The Return Gift

O’friends moving on bikes

cars and foot, if you have ears

listen: the city cracks and croaks

beep-beep, stop this mad rush
stand, slow down your pace

else you’ll be lost

never to be found again.

The proud skyscrapers
concrete steel and glass
without a blade of grass
the blind-eyed stars

blink at your arrogant dare.

Forests are no more dark

or deep with green mystery

hot air chokes the lungs,

the foamy gutters, bald yards

the billowing chimney, acid gas

the black soot showers are

our return gifts to nature,

poison to her sustaining bowers.

Our studies, research, inventions

are a Frankenstein monster

will devour us into its maws

mocking our suicidal wisdom.

Beware now and change
look afresh at your own game.


Sabita Sahu

Tolerance

Prafulla Kumar Mohanty

Wise men say: If you live in this world you have to tolerate even if a stone falls on you. But why should a stone fall on any one? They would smilingly argue and say-storms and blasts are nature’s inequilibrium: to restore balance such unnatural things will happen; since man is the best of nature the offshoots of the balancing process will fall on man only. Trees get uprooted, mountains crack, the sea gets churned but they never complain because they can’t; they never invented language. But they too suffer and wait for nature’s rejuvenating touch. Man is unrenewable, he comes for one life, therefore he does not tolerate the onslaughts of nature and the society which is of his own creation. Tolerance is a virtue of patience, patience is built into the human system; man’s psychic composure depends on this virtue which man must inculcate in his growing process. Since man is equipped with intelligence and a moral sense he alone can assimilate pain and psychosocial insults rationalising events and issues diligently. The desire to survive and the necessary struggle make the human beings tolerate all natural and societal slings and arrows with equanimity.

All religions, Hinduism in particular extol this virtue, as negative aggression shown towards unfriendly values is often self- stultifying. Priests and preachers with scholarly pretensions say, in line with Jewish revaluations, that ‘the wretched alone are the good: the poor impotent, lowly alone are the good; the suffering, deprived, sick, ugly alone are pious, alone are blessed by god...’ The soul sickening debate in the mind of Hamlet is unresolved- "whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune...” for religion always advocates tolerance of all onslaughts of fortune or powerful men, is a great human virtue worthy of God’s attention. We have been coaxed with the lure of heaven to be tolerant, cowardly accepting injustice without facing the challenge manfully. We never fought sacerdotalism, imperial autocracy and exploitation of aristocracy. Poverty and deprivation were the will of god, the reward in this life for sins committed in the past birth. We were forced to confess to untruths to protect the powerful. In short tolerance was always accepted by us against our grain for fear of base life.

In the twentieth century E.M.Forster advocated the same negative virtue after Europe’s experience of the War made him humble. He argued, it is now no more possible to love the Germans but we have to tolerate them. The Germans too have the right to live in this world. Is tolerance, turning the other cheek to the enemy, a value that can replace love? Is it love of the enemy or fear of survival? Frankly I don’t know.

In the present day world ISIS menace was tolerated by the powerful countries till Iraq was decimated. It was politically correct for some countries to overlook the menace. But when the survival fear, came tangibly near it became politically correct again to resist it. But it was late.  The cost was enormous. India has been protesting the terrorist killings in India for more than twenty years. Even today countries still debate who is a terrorist and whether in Jammu and Kashmir it is terrorism or a freedom movement. So called intellectuals in India and elsewhere still advise restraint and tolerance. If tolerance is an ethical value how is it that it has now become a political virtue?

The religion which Gandhi followed, a sort of political Hinduism, demonstrated the power of tolerance. In Dandi the salt makers were beaten black and blue but their bleeding heads did not bend. We still are proud of that. But where is that pride when lynch mobs kill a serving DSP in Kashmir? Those who shout against Indian Army for having fired upon stone pelting radicalized youth do they hold the banner of tolerance? A meek surrender to death is neither a moral nor a political virtue. Often we pay the price for our tolerance in the name of political expediency or ethical values. The dalits have paid the price over the centuries. Cow vigilante groups kill Muslims to protect the cow mother simply because they are a part of the Hindu majority assuming the minority will tolerate without protest: Why? Gods in our myths and epics never tolerated injustice; the Saints and Sages too were intolerant of insult or atrocities. Why should the weak always tolerate? Tolerance is not a virtue. Human dignity should not be compromised by this negative virtue. Manliness is a proud virtue: it should not be sacrificed on the altar of tolerance.

