Prafulla Kumar Mohanty's
DRAUPADI - 78
Krishna’s
Mediation Fails: Krishna Draupadi Discuss Future
Krishna refused Duryodhana's
hospitality
preferred the humble soft intimacy of
Vidura.
An honest coarse meal and a safe
mattress
are better than the luxury of deceitful
plenty.
In the Kuru court Vasudeva advocated
the Pandava cause with moral logic.
His advocacy failed, Dhritarastra,
Bhisma
silenced by Duryodhana's repugnant
hubris
lowered their heads, Krishna's final
appeal
for five villages for the Pandavas
was pooh-poohed
much to the shock of the royal
assembly.
Duryodhana's final declaration - Not
even
a needle point space shall be yielded
without war -
closed the issue, Dhritarastra's meek
silence
and wordless hesitation, the helpless
protests
of the elders were all rendered
irrelevant
by ranting Duryodhana who wanted
Krishna held.
The shocked assembly then saw
Krishna's
original oracular form wheeling his
disk
in spectacular radiance.
The foolish Kauravas stepped back as
he
walked out in victorious grace,
leaving
the assembly in self stultifying
chaos.
Auntie, said Krishna to Kunti, I failed
to stop the clash of brothers; war is
now the dark truth, the sky will fall
in torrents of gore slushing the earth
bones will stick out like stumps
after the harvest of death, unreaped
rots:
Kunti moist eyed had no voice as
Krishna's
chariot flew towards the dusky sunset.
Draupadi heard what she had foretold
to herself before Krishna went to
Hastina.
Pandavas knew what Krishna would bring
back
as Drupad, Virat and other message
hungry
nobles accepted the dark tidings
in formal fortitude to meet
their future with dutiful
preparations.
To arms was the new buzz spreading
from halls to lawns to dining space:
War drums vibrated fear
in the hearts of drooping trees.
Krishna with his familiar smile
asked Draupadi, at a corridor bend
Sakhi, did you expect any happy
results,
are you shocked or disappointed?
Draupadi in a calm demeanour, said
no shock Sakha, no disappointment,
the peremptory summons of war
came with the roll of dice years ago.
All my thirteen years of soul
sickness
waited for the balm of peace but
peace is not to be, if my wounds
are slated to be washed with blood
I never willed it nor desired it ever.
Who in her right senses would have
a death wish and see thousands in
battle array for mutual extinction?
But you are the cause of the war
can you deny it my sweet Sakhi?
O Sakha your words bleed me deep
if I am the cause I will uncause it
I'll pardon Duryodhana and enter fire
I won't allow the future historian
to raise his accusing forefinger
at me as the cause of the Mahabharata
war.
But I shall ask you O Sakha the wielder
of the chakra, why did you kill Kamsa
why Shisupal and many others, for
what?
To restore the balance between
good and evil for order and harmony.
What harmony Vasudeva? How can
one death harmonize another murder?
How will this war restore my dignity
time has no backward wings to self
correct
wrong directions, it never looks back
it brings no balance save ego massage -
Krishna laughed amiably: My Sakhi now
is wisdom in tears, if it be so, why
prepare for war, let us all withdraw
to
where civilization has not reached
and
meditate how to spend the rest of
life -
No Vasudeva withdrawal from life is
death,
the ego the fiery soul has its own
flame
when lit by enemies and ego hunters
it conflagrates and must consume
passions
to calm itself - Which is harmony Panchali,
chopped in Krishna with an innocent
grin.
If withdrawal is death and fight for
rights
is death which death balms your
patience
which death consoles your native
justice
which death is meet without guilt ?
Choose that Draupadi and the choice
is
now inevitably war for your civil
rights.
Draupadi nodded her eyes in flood
Krishna placed his arm around her
reassuring her burning soul :
The peace of the living is not a
graveyard
yet Sakhi the battlefield becomes
one.
