stands unreal, when one starts reading Viente Poemas de Amo of Neruda, written way back in 1924, when he was a young boy of 20, still continuing his study at Santiago. He says “Everyday you play with the light of the Universe. Subtle visitor, you arrive in the flower and water…. You are like nobody since I love you…. … my words rained over you, stroking you…. Until I even believe that you own the universe…. I want to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees.” Imagine these words spoken by ”Sri Radha”, as created by Rath.

Radha’s love for Krishna is unmatched. But for sometimes I was confused that what is so great about her love for Krishna. Perhaps, the greatness lies in loving someone, when you know that you won’t get him or her. Radha knew that Krishna could not be her alone. He has certain duties to perform in this world. In spite of knowing this fact, she loved him. The conscious mind which knows the truth of not getting, can not love. Perhaps this made her love for Krishna so great. The poet, whose words can reflect this thought, as if Radha herself is speaking, definitely has grown with the words, its nomenclature, semantics, and poetry, not being slave rather mastering them to make others feel that words are not the inferior mode of communication.

Rath’s creation of Sri Radha is considered to be a masterpiece of Oriya literature in this era. For long Radha’s feeling not only for Krishna but also her worldview, which was taken for granted becomes lively with Rath’s Sri Radha, where the protagonist (i.e. Radha) speaks herself.

A poet writes in the far south of America in mid 1920’s in his youthful years, and the other writes in a corner of this subcontinent in early 1990’s in his 50’s. Yet, the resonance created in these words take the same form, radiate the same feeling, penetrate the soul in same fashion. One writes in Spanish, the other in Oriya. What else can be more binding which withstands time, region, culture and language. For instance, when Neruda say’s

To night I can write the saddest lines.
Write, for example, ‘the night is shattered’
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.’

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

How truly it can be understood for Radha waiting for Krishna to come to Yamuna. Like all other times he does not keep unto the time. He enjoys making Radha restless, making her wait, when he knows that how painful it would be to wait. When the anger, sadness, and love all mingle in the same eyes, how it can be better expressed then

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How can one not have loved her great still eyes.
To night I can write the saddest lines
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

When the waiting grows to passion and Radha is at the verge of breaking down, that somewhere she hears the music of the magical flute. She disbelieves herself, as it happened several times before. And the verses go like this;

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.
What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is shatter and she is not with me.
This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.

Every time it happens that Krishna plays his flute somewhere in the distance and does not appear. Waiting becomes Radha’s destiny, and perhaps she may be saying it better in Neruda’s words.

My sight searches for her as though to go to her.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.
The same night whitening the same trees.
……….
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

How true it is for Neruda, that true it is for Rath. The pain is same for them, their characters, their readers. Poetry releases the pain and that is why it unites. But, whom? The characters like million others on the street, in the slum, in the hills and mountains, in the desert, who came as poetry through the words. May they be from Chile or Mexico, may be from Africa, Vietnam or Ireland; all similar, in their suffering, in their poverty, in their pain. We resemble the pastoralist in Chile with the leather worker in Mexico to a rickshaw-puller in Calcutta to a freedom fighter in Ireland, in the verses of the poets, like the one of Neruda,

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
And these the last verse that I write for her.

Morning Raga...

2006-10-12T12:13:00.000+05:30

[I remembered an Oriya poem titled as “Sri Radha” written by a distinguish Oriya Poet Ramakanta Rath. In the process of recalling the poem I lost the tract of it and went disarrayed. This poem is an outcome of that memory and feeling, a sense of incompleteness…]

Today’s morning is seemingly different from the others in the past
there is some strange brevity in the sun
as if; an exile lover has come to the city in disguise...

Like other days, today there is no disbelief in your eyes

In your face, there is an astounding innocence

A bereaving silence in Yamuna (1)

Birds are lazy to move out of the nest

All my friends are knowingly delaying to start their days

Cows are not in a hurry to move out

In everything, there is a peculiar tardiness

There is a commotion everywhere, because you are coming

Yet, all look calm to the naked eyes

and ears, cannot listen to the uproar

Today’s morning is seemingly different from the others in the past…

==========

(1) More than a river, it carries the legendary tradition of Radha and Krishna

Fatherhood

2006-10-07T18:25:00.000+05:30

This long absence has a sweet justification.
On 3rd of October A D 2006 my wife gave birth to a baby boy.
The attached photograph is taken by baby’s maternal uncle when he was not even 24 hours old. He has not used flash, hence snaps are bit blurred.