Pearl

Half alive was I, left unnoticed

lying on an ocean bed half hidden

from the sun, moon and human

don’t know who was he, who

sent him,God, fate or his free will,

picked me gently on palm,

wrapped me in a velvet cloth,

dusted me off the grime of time
insensitive to my innate gleam

polished with love, separating 

from grey mass transformed me
to a coveted pearl profound

worthy of life's golden round.
I am  proud out of the shroud

to adorn  the neck, ear, finger
of men, women and lovers keen

a prized gem, my shine divine,
enchants and enriches royalty:

I owe  the palms that released me

from the slushy sandy shell
as resurrected dew of nectar
fit to be crest jewel on the crown
of life's variegated kingdom.

Sabita Sahu

Donations

Prafulla Kumar Mohanty

When the Puja-Ganesh, Durga and Saraswati puja, Dola and Holi festivals etc come close, closer come groups of young  enthusiasts for donation. This English word has found meaning in almost all local languages of India by overuse. Perhaps the local word chanda is somewhat bashfully demeaning the status of the enthusiasts who move from door to door, at times from shop to shop with receipt book in hand, asking for help. The word donation gives the ‘asking for help’ group who organize street or area puja pandals some respectability. Puja donation in offices and certain organisations is compulsory and therefore is bereft of feelings. In the schools too it is almost mandatory for the god and goddesses of learning festivals. But when groups of young persons come calling in early evenings and demand an amount fixed by them for houses, the word donation loses its civilised meaning. If a householder politely expresses its inability to donate the youth brigade raises their voice and pitch. If the refusal is stubborn the group hurls expletives and at the dead of night a few stones as loud reminders. In erstwhile Calcutta refusal to donate often invited crude hand grenades before the regime change. But today violence and intimidation are perhaps few and far between. People voluntarily donate if not out of fear at least to get rid of these donation seekers. People these days are comparatively well off and a small post- demonetization five hundred rupee note is normally given as donation. Those who can afford donate in thousands if not in lakhs. In certain cities the rich and the powerful spend lakhs to celebrate pujas in an enviable scale. In such celebrations volunteers don’t move from door to door; the money comes plentifully to the group leaders who go to town with the free flow for a few days.

But such things are quite natural.  In a society where income inequality is alarmingly glaring at us, a few rupees for youthful pilferage is winkable. Only when extortionist behaviour harasses people questions may be raised against collecting donations for common social festivals. If it is a Puja or a collective function where society participates, people must form a committee of responsible persons to collect donations and manage such functions. The committee should be made accountable to the people.

But when political parties collect donations from the public questions crop up because there is no transparency of accountability. When Arvind Kejariwal formed the Aam Admi Parrty on principled politics, corruption free and committed to the people donations from India and abroad poured in. But it shocked people when the AAP website did not reflect certain transactions and people started raising fingers at the AAP leaders. Political parties cannot run without public donations. The public too should not mind giving donations to political parties as these parties serve the people. If transparency is demanded of them the political parties should receive all donations in shape of cheques. But the small contributors are not supposed to write cheques. Whatever rules are framed parties will find ways and means of jumping them. Similar is the case with temple donations.

Devotees put money in the boxes kept in the temples for donations. In the Tirupati and Shiridi temples and also at Lalbag and Siddhi Vinayak administrators and organisers try to maintain an acceptable system of transparency. Even with strict vigil, at times, human weakness surface. For such things the legal system happens to be the last resort. In politics the donations are of high volume and naturally pilferages are large. The law must take care of political donations.

Donations are a social tax. It is often self –imposed and voluntary. But if force is used to collect donations for social celebrations where people gather to participate, it is unacceptable. If it is a tax of love let people pay voluntarily to make the celebrations lovable and enjoyable. Those who collect such tax of love should also be loveable and polite. They are not the Enforcement Squads of the Tax department. They are people inviting participation of others appealing to their sense of charity. Donation should be a token of joy not a scornful ’good riddance’ fee
                                           

Kiss

If kiss is the stamp of love

stamp me all over,

a honey smear of love,

bright and glistening

lustier than wine

rosier than the early sun

pricier than gems and money.

If eyes are the pathways

to the inmost being,

lips are the gateways

to late winter spring.

Paint them in any shade

musk, ebony, green or red

they shine ravishing with

the touch of magic rainbow,

the lips untouched by colours

look a spray of all hues, 

nothing to take away or add .

