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Life seems to be in a rush…
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And thoughts blurry,
Like passing an array of lights
On moonless nights.
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Timely, untimely one hears
What is not said,
But is felt vaguely
And declared mandatory suddenly.
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One click, one blink, one tick-tock
And life is not the same,
And I will happily testify to it
For I, unlike life, am not in a rush.
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The monk was tired, he drank the water from the rivulet, still felt the same. Like the dark heavy clouds that take over the sky so often, the monk had almost surrendered to such heaviness. If only he could just sit there forever and listen what stories the wind brought to him.
Thinking this he got up and moved ahead. One step at a time. The seamless pattern, the embroidery cross, squares, diamonds, chevrons on his sweater soaked in the sun; it was a parting gift, the monk couldn’t refuse the loving people of that small village.
Strong wind currents and his rough hard shoes made music together; often the pebbles added to it.
Lines on his forehead made him look tense. Just then he reached a fork in the road; the monk stood still and saw two things – the rough path ahead and a tiny little flower beaming at him, growing out of the rocky mountain. The monk walked towards the flower and stared at it.
He smiled and resumed walking ahead. His smile echoed in the mountain valley.
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Lines, full of an era’s touch, were written. Some read and understood. Some followed. They tried. And then, lines were drawn.
Lines drawn were stone-solid, iron-hard. But time can always seep through and can rust till it is dust. Thus, lines started to fade.
Lines started to change. Change bloomed. They so rightly say, whatever is unimaginable is imaginable.
Lines are narrowed down to a box. A box in the head. The head awaits to breakaway, not realising that because it awaits, it awaits.
Lines are pruned to look similar, to look contemporary, to look right.
Lines are shredded. Words crippled, meaning transformed.
Lines like a guide help a seeker. The one who is seeking life meets the mid-way end. The end is the beginning.
Are you seeking life? In this very moment?
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In a thin air-light piece of blue paper words were written, no space wasted, legibly shinning, beautifully written. It was for everyone, Cid Corman called it direct poetry.
If these words
don’t remember you—
forget them.
The leaf at last gets
the drift of wind and so
settles for the ground.
I wear the mask of
myself and very nearly
get away with it.
There is no end and
never was a beginning – so
here we are – amidst.
Rain-drops. Each
makes a point
of silence.
You are here – just as
I had imagined –
imagining me.
Nothing ends with you —
every leaf on the ground
remembers the root.
We wear out
but the sky
looks as new
as ever.
A COUPLE
She keeps coming home
to me – of all things – and I
remain home for her.
Has it ever
occurred to you
you’re what is oc-
curring to you?
Cid Corman wrote for and ran the magazine Origin. He followed a lovely rule, he replied to each and every letter that the magazine received within 24 hours, if he couldn’t, he didn’t do it at all.
Lucky must be the ones who got his answer, that too in the form of direct poetry. The book, Famous Blue Aerogrammes, is about these replies.
I have just read a few of these, still I can say that it continues to create magic… blue feathery magic that makes you smile.
Read more about Cid Corman here.
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“Drinking Alone under the Moon,” by Li Bo
Translation by Paul Rouzer
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Among the flowers, a single jug of wine;
I drink alone. No one close to me.
I raise my cup, invite the bright moon;
facing my shadow, together we make three.
The moon doesn’t know how to drink;
and my shadow can only follow my body.
But for a time I make moon and shadow my companions;
taking one’s pleasure must last until spring.
I sing — the moon wavers back and forth.
I dance — my shadow flickers and scatters.
When I’m sober we take pleasure together.
When I’m drunk, we each go our own ways.
I make an oath to journey forever free of feelings,
making an appointment with them to meet in the Milky Way afar.
Li Bo overwhelms one with the powerful yet simple use of imagery in this particular poem. You’ll see him walking alone, with a pot of wine, the moon shining above and his shadow dancing along. Loneliness is what drives him, hope is what is hidden. Maybe he laments for the dead past or he cries to see the uncertain future, but he is definitely, truly in the present. The moon, his shadow, his two close friends, vouch for it.
Read more about the poem and the translator’s take on it here. For the poem’s literal translation, click here.
