Momentary Madness

It all happened within a fraction of a second.

Before I could even evade,
(by letting details of the incident settle in).
The issue behind the incident,
Being the core culprit that it is,
Took control and charged ahead.

Assuming the form of a giant octopus,
With its powerful eight sucker-bearing arms,
It entered my head,
Of course it was now not a mere giant octopus,
(though even as just that – a giant octopus – its strength would have sufficed to overpower me)
It was now an octopus with a human-related issue at hand,
(Eight arms mind you, manhandling one issue).

Can you imagine how wilfully the eight arms spread themselves in my head?
In the name of the god of which I cannot make up my mind now,
It was horrendous, I tell you.

With its eight powerful arms,
This so-called issue a.k.a octopus
Crawled itself into me,
With a look in its eyes that said,
You’re all mine today, woman!
(you know the kind of look a murder-bent person would give his victim as he gains on her).

First it settled itself with a thud in my head -
grabbing control of the physical space.
Then it went for the inhabitants.

The emotions which were in control till then – it stirred,
Moving them away from familiarity,
Repositioning them next to those they could never imagine themselves to be.
Then, seeing that the emotions were all damagingly misplaced,
It gave its evil laugh and belched its satisfaction off.

Then - the issue aka octopus reached for my sanity.

And I knew then –
that I was a goner.

The Guesthouse - Jalaluddin Rumi

This being human is a guesthouse
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness
Some momentary awareness
Comes as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows
Who violently sweep your house
Empty of its furniture
Still treat each guest honorably
He may be cleaning you out
For some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice
Meet them at the door laughing
And invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes
Because each has been sent
As a guide from the beyond

(Translated by Coleman Barks)

The Beauty of Your Being...

Did you know, sir, that you have really beautiful eyes?
I wonder if anyone had told you that before
(you being a saint and all...would anyone have dared to?)
I admit I know very little of you,
But when I saw that pair of eyes,
And that calmest of smiles,
I couldn’t help falling for you
(in a spiritual way, of course).

What made you tilt your head that way, I wonder
What made you smile that way
(though your lips and eyes),
Was it the reflection of your compassion,
That you (at that moment) showered
On the one who was trying to capture you?

Or was it the enlightened knowing - that
that face, that body,
what are they really
(to be captured in a photograph)?
When what lies within,
(that soul which you know to be the real you)
Can never, any picture, describe...

Beautiful you are, my divine Ramana Maharshi,
I wonder if you knew that...

I Once Knew A Little Girl ...

I once knew a little girl,
Chubby-faced, cheeky-eyed,
Two long plaits hanging by her head
(Plaits that looked like two karunaagams, said some).
A heart that knew nothing but joy,
A mind that churned questions after questions
(Who is the mother of the mother of the mother of the neighbour aunty).
A pair of legs that skipped wherever she went
(Walking was drearily slow).

There was barely any flesh on her body,
Skinny she was during the early years,
But a tinge of chubbiness was there always
(in her cheeks),
Tracing her to the man who made her,
Reminding her of where she came from,
Never allowing her to forget the dark old man (with his full-teeth-grin),
Even as she grew bigger
(literally too, and eventually matching the chubbiness of her cheeks).

This little girl I knew had a sister,
Much elder, much wiser, much like a mother.
Clinging to the sister as she grew
(sometimes literally too).
The little chubby-faced one stepped into the world
(still occasionally hiding behind the older wise one - with big scared eyes,no doubt),
Learning a great many things,
Making a great many mistakes,
All of which entered her books of experiences
(not that she didn't have enough books to manage already).

I sometimes wonder what happened to her
(that little chubby-cheeked one),
If at all she really is no more
(like I believed her to be),
Or if she has outgrown that child I once saw in her
(so much so that I no longer recognise her),
Or if she is indeed hiding away from me,
Fearing that I would see the real her,
And that seeing me would remind her of things
(things she wants to forget).

I haven't a clue...

But I do miss that chubby-faced, cheeky-eyed one,
The one who had two long plaits hanging by her head
(Plaits that looked like two karunaagams)...


* karunaagam is black cobra in thamizh

In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: It Goes On - ROBERT FROST

Had Robert Frost been alive, he would be 134 come 26th March.

Hmmm...that doesn't sound like a remarkably realistic introduction, does it?:) But it is Robert Frost we are talking about here. Is an introduction necessary at all? :)

Anyway, I was reading Frost's poems and discovered some rather interesting ones that are not as commonly quoted as his other famous ones...thought I'd post some as part of my countdown-to-his-birthday-posts. :)

FIRE AND ICE

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To know that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.


WHAT FIFTY SAID

When I was young my teachers were the old.
I gave up fire for form till I was cold.
I suffered like a metal being cast.
I went to school to age to learn the past.

Now I am old my teachers are the young.
What can't be molded must be cracked and sprung.
I strain at lessons fit to start a suture.
I go to school to youth to learn the future.

Grief...

I saw Grief drinking a cup of sorrow

I called out,
“It tastes sweet, does it not? ”

Grief answered;
“Oh, you’ve caught me and ruined my business. How can I sell sorrow, when you know it’s a blessing?

Jalaluddin Rumi (1207-1273)

Reading Walt Whitman At An Ungodly Hour...

...results in a sweeping madness that envelops me, the reader, and forces me to post all these right away, for reasons I know nothing of. Has Uncle Walt entered my mind and soul...? (this being the ungodly hour afterall)

I stand corrected.
How could The Madman re-enter that which he never exited in the first place...?


AN EXCERPT - SONG OF MYSELF (PART 2)

The past and present wilt - I have fill'd them, emptied them.
And proceed to fill my next fold of the future.

