We Have Shamed The Maker

You created the Universe

Sun, Moon, Stars, Trees, Animals

men of diverse  dreams rose and sword,

but you never visited to see your handiwork.

We have grown multiplied spread

cut jungles, buried rivers broke hills

our cities have more glitz and glamour

surpassing your imagination and fancy.

You created us equal, we divided

we created rich and poor

hated each other, fought on land

air and sea we have invaded,

we killed for faith by stonewalling

ourselves with stubborn logic

we destroyed temples, mosques

gurudwaras and built anew in its place,

our islands of pride.

Will you ever come, at least once

if ever you come you will seal yourself

with self hatred and disappear

leaving us orphans

for the way we nail you

every moment, unredeemed.

Sabita Sahu

Bhishma

Prafulla Kumar Mohanty

Watching B.R. Chopra's Tele Mahabharat serial compulsorily during the pathless lockdown I was struck by one shot : Bhisma lying on a bed of arrows in a forlorn corner of the Kurukshetra battle field with countless bleeding zones in his white clad body.  A man whose bow's thunder sank the hearts of the high and mighty and melted all stubborn heroes to fearful cowardice before the murmur stopped, the same hero lay half awake on a bed of arrows! The man fortified with a boon from his father Shantanu to die as per his wish was still thinking of his motherland, Hastinapur, wishing to see its secure future before wishing his breath to cease! It was an imaginative shot bringing the irony home that life is not a biological process, what matters in life is the will to counter the unseen vicissitudes by wisdom and fortitude which ultimately betray man's sole purpose of life. This stately scene  in the sunless battlefield of life stands out as the ultimate worth of man. Even after a full life of dedication and service man fails and falls on the arrows shot by the very things he loved to protect.

 Arguably Bhishma was the tallest figure  in Aryabarta. He was invincible in archery. His own Guru Parshuram had to acknowledge defeat. He was godlike in his resolve  to rise above the worldly ties of family, power, royalty and other luxuries of life which accompany them. He took a vow not to marry and raise a family when  the father of Satyabati apprehended that his children may rival her daughter's  children to the throne of Hastinapur. But here one is tempted to ask the question: Should he have taken such a vow? Only to pave the way for his old father Shantanu to marry Satyabati which in any case was lustful to say the least why, should the Prince, the most suitable and rightful inheritor to the throne make  a sacrifice of his own future? A future which was made uncertain by the unholy and  unequal marriage between Shantanu and the daughter of the fisher king, Satyabati. Bhishma's personal sacrifice was not for any noble cause. It was a vain sacrifice for a weak willed man, the king of Hastinapur who could not make his divine wife Ganga a queen or a woman. Sacrifices are made to save lives, to speak out Truth, to reveal wisdom; but Bhishma's sacrifice was for his father's lust.  Was it not a deviation from the course of nature and also politics? In return, however, he was given a boon of Death by Self will. But what is the utility of wishful death for a  man who has alienated himself to a metaphysical level by his own volition only to watch life flow without his effective controlling hands and even mind?

He had given his word of honour to his father to protect the throne of Hastinapur and accept the person who sat on the throne as his king. But we may ask legitimately whether his understanding of his own commitment was clear. Throne is a symbol of royal authority and kingship is another symbol of power wielded by a person to protect and serve the people. If Bhishma  accepted the person sitting on the throne as his master, he has reduced himself to the state of a subject if not a slave. How then could he control and guide the Person on the Throne and by what powers?  The king was responsible for Hastinapur and Bhishma's vow to protect Hastinapur was lost in his obedience to the throne.