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In the search of a moon Haiku poem, I found how beautifully a 21st century poet addressed to his favourite classic poet –
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… lifting my cup,
I asked the moon
to drink with me …
Li Po
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And if Li Po had
got the moon in his mitts
what would he have done with it?
Cid Corman
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Today, I decided, I will stay with these words and leave rest of the search for tomorrow.
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Moon was its usual self,
I was the one, lost and fuzzy,
Moonlight still showed the way.
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Faded and hazy… old eyes can nevertheless make out who is who. They are all standing awkwardly still for the photograph. It deserves a lovely laugh. It achieves so every time. And moist eyes…
Black is disappearing into the white and the white into the off-white. Will the memory die soon? Or will it live as an anecdote?
An anecdote that is passed on, with number of ears listening to it adding flavours they find must be incorporated, by one storyteller to another. It becomes precious, a small piece capsuling time. Golden time…
Her old, wrinkled smiling face was so young once. Gush of euphoria hits my mind for a few seconds, while she stays as quiet as serene scenery, softly caressing the black and white photograph.
Your memory, liquid time solidified by a click, an era’s voice captured in the photographic paper stays alive… first in form, later as a story.
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If you fall and the fall resembles the fall of Macchu Picchu…
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The dust around you, the dust in you tells you the truth. Listen carefully. They blame the dreariness on the modern technology, but just open your eyes to see who is not moving. City streets shine blood-red and dead empty; finding fault is out of fashion now. Hiding is a fad, not believing is a fad, not feeling is a fad. You don’t check the time any more, the clock reflects grime all around. The war is also over, the hunt has ended, panic seeped within is now quelled and happily so. The dead ones are dying and the living ones are dying. You know nothing stays forever, yet you hope for a forever. Stale thoughts to no thoughts, you look outside the window, you imagine what it will be like to jump, to bring an end.
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If you fall and the fall resembles the fall of Macchu Picchu, you will rise back.
5W, 1H and a question mark.
If you go through The Heights of Macchu Picchu by Pablo Neruda, you’ll know. If you believe, you’ll know.
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Read The Heights Of Macchu Picchu by Pablo Neruda, translated by William Little, here.
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Ra-ra: Why did the window go SHUT… who closed it SHUT… my question is just HOW?
Ra-ra’s friend Coo stays quiet, looking absolutely nowhere.
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Ra-ra: S-H-U-T shut, right when I was about to pick my share and leave…
Coo: I believe you, it has been so many years since you first told me this story.
Ra-ra: (astonished) Many years you say, gone nuts…? It happened an hour ago.
Ra-ra: Coo, this ain’t the time to argue.
Coo: A while? He died ages ago.
Coo: You’re standing fine, 900 years have passed.
Ra-ra: 900? I have come flying from the west port of Oraffa city just now.
Coo: Oraffa city? Hah! Blind dreams!
Ra-ra: How dare you? I can see very well… you can’t, you blind ugly funny-sounding bad crow!
Coo: I said blind dreams… didn’t call you blind.
Ra-ra: Oh, oh-my, then let me apologise.
Coo: For what? We are blind, the world knows it. Yet…
Ra-ra: Blind we are, yes, yes… very much… (mumbles).
Coo: I’ll complete my sentence… yet we are still alive.
Ra-ra: (flaps wings) Death sentence, I have been given a death sentence and yet I am alive.
Coo: Cool-cool yourself Ra-ra. We are together in this.
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Ra-ra starts sobbing, mumbles again.
Coo: I am turning left.
Ra-ra: (softly) Left?
Coo: Turned.
Ra-ra: Wait for me!
Coo: Can’t.
Ra-ra: I think I also turned left unless it is the right, or it is somewhere in the middle, who knows.
Coo: Not me.
Ra-ra: (laughs) You’re funny!
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Both Ra-ra and Coo stand quietly. Coo speaks after some time.
Coo: Hey Ra-ra, you never told me your famous window story.
Ra-ra: I didn’t? How come?
Coo: That’s the truth.
Ra-ra: Well, then listen… the window was SHUT before I could pick my share… someone just closed it SHUT…
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The two blind crows talked facing what they thought was the left.
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Walking straight, walking on the mountain listening to ‘The Times They Are A Changin‘ I saw nothing, neither the trees nor the rocks, neither the shadow nor the light, and just kept walking ahead. Mountain spoke, I didn’t hear, until I bent a little.