Three Love-like Poems

2006-09-27T19:34:00.000+05:30

(1)

Yesterday I left my bus

seeing you there.

Today I did it again

(2)

I can even notice

falling of a leaf

Now when you are not there

(3)

The thud like sound

grousing from distance

is my own voice

that keeps repeating your name

Roads Destined Towards Tree and Cloud

2006-09-19T17:13:00.000+05:30

She walks in the solitary road

Thinking that

Some one will join somewhere

In fact, she is not bothered about

Some one joining

The thought that bothers her for long

is her own self……….

A tribute...*

2006-09-06T14:33:00.000+05:30

Between blistering terrain and my words
a life incarnates
some one at distance
whispers Bismillha(1)

someone at distance….

A boy runs to play with the marbles
the wings spread across the cloud
this is the time for Mallhar(2)

I wait
I wait for your return

Now when you are not there
I gather all these small little images
you left behind

That soothing sound of Shehnai(3)
creates resonance in ear and thought…

Yaman(4) takes uncounted steps in avaroha (5)
And mingles in Ganga (6)
like a poem…

From Taar(7) to Mandra(8)
From Sa(9) to Nee (10)
From life to cadaver
each stanza of your poem
waft with the ferryman who sings a Kajri(11)

Coming Holi(12) you will not be there with us Ustad(13)
Nor your Shehnai will be filling the heart
for that endless fasting of Ramzan(14)

from Reshav (15) to Pancham (16)
the language of your invisible poetry
will cover that miniscule distance of death

I will wait
I will wait for your return
in the mournful afternoon’s veranda
to start the journey from Sabd (17) to Naad (18)

=========
*This poem is a tribute to Ustad Bismillha Khan, more than a synonym of Shehnai was a creator of poetry with his attitude and this instrument…

(1)The holy beginning…
(2)The Hindustani classical raag of rains…
(3)Shehnai is a north Indian Oboe a quadruple-reed instrument with two upper and two lower reeds
(4)Yaman is a raag in Hindusthani Classical, the favorite of Ustad Bismillha Khanji…
(5)Descent, a movement from the high note to low one…
(6)Ganga the holy river of India
(7)Third or higher Octave
(8)First or lower Octave
(9)a
(10)g
(11)It’s a singing form of folk music sung by classical semi-classical musicians. The word may have origin from kajal, which means Kohl or Black
(12)An Indian Festival of Colors…
(13)Master, Here Ustad Bismillah Khanji
(14)The lunar month of fasting
(15)b
(16)e
(17)Words and semantics
(18)The music, beyond words and semantics…

A House of Flowers

2006-08-23T10:11:00.000+05:30

I have the wishes of an Ocean
in which,
I can paint my
small house
flowers
and many other things

perhaps she will come
and will make it more colourful
he thought

In that long wait
there were a few
old news papers
an empty glass
and some dust and dry leaves

Graffiti

2006-08-10T09:42:00.000+05:30

Graffiti

“Boy” wounds me and thinks

his love is conveyed

“Girl” rips me apart

hums a love song

“Boy” repeats

“Girl” repeats too

what though I am wounded repeatedly

long live thy love

long live thee love

The Journey

2006-08-01T15:15:00.001+05:30

The words
Remained
Untalked
In spite of several attempts

The Woman
in the next door
Walked in the alley
the way
She had gone several times
Unnoticed

The returning gale
Carried a few leaves with it
The sky did not change its colour
for hours together

Things went
Unnoticed
in the
Mournful Verandah of the afternoon

She turned her side in the bed
And, saw the slippers
One above the other
Thinking that
This will bring
Some good news.

Afternoon of a Pre-empted Solitude (3)

2006-07-03T11:43:00.000+05:30

Time is slipping away from our hand
She murmurs
and
remains silent

She waits
in the mournful afternoon’s veranda

Sparrows play with the walls
each spot on the wall engulfs
array of dreams
thud of silence
and
congress of tears

The silence stretches like river

An old lady weaves her dreams
in the bank of the river
with the threads of her remembrance

in each sadness
echoes
every sadness

Are you listening there???