His vow is in a way  responsible for the moral corruption which the Rajmata Satyabati had to submit to in the name of saving the clan. Shantanu's two sons were physically weak ; perhaps that was the way of destiny's revenge on Shantanu's indiscretion. Satyabati invited her own rape- son  Vyasa, the great scholar and sage to mate with the widows of Bichitravirya which definitely flouted the moral codes of society. Bhishma became  a mere witness to the gradual decline and fall of all values. Blindness to reality and loss of natural virility set on the Hastinapur throne to which Bhishma's oath bound loyalty had to acquiesce in. Bhishma definitely had a throne - loyalty that was skewed. He never questioned the Barunabrata crime and conspiracy. He never could hold the integrity of the Hastinapur throne. The kingdom was divided between the cousins.  He was responsible  by his assent to the division of territory. Like Shakespeare's King Lear Bhishma too treated the 'earth' as family property. He allowed the dice game  in the Royal  Court of Hastinapur and unprotestingly sat through the inhuman sight of  the denuding Of Draupadi by Dussasana at Duryodhan's orders.  Had he raised his voice or calmly walked away from the court the Hastinapur Royal Court would have been  spared  the moral  accusations of history. And finally the Mahabharat war could have been avoided had Bhishma stayed neutral like Vidur . Bhishma's vows to protect the  throne have no significance as Bhishma failed to protect the values of the famed kuru clan. The throne is a lifeless material frame of authority but the symbol is more important than the substance. Bhishma tried to protect the substance at the expense of the symbolic majesty.

But history will pay its due tributes to this great helpless Hero. He had the right perceptions and also the right commitments. But never imposed his sense of order  on the chaotic minds around him. In short he did not walk away. He stayed in the rut and till the final moment was true to his convictions.

The final scene of his life is a loud statement of his true position in history. Bhishma's glory did not have a verticality: He lay horizontally oh a bed of arrows . But the angels and humans threw petals on the dying, bleeding body while his great soul was adored and admired by Time and its unending manifestations.

A New Future

If the present  is full of chaos

disturbs your sleep

don't worry -

dream of  a new beginning

make the present  the bricks

and mortar of your new home

plaster it with exotic distemper

draw pictures of man's future

that will guide and direct you.

But the question is what is new-

Is it the same chores of life?

Then what else could it be-

Yes- create a world without

the hunger of body, don't

confine it to your past again.

Stars planets they will be there

think of man -  that man who

can design life with a starry vision

of Humane togetherness:

How will you do it???

You will do it

by making the world

the home of mankind

where Men, Women and Nature

will sing  anew birth of  life.

Sabita Sahu

Dharma Is Reason Not Religion

Praeulla Kumar Mohanty

All systems are based on law and all laws are based on reason. Some laws are written and others are unwritten. Those unwritten too are based on reason where the authority is not specified but  surmised or experienced. The written law is  backed by authority, the authority of king or council or the People. Any breach is punishable after  a trial where  men and women of reason discuss, listen and proclaim a judgement to punish or pardon or release. But no system works or operates without law. The earth too is bound by law, she cannot deviate from the orbit, cannot stop moving wilfully. The cosmic laws too are based on reason. One may ask, what is this reason? The Greeks claim to have invented reason. But the Indians had practised Reason much before the Greek Enlightenment. Reason for the Greeks was mostly logical. For the Indians it was moral. Rationality for Indians was Dharma not religion. The rational faculty however is not a given constant. The cosmic constants are never changing but the human constants change  when the living conditions change. In other words laws made by men change when society changes. For instance when war is accepted as a human institution the peace time laws change. When food and shelter and peace are available  a liberal temper modulates human logic. But when there is scarcity the changes come in terms of a new logic where survival determines  the new law.

Man in the beginning thought of a divine origin of everything. God has created the world of man and nature. Very easily people thought that he who has created man must provide for him. But the same man later challenged the anthropomorphic origin of man. Darwin  changed the entire system of life and life management with his book Origin of Species. But the two systems exist simultaneously. Rationality  and irrationality exist as twins. Today the world is conflict ridden. The desire to dominate the human order by the rich and powerful comes into conflict with the idea of universal brotherhood. The Indian thinkers believe that the world is one  Family. But this belief was challenged  by several marauders and aggressors. India never learnt to defend herself as its logic was that there is moral reason everywhere and members of the same human family should not attack or defend each other. But  this logic was changed when the country and its people were ruled by the aggressors. Chanakya changed the obtaining logic  and gave a new system of  moral reason. It is obvious that in the evolutionary process of life reason too evolves. New efforts are made to change  the behaviour of man to suit one system of logic.