Listener up there! What have you to confide to me?
Look in my face while I snuff the sidle of evening,
(Talk honestly, no one else hears you, and I stay only a minute longer)

Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes)

I concentrate toward them that are nigh, I wait on the door-slab.

Who has done his day's work? Who will soonest be through with his supper?
Who wishes to walk with me?

Will you speak before I am gone? Will you prove already too late?


FULL OF LIFE NOW

Full of life now, compact, visible,
I, forty years old the eighty-third year of the States,
To one a century hence or any number of centuries hence,
To you yet unborn these, seeking you.

When you read these I that was visible am become invisible,
Now it is you, compact, visible, realizing my poems, seeking me,
Fancying how happy you were if I could be with you and become your comrade;
Be it as if I were with you. (Be not too certain but I am now with you.)


ARE YOU THE NEW PERSON DRAWN TO ME?

Are you the new person drawn toward me?
To begin with take warning, I am surely far different from what you suppose;
Do you suppose you will find in me your ideal?
Do you think it so easy to have me become your lover?
Do you think the friendship of me would be unalloy'd satisfaction?
Do you think I am trusty and faithful?
Do you see no further than this facade, this smooth and tolerant manner of me?
Do you suppose yourself advancing on real ground toward a real heroic man?
Have you no thought O dreamer that it may be all maya, illusion?


O ME! O LIFE!

O me! O life! of the questions of these recurring,
Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill'd with the foolish,
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I,and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the struggle ever renew'd,
Of the poor results of all, of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me,
Of the empty and useless years of the rest, with the rest me intertwined,

The question,
O me! so sad, recurring - What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer.
That you are here - that life exists, and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.


STRONGER LESSONS

Have you learn'd lessons only of those who admired you, and were tender with you, and stood aside for you?
Have you not learn'd great lessons from those who reject you, and brace themselves against you?
Or who treat you with contempt,or dispute the passage with you?


LINGERING LAST DROPS

And whence and why come you?
We know not whence, (was the answer,)
We only know that we drift here with the rest,
That we linger'd and lagg'd - but were wafted at last, and are now here,
To make the passing shower's concluding drops.


GOOD-BYE MY FANCY (I)

Good-bye my fancy - (I had a word to say,
But 'tis not quite the time - The best of any man's word or say,
Is when its proper place arrives - and for its meaning,
I keep mine till the last.)


GOOD-BYE MY FANCY (II)

Good-bye my Fancy!
Farewell dear mate, dear love!
I'm going away, I know not where,
Or to what fortune, or whether I may ever see you again,
So Good-bye my Fancy.
Now for my last - let me look back a moment;
The slower fainter ticking of the clock is in me,
Exit, nightfall, and soon the heart-thud stopping.
Long have we lived, joy'd, caress'd together;
Delightful!--now separation - Good-bye my Fancy.
Yet let me not be too hasty,
Long indeed have we lived, slept, filter'd, become really blended into one;
Then if we die we die together, (yes, we'll remain one,)
If we go anywhere we'll go together to meet what happens,
May-be we'll be better off and blither, and learn something,
May-be it is yourself now really ushering me to the true songs, (who knows?)
May-be it is you the mortal knob really undoing, turning - so now finally,
Good-bye - and hail! my Fancy.

Mahakavi Bharathiyar on Who's a Poet & Who Isn't...

கவிதை எழுதுபவன் கவியன்று.
கவிதையே வாழ்க்கையாக உடையோன்,
வாழ்க்கையே கவிதையாகச் செய்தோன்,
அவனே கவி!

He who writes poetry is a poet not!
He who embraces poetry as life -
and who lives his life as if it were poetry,
He alone is a poet!

Among the Multitude...

Among the men and women, the multitude,
I perceive one picking me out by secret and divine signs,
Acknowledging none else, not parent, wife, husband, brother, child, any nearer than I am;
Some are baffled - but that one is not - that one knows me.

Ah, lover and perfect equal!
I meant that you should discover me so, by faint indirections;
And I, when I meet you, mean to discover you by the like in you.

Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

The Madman Speaks...

TO A STRANGER...

Passing stranger! You do not know how longingly I look upon you,
You must be he I was seeking, or she I was seeking, (it comes to me as of a dream,)
I have somewhere surely lived a life of joy with you,
All is recall'd as we flit by each other, fluid, affectionate, chaste, matured,
You grew up with me, were a boy with me or a girl with me,
I ate with you and slept with you - your body has become not yours only nor left my body mine only,
You give me the pleasure of your eyes, face, flesh, as we pass - you take of my beard, breast, hands, in return,
I am not to speak to you - I am to think of you when I sit alone or wake at night alone,
I am to wait - I do not doubt I am to meet you again,
I am to see to it that I do not lose you.

Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

Powerful Sparks from Mahakavi Bharathiyar

தேடிச் சோறு நிதந்தின்று- பல

சின்னஞ்சிறு கதைகள் பேசி- பிறர்

வாடப் பலசெயல்கள் செய்து- மனம்

வாடித் துன்பமிக உழன்று- நரை

கூடிக் கிழப்பருவம் எய்தி - கொடுங்

கூற்றுக் கிரையெனப்பின் மாயும்- பல

வேடிக்கை மனிதரைப் போலே- நான்

வீழ்வேனென்று நினைத்தாயோ



Thedi choru nithamthinru - pala

Chinnanchiru kathaigal pesi - pirar

Vaada pala seyalgal seythu - manam

Vaadi thunbam miga uzhanru - narai

Koodi kizhapparuvam eithi - kodung

Kootrukku iraiyena pin maayum - pala

Vedikkai mainitharai pole - naan

Veezhvenenru ninaiththaayo