2006-06-26T11:43:00.000+05:30

“The women
we will marry in future
are Black in colour”
…then we evoked

It is fourteen years since…

On an Uneventful Day...

2006-06-23T12:25:00.000+05:30

I make a poem
of the words gathered
in a long journey
Uneventful

She appears
She disappears
in a wait
Uneventful

I make a collage
of uneventful happenings
beneath a colourless sky
in the mournful afternoon’s Veranda

A Haiku I never attempted….

2006-06-21T17:48:00.000+05:30

Sky
Clouds
Sound of birds, insects

People
Movements
Crowd and noise

Eyes
Still
Songs and rhythms

They Happen
I see them Happening….

For Her Dreams....

2006-06-15T11:29:00.000+05:30

From the remains
She gathers the
fractured dreams
once she lost
some where in the
Mournful afternoon’s Veranda.

She repeatedly sees
someone peeping at her
in her sleep

The dream stretches till the river
and spreads its colours
in thousand alleys on the way.

Death takes rest in the riverbed
She searches the language of death
in her dreams.

of wait and destiny

2006-06-08T10:57:00.000+05:30

Now a days
She does not come running
to tell all that
what she normally does not mean.

Evening falls
neither she comes
nor any of her messages.

Now,
when she is not there
the meaningless words
she uttered several times before
start taking shape
on the walls,
on paper,
in thought.

Those words become lyrics
and start humming
in the wind
sometime they fall like rain
some other time
like poetry

In a deep corner of thought
wishes start sprouting
night falls
neither she comes
nor any of her messages.

{quite a few people asked me why I name this blog "SHYAMALEE"
though I need not justify the name, I feel shyamalee is the women in me. And I wish to express me i.e. these women in my best possible way. I find it easy to reflect through poems. In fact, to be truthful, I lack any other means. Udayan Vajpayee's "Kuch Vakya" has a deep impact in me. Often, I take his words for granted in my poems too...}

Khalida

2006-06-01T11:05:00.000+05:30

I love you Khalida
while gathering the mat in the dawn hours

in the morning I can see the depth of an ocean in your eyes

when noise of the hand pump echoes in the slum
your looks tremble me

why so you look
so beautiful in this morning hours
and see,
how petite is my morning

The children would be rushing to the ice-cream vendor
in the recess time of their school

I have to reach there

Yaa.. Allah..
If there were no school in this world!!!

(In the Original in Oriya I titled this poem as “The Ice-cream Vendor”. Here I prefer it to be Khalida, such a beautiful name, isn’t it?. I know, I have failed to recreate it in English.)

Afternoon of a Pre-empted Solitude (2)

2006-05-22T12:09:00.000+05:30

Now,
it was her turn
to remain silent
And,
She did it
pretty ordinarily
as she did it before.

A thought crawled saying:
True things are essentially ordinary
and, ordinary things are secret
A treasure hidden.

She turned towards the window
She peeped into the
Mournful afternoon's Veranda

May be somebody will come and
disturb her
This thought troubled her
from further thinking

And, she disappeared
Leaving behind
Innumerable marks of her disappearance.

Afternoon of a Pre-empted Solitude

2006-05-17T13:04:00.000+05:30

We are growing old
‘She’ told
as unnoticeably
as the leaf falls from the tree
Or,
the crawling insects
in the process of gathering a few things

‘She’ continued her talk
on job insecurity to stock market
from low dividend to falling interest rate
on relation and marriage

Every word perhaps is destined to silence
‘He’ interrupted.
You are going abstract dear
‘She’ intervened.
No, ‘he’ replied
Perhaps, we are growing old.

‘He’ wanted to notice
all the unnoticeable happenings
in the mournful afternoons veranda
the direction of cloud
the unchanging colour of sky
the sound of water
from the open tap of the next door neighbour
And,
the words that remained unestablished
‘She’ would have told otherwise.