But no feel is heavenly
like a  kiss of warm love

no feather can  ever
match its soft warmth

a liplock of true love
makes the body burn,
heart beats louder than drum
the twilight delight
overtakes the night
a moony paradise dawns
the being transcends life.

Sabita Sahu

Poet And His Reader

Prafulla Kumar Mohanty

Every day tons of books are sent out by publishers to the bookstalls in all major cities. Every day million or more poems are written in the world in languages of the east-west- north-south. The unseasonal snowfall and rains, the atomic threats not withstanding poets sing of their solitary anthems in free- blank- rhyming verse. International book exhibitions, lit-fests and commemoration of literary figures go on all over the world in myriad languages: Yet authors, particularly poets say the readers now shy away from poetry in particular and literature in general. What is the truth, one may ask. More and more people write poetry in all languages. The modern times are more practical and material ambitions commensurate with the opportunities dampen the indolent romantic effervescence of overflow of feelings, powerful or weak. The world today is more physical than metaphysical, more open to the new instruments of scrutiny than a speculative universe where the ’beyond’, the ‘spiritual ‘and the ‘I of an inscrutable Being’ are not suitable data for analysis or imaginative recounting by artists for the data religion. A more direct, unadorned language for easy communication is advised by all gurus in all kinds of linguistic composition. In short the world is no more the archetypal image and modern life is not the ultimate metaphor.

But the common reader is not dissuaded by the metaphorical design or labyrinth of imagery to avoid poetry: he finds not his self or his world in poetry. He lives in a world voluble, divisive and competitive. His poetry sense is satisfied in the bus-car-train where blaring music and lurid lyrics make his steps faster on to the pavements. He has no time to brood over poetic epithets or the metaphysical universe which great poetry creates. Most poetry written today are confessions of personal sorrow or loss. Hardly a poem creates an atmosphere of joy, hope or human glory. Hardly a poem speaks of love beyond unfulfilled desire. An office clerk or a babu has no time for the private worlds of mutilated hearts or wanton deprivations of rebellious self negation.

Poetry today has no mystery. The mysteries of messianic proportions have been exhausted in classical poetry. The mystery of romance and the individual’s personal salvation quest is seldom appealing. What the  modern average reader needs is to read in poetry,  anecdotes of success and encouragement to live life fully. Modern man says: no imaginary beliefs or constructs on a submissive reality. No fairy tale, give us logically acceptable imaginaries or illustrate mans mundane worth without distorting reality. The world has seen enough bloodshed, enough hunger, poverty, sickness and death. Give us dreams of immortality, dreams of well being and inspire us to fight and win. No uneasy truce with life, no compromise. Make the human being live without his rights being trampled under political authority or cowardly manipulation.

The poet, on the other hand claims his creation to be accepted with humility. He creates for his own pleasure which he thinks is objective and good for the common reader. Every man now is a poet, if not with words with designs, colours, and fanciful wishes. The Puja magazines are flooded with poetry. So many poets write! Such a variety of expression, style, imagery and experience ought to delight the reader beyond the pleasures of ordinariness. But the reader is not enthused. Why? the poet asks. May be the common reader has no sensibility or the poet like Narcissus wallows in his own image without communicating his own sensations  in terms of the readers expectations. Either the reader must consider poetry as the ultimate expression of human totality or the poet must understand the reader’s world and his human totality. We have to search for the answer to readers unresponsiveness (if at all) within the space of this either/ or. This will lead us to the limits of human intelligence and human consciousness: we must search beyond these limits.

Poetry is beyond the intelligence with which we perceive consciousness but the poet must move with the reader to attain this beyond.

When Alone ...

I reach the unreachable

birdlike I fly to map the sky,

paint the sun in different shades

to let the world enjoy the spectrum,

I turn the gears of the wind

to listen to the music new born,

When I am alone.

I cry my heart out,

laugh, sing and dance

shout, jump and unlock my

buried desires from the cocoon,

the crowd listens to my songs

of silence long suppressed

the new born reality grows green

on nature, carrying him in me

as the angel of my being,

when I am alone.

What’s life after all !

Not three royal meals,

going away on long drives,

to escape father’s pain, mother’s

tears and other symptoms of being

alive? No it’s a journey inside

to discover the soul's worldly self

to enter life’s mysteries:

This is best done

When I am alone.


Sabita Sahu