It’s autumn again. Midas lingers in the woods touching the green sages in penance. Looking to the sky, rooted deeply in the earth for ages, I wonder what truth they seek! If a boon they must ask, it must be to be born a tree again.
pc- pixabay
To look upon them as pious is how we can revere the noble souls for all that they give us. While fall is all a burst of colors to the worldly eye, there must be more to it. Losing is winning is what trees try to teach us. Every year autumn anoints them in gold perhaps to test their resolve. Politely returned all the wealth surrenders by their feet. The onus now is upon the spring to breathe green into the leaves. And when it does trees are all smiles again!
The focus in short forms is on the brevity and economy of words. It’s the art of saying all that we want to while saying too little or not saying anything at all.
when a raindrop says it all
why talk an ocean!
Lyrical Passion Poetry E-Zine publishes all Japanese short forms of poetry. Happy to have my poem here. To read and contribute to this flourishing community of poets click http://lyricalpassionpoetry.yolasite.com/
Mythology has held us all in awe and fascination. Kings, queens and demons come alive in the stories we have grown up listening to. Our heads turn salt and pepper but mythology retains an aura of intrigue and remains our favorite fantasy. Watered further by our social and cultural fabric, mythology grows on us like our second skin. Characters from mythology have etched themselves on our minds. We love their generosity and flexibility, and appreciate the power they have given us to imagine them however we wish. We constantly challenge our own imagination. What their world feels like? What’s their music like? What they might look like? Indian mythology contributes its own rich share. There are Gods, demigods, demons, birds and animals. How lucky must we be if a folk art brings alive our fantasy land!
Yakshagana is a traditional theatre form which is believed to have its origin in the coastal belt of Karnataka, a southern state in India. It’s a vibrant dance form that blends singing, dancing and narration. Yakshagana, bisecting the word, may be interpreted as the music (gana) of the celestial beings (yakshas/gandharvas). The dance dramas typically called ‘prasangas’ are generally based on Indian mythology. However the art is adapting to the need of changing times. Until a few years ago both male and female characters were played by men but in the recent years women have actively embraced the art form, both as singers and performers.
Krishnarjuna kalaga- a righteousness dilemma for Subhadra (Krishna-Subhadra)
There is a backdrop of singing throughout the performance. The singer has the accompaniment of chande, mrudanga and maddale which are percussion instruments, and taala or cymbals. Together they form the musical narrative for the performers. The vocalist and instrumentalists are dressed in a colorful turban and white (panche jubba) attire. The performers on the other hand wear strikingly colorful headgears, costumes and glittering adornments. The facial make up is quite elaborate and loud. The eyes, brows and mouth are over emphasized to depict the dramatic expressions of the performer.
Krishnarjuna Kalaga- Krishna
The dance is attractive and involves vigorous and equally gracious steps. The story proceeds switching between dialogues, dance and drama. Light humor is introduced through clown characters known as hasyagars. All is not simply a flash of colours, glitter and razzle-dazzle. The performance acquires a serious and contemplative mood as characters debate dilemmas and righteousness evoking our sensibility and judgement. Witty conversations rule a well enacted prasanga. I do watch yakshagana shows when I get a chance. They are typically late evening to dawn shows. There are daytime shows of three to four hour duration which I personally prefer over whole night shows. The loudness of music and make up may seem overwhelming for beginners but you will soon begin to appreciate the art. The extraterrestrials are entitled to make the right kind of noise. Whoever imagines a soundless world of kings and ogres, wars and battlefields!
Scenes involving Subhadra, Arjuna and their son Abhimanyu
A couple of weeks ago a Kannada monthly magazine ‘Samajamukhi’ in collaboration with Bangalore International Center organized one such performance Krishnarjuna Kalaga which means war between Krishna and Arjuna. Krishna is the Lord, and Arjuna is a character from the great Indian epic Mahabharatha. The purpose of having this event was to promote the folk art of Karnataka. The event was performed by seasoned artistes of Ananta Yakshakala Pratishthana of Sirsi town. The pictures are from the day’s event.
Those who are in the knowledge of folklore would know the storyline. Krishna has vowed to kill Gaya (son of Kubera) in eight days because he is angered that Gaya polluted the holy water intended for worshipping the Gods. Krishna has also vowed that if he is unable to finish Gaya he would kill himself. He finds out that Gaya has found shelter with the Pandavas who are supposed to be loyal to Krishna. In order to get Gaya out of the shelter of Arjuna (one of the pandavas) Krishna sends his sister Subhadra who is married to Arjuna but now under the care of brother Krishna as the pandavas are in exile in the forest. The prasanga ends with an all is well note.
will you rest? there’s always a grain to find there’s always a grain to feed and a dishevelled straw to put back in place. aren’t nests like that – restless!
As we grow older we become more and more sentimental about everything. We cling fiercely to things dear to us. We get teary eyed much easier and quicker than before. We know we have begun to over react but we cannot revert to our older selves. We begin to accept our over sentimentality. We know this new guest wouldn’t leave, and would only get more intimate and is here to stay. We come to terms and look for ways to detach ourselves. We try to avoid being tagged the touchy one. We turn more and more to spirituality and philosophy. We pretend we have begun to insulate ourselves from attachments. I am not absolutely sure if we are in a way deceiving ourselves. We try to strike a balance between how we are and how we are supposed to be. It’s a tough call. On the outside we are these persons who have realized we can’t hold on to things forever. On the inside it’s a tug of war. let go…don’t let go… Now isn’t it too much if my eyes welled up while I returned home from a home appliances service shop. My blender is my dearest kitchen friend and has seen me in intense pressure times. After nearly two decades it has started showing symptoms of stress. I can see it’s trying to do its best but no, it simply can’t run with the rush hour demands. That’s when I realize my good old friend is ageing like me. I took the blender to the service shop and left it there for the expert to diagnose. Two days and I didn’t hear back. I went down to the shop. The expert looked like he had examined the anatomy of my blender and was ready with his inferences. He said looking half pitifully and half in admiration at my blender,
nobody makes this model anymore. The motor’s efficiency has reduced considerably and it won’t take much load. It will switch off if you don’t use it delicately. I will try replacing the weak motor but it would cost you half the price of a new blender.