A Disarrayed Note on Poetry

2006-05-08T17:07:00.000+05:30

Now when I am no more writing poems, an abysmally void thought peeps into the mind, ‘Poetry does nothing to this world’. But somebody in the corner reminds me that it may be true that poetry may not make anything happen, but it survives. It may not help our world in a great sense, it may be fragile, but it extends in the wave of feeling, thought, and depth of relationship. Poetry may not have any practical consequence in its’ worst situation, yet it succeeds in the most difficult task of all – it “stretches the mind”.

During this dogmatic war of thoughts, two poets who instantly touch my inner breath are Pablo Neruda and Ramakanta Rath. Two great, one belonging to Chile, the Latin America and the other, native of Orissa of this subcontinent. My attempt here is not to produce an analogy of the poets. It is even true that I am incapable of putting them into the critical dissection of literary criticism. What I can do is what they do to me, i.e., stretch my mind, provoke me to feel not their words but the sculpture portrayed in these words. The cynicism of thought that words are the most inferior mode of communication stands unreal, when one starts reading Viente Poemas de Amo of Neruda, written way back in 1924, when he was a young boy of 20, still continuing his study at Santiago. He says “Everyday you play with the light of the Universe. Subtle visitor, you arrive in the flower and water…. You are like nobody since I love you…. … my words rained over you, stroking you…. Until I even believe that you own the universe…. I want to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees.” Imagine these words spoken by ”Sri Radha”, as created by Rath.

Radha’s love for Krishna is unmatched. But for sometimes I was confused that what is so great about her love for Krishna. Perhaps, the greatness lies in loving someone, when you know that you won’t get him or her. Radha knew that Krishna could not be her alone. He has certain duties to perform in this world. In spite of knowing this fact, she loved him. The conscious mind which knows the truth of not getting, can not love. Perhaps this made her love for Krishna so great. The poet whose words can reflect this thought, as if Radha herself is speaking, definitely has grown with the words, its nomenclature, semantics, and poetry, not being slave rather mastering them to make others feel that words are not the inferior mode of communication.

Rath’s creation of Sri Radha is considered to be a masterpiece of oriya literature in this era. For long Radha’s feeling not only for Krishna but also her world view, which was taken for granted becomes lively with Rath’s Sri Radha, where the protagonist (i.e. Radha) speaks herself.

A poet writes in the far south of America in mid 1920’s in his youthful years, and the other writes in a corner of this subcontinent in early 1990’s in his 50’s. Yet, the resonance created in these words take the same form, radiate the same feeling, penetrate the soul in same fashion. One writes in Spanish, the other in Oriya. What else can be more binding which withstands time, region, culture and language. For instance, when Neruda say’s
To night I can write the saddest lines.
Write, for example, ‘the night is shattered’
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.’

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

How truly it can be understood for Radha waiting for Krishna to come to Yamuna. Like all other times he does not keep unto the time. He enjoys making Radha restless, making her wait, when he knows that how painful it would be to wait. When the anger, sadness, and love all mingle in the same eyes, how it can be better expressed then
She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How can one not have loved her great still eyes.
To night I can write the saddest lines
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.
When the waiting grows to passion and Radha is at the verge of breaking down, that somewhere she hears the music of the magical flute. She disbelieves herself, as it happened several times before. And the verses go like this;

To hear the immense night, sill more immense without her
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.
What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is shatter and she is not with me.
This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.

Every time it happens that Krishna plays his flute somewhere in the distance and does not appear. Waiting becomes Radha’s destiny, and perhaps she may be saying it better in Neruda’s words.
My sight searches for her as though to go to her.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.
The same night whitening the same trees.
……….
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

How true it is for Neruda, that true it is for Rath. The pain is same for them, their characters, their readers. Poetry releases the pain and that is why it unites. But, whom? The characters like million others on the street, in the slum, in the hills and mountains, in the desert, who came as poetry through the words. May they be from Chile or Mexico, may be from Africa, Vietnam or Ireland; all similar, in their suffering, in their poverty, in their pain. We resemble the pastoralist in Chile with the leather worker in Mexico to a rickshaw-puller in Calcutta to a freedom fighter in Ireland, in the verses of the poets, like the one of Neruda,
Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
And these the last verse that I write for her.