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The ocean of air stood
Heavy with impurities, until it rose again
With love to revive life.
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On a round little boat
Rowing
I make circles on the river
Going
Catching nothing but matching the twinkling
Sound
That the river makes, singing
Aloud
The eternal song – fresh and fragrant –
Ever
And forever – the twirling dancing roar of the
River
Meets mountains, clouds, the slant sunlight and the gazy night
Alike,
Exploding in joy, splashing timelessness in the air and
Life
In every drop.
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On a round little boat
Rowing
I make circles on the river
Going
Watching rocks, trees, the playful wind and the dancing
Shadows
That fall on the river silently, attuned to its
Flow
Rapturously it unfolds, turning, twisting, shaping its
Way
Melody-like, harmoniously, day by
Day
By day, and this gargantuan movement appears
Unmoving
To those who fetch the tools to measure the
Unmeasurable
And pin it to the wall.
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The round little boat is NOW facing the riverine plastic trash monster
That has devoured the oar I used to beat it
Foolishly… like a fool fooling no one
And the river goes on to meet the ocean.
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Glaring at the pencil-like sleek and sure fishing boat, far off in the ocean, moving/unmoving yet listening to the waves, Lo sat still, statue still… tail dancing now and then.
Wo, reaching there after a long stroll, declares without even looking – “not pencil-like, mm-mm, paint-brush-like… the strokes say so, Lo. Look-look, why don’t you look, Lo.”
“Quiet Wo! Where’s Mo. On the boat?” – says Lo.
“Meow, meow! I mean I don’t no.” – meows Wo.
Lo cleans her forepaws. Wo stretches, then chooses a good spot to rest. Her highness and his highness both looked, not searchingly, at their renounced kingdom. Oh! Pardon! Anytime now, his highness will doze off! And… now!
There that same fishing boat gets a bout of hiccups. Hindola-hindola…O, hindola-hindola*!
A strange phenomenon, ho-haye, thought the folks on board for theirs was the only fishing boat that was dancing not anyone else’s, haye-ho!
The waves clapped! Three drenched souls – two humans and a black cat named, Mo – on that same fishing boat fought the hiccups and looked at the shore.
“Someone’s missing ya, so they say!” – comments human one, holding on.
“Meow, meooowww! It is Lo, it is Lo, it is Looo!” – cries Mo.
Humans understand nothing. No, instead they open their eyes wide, looking left and right and left and right, ho-haye, haye-ho, shying from the ocean, silently swaying with the flow.
They survived and reached the shore, with fish, lobsters, prawns on board and the three souls in tow, caught in the net, dizzy and wet.
Trapped in the air, the salty news reaches Lo and Wo and they jump into action, meeting Mo on the go. Climbing walls, branches, climbing down stairs, crossing paths, they reach the neighbouring dock.
A piffling war, two high jumps, ducking for cover, grabbing and dashing away, the tails signalling victory… victory once again.
Mo bid bye in style, when Lo and Wo were busy sorting the loot… “Who gets the one prawn?” – they wonder, and so do we.
Hint – ask the painter babu who swiftly captured this moment before Lo could shout Wo or Wo, Lo.
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The post is inspired by this amazingly simple yet fantastic Jamini Roy painting.
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*Hindola is a Hindi word which means a swing and/or swaying as if you’re sitting on a swing.
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देर हो गई इतनी, मैं सोचूँ तो बोलू इतनी कितनी?
कई मंत्र जप्पे थे, कई जाने थे, अब आई बात समझ जाकर नंबर 205 पर।
उमर होगी मेरी 88-90, बोलो फिर कहाँ पाले मैंने इतने मंत्र?