It said, ‘You will reach your destination, you will, for sure’, and happily I smiled, crossed my hands behind my back and continued walking.
Swiftly I moved forward, there was no stopping me. Dashing ahead I crossed jungles after jungles, I played with the shadows and the light, I didn’t even wait for the wind.
Like a curse, definitely a curse, a disaster hit me – I started panting. It had never happened all this while, why now?
Then I remembered faintly of what the mountain told me… I pleaded it to guide me again, the mountain listened. It said, ‘Know patience and its power’, I bowed down and stopped walking. I stopped for the first time in my journey; I learned the art of deep breathing. Ages passed there; then I left in search.
In search of what I was looking for. I was looking for what I was in search of.
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Familiar with the pace of the trees canopying me, stopping and listening to the rocks and their untold gathas, attuned with the shadow and the light, I kept walking when I reached near a ferociously musical river. It carried along the ocean’s depth and waves’ nimble notes… ‘Will merge with the ocean, I do not wait for anyone’, replied the river to my question – ‘can you please let me pass?’
So I changed my path and followed the river. Who said you can’t? Change… change and move ahead.
Right where the river met the ocean, where it all seemed to end, where the trees, rocks, shadow and light all disappeared, music stayed by my side and showed me a narrow, slippery way to cross the river. I stepped in, the water was cold, but shallow and so I could cross easily.
With joy and cheer I continued along, I danced on the way, I slept peacefully and then walked leisurely. I sang, the tune echoed. My mind envisioned a valley of flowers and pink clouds when suddenly I tumbled down.
I was hurt. My dream shattered and cold winds bruised me badly. It started hailing. Troubled, I shouted angrily… who knows at whom?
The weather opposed me and pinned me down, I accepted defeat.
Lying half dead, I waited for the weather to change…
When it did, I woke up and saw as the fog disappeared that there was a huge mountain standing in front of me. I couldn’t stop smiling, a new journey was going to begin.
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Climbing the mountain I listened again to Dylan’s ‘The Times They Are A Changin‘. I didn’t know it, but I was free.
I have always been free.
Listen to ‘The Times They Are A Changin’ by Bob Dylan now –
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Sujata – The Voice of the Unheard
Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam – A tale of role-reversals and downfalls
Chalti Ka Naam Gaadi (That which moves is called a car)
Mrinal Sen’s Aakaler Shandhane (In Search of Famine)
La Strada And The Round-Faced Clown
Sherni – Even in the dense jungle, the tigress knows her way.
Gabbeh, the 1996 film, is a simple tale of a gipsy girl, her clan and the way their life goes on. Unfolding beautifully just like an artist painting a canvas, Gabbeh quietly touches the grand questions.
Essentially Gold, The Lavender Hill Mob
Ranked as one of the greatest British films of all time, The Lavender Hill Mob confides in the audience, letting them see, feel, laugh and think without tickling persuasively with a joke here and a punch-line there.
Regina Spektor’s Musical World – Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V
Of Monsters and Men and This Journey
The Circle Game, Joni Mitchell, You and Me
The Answer Is Blowin’ In The Wind
The Wonderful Mr. Tambourine Man Song
Weather Forecast Says Listen to George Ezra
The Choir and Their Toads Sing ‘Double Trouble’
Yes fly! For walking on the second track is dull and usual, but dreaming high, high, high requires tools. Tools like the right pair of shoes, a chirpy, gritty soul that eats butter-jam dreams, a soul that drinks milky-milky creams.
Silver cascade shimmering the night sky, music to the waves and surreal beauty to the eyes, the Moon loves the art of discipline.
It may be difficult to believe for the Moon’s splendour defies time, it stupefies the clock, it follows the path of a dreamer, but how could this be possible if the Moon knew not discipline?
In this moment, I am a little bit of this and a little bit of that, I am complete and incomplete, I am pleased and uncertain, I wish for nothing and I know I have to wait.
Because the distance covered reminds me of the hurdles I have crossed and the ones I could not, it reminds me of a throbbing past and a dreamy future and it reminds me of how much time is left.
A joy so complete without any rise or fall, so free without any time corners, so real without true being false, false being true.