The Indians today are stay at homes because of the nature of the Corona Virus. To keep them entertained  and enlightened the masterly epics of India., Ramayana and the Mahabharat are serialized after a gap of about 30 years. Every day people hear one word- Dharma- in the epics, especially  in the Mahabharat. There is a confusion in the minds of the modern generations over the word Dharma. Almost all people, particularly the bigots and the politicians use the word Dharma to mean religion. But Dharma is not religion. Dharma fundamentally is moral reason which should help life management. Duties, responsibilities, loyalties, political systems, family systems are all modulated by Dharma, that is, responsible behaviour, respect of the  worthy and dignified behaviour. The attitude to life is primarily sober, culturally courteous and intellectually  refined. But in the Mahabharat particularly we notice a blind king behaves and functions more as a father foolishly overfond of his son than a king  who should treat all the subjects as his own children. This blind king, Dhritarastra who could never have become  the king if his brother had not died, never accepted the Reason that a blind man cannot be a king. He also thought, that his son although younger to Yudhistira ought to succeed him. This is politically and morally Adharma that is unreasonable. It is unreasonable because it does not  have any moral base. In the context of the then Arayavarta.

On the other hand in the Ramayana we see another kind of  unreason. If a noble and virtuous king treats his subjects as his children and tries to please them we should think that Reason's reign has begun and all systems - society administration and family  will grow  and  attain moral perfection . But if a king sacrifices a noble, chaste and loyal wife- the Queen- to pacify or appease the people, his reason is flawed. Injustice, cruelty and irrational action cannot justify Rajdharma.. Sita was sacrificed for political expediency. This is not Dharma. If Dhritarastra was politically and literally blind to moral logic, Rama was blind to innocent virtue. If Dharma is used for personal aggrandizement it butchers logic and rationality. These ancient epics of India should teach the present generation that Dharma is not religion. There is no Hindu or Muslim in the world. There is only man and  his moral logic should be sound enough to lead him in life.

Unsung Melodies

I never saw the rise and swell

of Baitarani waters from my window

the boatman's song eluded my ears

father's concern for my  mother

never reached beyond the sheets.

My high jumping  feet cute and shapely

kicked the medals  to ignoring friends

I sobbed in dark rooms for lonely relief,

the gathering clouds went without tears.

From frock to saree I grew unripe

my diary poems were dreams torn

when results graduated me to love

for the man who never looked at me.

Silent he was to my unsaid words

while the sandy beach counted waves

He went away leaving his silence

for me to fill with painful rhythms.

Wifehood came followed by whines

motherhood filled me with pride divine

book racks grew dusty and mouldy

I croaked in the kitchen the old melodies.

Now I have cleaned up the stables

my Pegasus is opening its wings

I'll move in space time-defying

and sing of life in forbidden rhyme.

Sabita Sahu

Loneliness

Prafulla Kumar Mohanty

He who is alone is either a god or a beast, said Aristotle. Logic would ensure that loneliness is either  divine or bestial . If your loneliness is divine, you may load and bless the needy and despondent  people around. If it is bestial, you may kill and torture unsuspecting people. But man is midway between god and beast   and his loneliness cannot , I hope, be stretched up or down. A  lonely man is not a scarecrow, "A tattered coat upon a stick" as Yeats wrote  or  a demented man prowling  the midnight streets. He may be a discernible face in a crowd. He maybe a  mountain peak gazing at the vast sky for a kindred  soul. He may be a Hamlet questioning in silence the logic of the palace .He may be a genius searching for an answer to the oft - asked  question, ' whence we came whither shall we go'. He may be a responsible  President or Primeminister searching for revelations of a different kind  to save  his people from untimely death. He may be  a lonely poet scanning a word for his poem beyond all lexicons. Or he may be a sexcited man in a different city needing release of his urges. He may also be a T.S. Eliot who failed to connect  nothing with nothing. Loneliness is not being alone  without companionship, it is most often a state of mind, self chosen to ponder over a disturbing question concerning life's mystic challenges.