हाँ तो मैंने फिर जाना की माना इस्कूल में पढ़ाया था जल ही जीवन है,
मैं गई भूल, अब आई बात समझ जाकर नंबर 205 पर।
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अब खा लूँ मैं जल, पी लूँ मैं जल, करलूं सफाई जीवन भर,
जल ही औषधि, जल ही प्राण और मैं राख,
जल नाले-नदी -झरने -समंदर में, जल मेरी मटकी में और मटकी मेरे सर पर,
मटकी टूटी तो जल ज़मीन-बीज-पौधे-पांच-साल-में-पेड़ पर, और मैं पेड़ की डाली पर।
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झोंपड़ी सी है मेरी, छत डालियों की बुन्नी थी कभी, अब छेद वाली है… फिर…
फिर इस बार अम्बर का पानी मेरी झोंपड़ी में और मैं मुईं झोंपड़ी की छत्त पर,
मुंगी भौंक उठी उस दिन मुझ पर, या मुईं छत्त पर… बिजली चमकी अचानक
और मैं गई कूद, गिरी सीधे चार-पाई पे, अब लगे मेरा बिस्तर फर्श पर।
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बड़े मटके में बड़ा, छोटे में छोटा बन जाये ये जल
और जब जाए मेरे भीतर तो बन जाए मुझ बुढ़िया सा कुबड़ा।
मूयें कुबड़े होंगे तुम सब, मैं कोई न होनी…
*
फिर जल कभी मेरा खाना, कभी मुंगी का, जो वो न खाए तो चिड़िया का।
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जल आकाश, जल समंदर, और ये माटी के पहाड़ जैसे मेरी मटकी,
रिस-रिस के पानी, अंदर इस भू को जल दे जाए प्राण और ठंडक…
क्यों? पृथ्वी घूमे है तो थके न क्या? जल तो मांगे है…
फिर जल से कौन बचा, जो डूब गई वो भी किश्ती थी, जो तैरती रही वो एक किस्सा,
तुमने सुनाऔर मुझ बुढ़िया ने भी जाना, माना माना, नहीं माना नहीं माना।
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बचपन में आई एक बार बाढ़, सब जगह जल ही जल और सत्यानाश,
मैं बच गई… काहे चौंके?
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देर हो गई, देर हो गई इतनी, मैं सोचूँ, तो बोलू इतनी कितनी?
देर नहीं होनी कोई, तुम्हारी घडी भागे दिमाग से तीन कदम पीछे।
सुनलो, जल पीना चौकड़ी मार के जैसे है कोई अमृत ये, तब ऊपर के निचे के
दांत झड़ेंगे पहले और तुम मरोगे बाद में, बिन बतीसी के
बुड्ढे खुसठ 100 पार छलांग लगा कर।
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हाँ, याद रखना, मुझ बुढ़िया की बात, मैं जल देवी कहलाउंगी इसके बाद।
हं… हं… हाँ तो…
कई मंत्र जप्पे थे, कई जाने थे, अब आई बात समझ जाकर नंबर 205 पर।
English Translation –
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I understood quite late, but then I wondered how late is quite late?
I chanted many mantras, knew many more, but mantra number 205 enlightened me.
Am around 88-90, so will you say I have gone overboard with chanting mantras?
Hmm, so as I was saying I know we were taught in school that water is life,
But I simply forgot about it, but now mantra number 205 enlightened me.
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These days I eat water, I drink water, and I say keep it all spick and span forever,
Water is medicine, water is life-force and I am dust,
Water in the stream-river-cascade-ocean, water in my earthen jar and the earthen jar on my head,
The earthen jar broke, water seeped in the earth-seed-plant-and-in-five-years-the-tree and am now sitting on the tree’s branch.
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I live in a small shack, with an old thatched roof that now has a hole in it… then…
Then, recently, it rained heavily, water entered my bloody shack, I climbed the thatched roof then
Mungi barked at me or was she barking at the bloody roof… Lightning struck suddenly,
I jumped and landed on my cot, as a consequence of which now I sleep on the floor.
*
Big in a big jar, small in a small one, water takes any shape
And when I drink water, it takes the shape of a hunchbacked oldie…
Oh, you all must be hunchbacked, because I surely am not.
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Hmm… I often have water for lunch, sometimes I share it with Mungi and if she rejects it, the birds feast on it.
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Water is sky, water is ocean and these mountains made of earth are like my earthen jar,
Slowly seeping inside, water gives life-force and coolness to the earth…
Why not? The earth rotates so don’t you think it gets tired? It too asks for water…
Water is very powerful… the one that sinks is a ship and the one that doesn’t is a legend,
You have heard such tales, this oldie has also known some, if you believe in it, you do and if you don’t, you don’t.
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Once, in my childhood, a great flood caused catastrophic destruction,
I survived… you look surprised, why so?
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Quite late, quite late, but then I wondered how late is quite late?
You’re not quite late, your watch runs three times slower than your brain.
Listen, sit down cross-legged whenever you drink water as if it is an elixir, then your lower and upper
Teeth will fall before you die and you will die toothless
Grumpy and senile, only after crossing 100.
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Okay! Remember what this oldie has shared, maybe from now onwards I’ll be known as the ‘Water Goddess’.
Hmm… hmm… like I said…
I chanted many mantras, knew many more, but mantra number 205 enlightened me.
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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.