A political prisoner in a single cell or a Napoleon in an island is not necessarily lonely. Loneliness in the social  sense often means physical isolation. If a person is removed from his familiar reality he feels lonely as the landscape or the people do  not register on him. No memory is evoked, no  drama of live experience is re enacted. But this is not  loneliness . It is a temporary feeling of abstraction from reality which can be reinforced when the mind adjusts to the new scene. The left and the right brain, the creative  and the analytical will function together to create a new familiar reality,  Sita in her exile, her abandonment was not lonely. She was conscious of her motherhood and moved forward. Loneliness comes only when  person surrenders his freedom to respond  to his physical  or mental state. If a bird accepts  the cage and surrenders to the confined space and gets mentally prepared to lose  her birdness to controlling hands she loses her being forever. She is removed from her destiny  and   she compromises. Such creatures cannot understand loneliness. A lonely man is a revenge hero  biding his time to act. He is hopeful of change as he does not seal  his mind. He may shout in agony or seal his mouth  as though he has lost the power of speech but inside his mind his world moves faster than the earth's diurnal motion. But loneliness is not all these. God is the loneliest creature or divinity if you prefer. Loneliness is a virtue inculcated by a few fortunate men who create alternative worlds .   

The enforced loneliness in this Corona lockdown today is however, painful. I cannot walk on the road I built? Shops are closed. Sitting in a corner room I watch the sunset . I am a nobody here. I cannot touch my ailing mother, cannot talk with my grown up children. I have no work except the usual repetitions of the animal habits . What am I now?  An animal in a cage ? Have I lost my freedom to participate in the lila of life. I have lost my identity. If I connect my cell phone the voices on the other side sound like aliens lost in a world forlorn. I am no more  a part of the history making process- and history has come to a stand still . Time too is blank, not even a palimpsest to receive the new vocabulary of alienation. Man has always chased time to a future or dissected with analytical    scissors the palm leaf, heaps or walk back to the origins. But now time and space are both like imaginary hail storm full of lightning flashes and sterile thunder. Man closes whatever is open in the room, door or window, to shut out the fury of the elements. Where are those poets, sages, scientists who always goaded us  to fight? If I want to fight - I am always ready - but who is my enemy? A lifeless virus  who finds life in me, inside my wonderful body , grows in me -  is that virus worthy of my heroism ? I don't seek bubble reputation  in my allotted time. I have a face, a head, and a name; Yes a name; should I stake that name just for mere survival ? No, I will live. Man has lived in the world, climbing its peaks, swimming the seven seas, building bridges to heaven. Man has sung sweeter than the birds and air; man has created beauty on stone , strangeness on the prehistoric rocks. He has written epics, discovered all secrets of creation- almost -:   will he now die a secret death in a room which will be fumigated after he  stiffens?  

But man has conquered everything with love. Christ, Buddha, Gandhi  won all human wars with love. Can Corona understand  My Love ? If I sing - come my love, live in me, together we will love the mountains, valleys, slopes, gradiants of the earth, shapely, luscious and seductive like Uravasi - Meneka. We will keep the rivers crystal clear, mountains and virgin forests eternally charming like dew washed buds at dawn. We will eat whatever the earth gives and never shall we greed for more. We will sing for our love from distant shores and never admit separation to our perennial union. We will love man for all his shortcomings irrespective of his caste, religion, nationality.  We will hold the banner of peace in the hands of love.  Will Corona respond?  If not let us break this lockdown and do what we have been doing  with greater vigour. Let's bury loneliness in the Choric song of life and wish victory to man.                                                                             

Corona 's Home

Tired of roaming around

in the unwholesome air

he enters the body of the

human being to taste the

choice of its own life,

it enters the lungs to breathe

and purify its own blood.

The allure of unknown

unseen predator has

darkened the earth

Mother Nature is quiet

watching her children running

here and there to save their lives

whom they call humans.

Man is maddened

by the internal strife

he runs to the doctor,

who isolates him prisoner like

without guilt or crime.

He prays wishes to light a lamp

before his deity

but all temples are closed

as He is quarantined.

The leaders of the world

feel  helpless,

man is the plume of creation,

now is gilted waiting for the end.
Making the body home for the alien
he has alienated himself.

Who and what is this Corona,

has it come to make us more

aggressive in thought and action

more violent and inventive to kill,

or Corona has come to teach man

how to behave, admire, respect

and submit to Nature:

Nature is the only God Principle

and man must surrender his ego.

Is this Armageddon or Kurukshetra

we need not know:

Life is to be lived

to do good to each other

with Nature as the

presiding deity of our actions.

Sabita Sahu