I pleaded with him to do his best to revive my blender. He must have wondered why I didn’t want to buy a new one instead. For the next ten minutes he just listened as I told him how loyal and efficient the blender had been all the while. He had about fifty blenders queued up for servicing, most of them looking overused and exhausted, and in dire need of ‘moksha’. His eyes softened as he turned around and looked at them, as if for the first time someone had made him realize what a life saving job he is entrusted with. He sighed and promised me to get my blender on her feet. How we develop affinity towards things that have made our lives easy, have listened to us silently, and have sometimes even borne our tantrums! It’s this humane side of objects that draws us into an emotional equation with them. Curiously I looked up more about this kind of attachment to inanimate things. Anthropomorphism is the term though I am not sure if the attachment becomes more intense with ageing. Of course there are instances where this affinity stretches too far and becomes something of a medical condition. Given we are basically emotional beings I would like to treat this as normal behavior. Moreover the years that make us all salt and pepper on the head must add a fourth dimension to our thinking.
Picture courtesy- Internet (Japan Experience.com)
Hari-Kuyo, a Japanese Buddhist and Shinto Festival of Broken Needles is observed (feb 8 ) annually where a memorial service is held for broken or worn out needles and pins. That’s how gratitude is shown, by gently laying them to rest on a tofu bar.
Picture courtesy – templesinindiainfo.com
Something similar to the ayudha puja an Indian festival celebrated during navaratri/vijayadashami where all implements and tools are worshipped. I am sure my hale and hearty blender will get its share of adulation. On that day they get a break as a mark of respect for the services rendered. One day in a year isn’t too much to ask as against our weekly off of two days.
Who wins the obedience medal between the mind and body? I am thinking only of normal people. People whose lives are controlled by the two mischievous brats they have raised. It’s an odd combination if the two don’t age correspondingly. That we can control neither is the biggest truth and life’s most important feature. Wisdom lies in gracefully accepting this enlightenment, and also our limitations. All we can do is channelize the energies of the mind and body and churn a healthy brew.
A good fitness regime, as much as our health and age permit, is a basic necessity of our body. Likewise we must have a custom made regime to flush out the toxins of the mind. There’s a way to keep a watch on the body. There are sure tell-tale signs. But it’s the mind that takes a beating. The whole process is abstract. We will never know how, where, when these toxins royally march into our mind. Isn’t it strange that our mind knows how to keep our body fit? It tells us how much we must eat and when we must stop eating and when it’s time to exercise etc. But when it comes to keeping itself fit, it’s rather casual. I am tempted to compare the mind to a slightly older sibling who gets away with a little sermonizing over the younger one, a little monitoring and perhaps some bossing.
The mind too needs to be cornered. The mind needs to know that we cannot play favoritism. The mind needs to find the regime that works best to flush out the toxins. Meditation is one way to drive away the crazy calories of the mind and restore some sanity and peace. It’s quite challenging to bring our mind to behave itself. A proven vagabond that it is, holding its reins takes some real effort. I wonder how such vulnerable mind is tough and ruthless when it comes to overseeing the physical fitness activity. But we are at least half done if our mind doesn’t tempt our body into an unhealthy lifestyle.
The other half is a difficult mile to run. Some days the mind begins to run amok even before the net is cast. It’s such an instinct of the mind to escape knowing well that we are out to fix it. There’s lot of action, hide and seek, and luring, happening behind the closed eyes. That’s the time I realize I haven’t been able to tame my mind one bit. What an embarrassment contradicting the calm and serene outward appearance! I let it wander aimlessly and wait for it to be tired and get home. When it finally happens I feel like a winner.
In the poem, which was published in Strange Horizons, I am being courteous and large-hearted by calling the mind a pilgrim.
Maya I. My comfort niche recedes into the mogra mist homeless, unhinged within myself I grow a pilgrim’s feet. Flitting chakra to chakra greys to gleams apogees to perigees. An aberrant sixth demon has carved her nest peeled three layers of bark blued the veins of rootless trees. In her maya mazes in mazes I’m lost I’m lost.
II. A restless frog breaks the pond moon a thousand times! I can’t escape the allure of the water mirror It’s not a myth of the sepia pond that faces are epicenters of brewing storms ripples moving outward from the ajna chakra reaching for the ashwatha, almost. Mired in delphic ponds I wander I wander cities of glyphs
III. Cosmic drifts of a pin head universe frank the homecoming of the conqueror. A lotus of folded palms for my acharyaa.
Enough has been said about how parents spoil their kids, overloading them with tech gadgets, for whatever reasons. At times to compensate their inability to spend as much time with kids, or simply because technology has crippled us so much that we are compelled to fall for them. Most of us thankfully know how much is good enough and necessary to stay connected. Thanks to the kind of world we have created for ourselves, we cannot think of a day without cell phones, internet, laptops and a host of other members of this family. This tech family is the next best thing to being surrounded by real family. Not shooting off on a tangent here and defending how technology has become an inevitable part of our lifestyle. We must accept the reality that we revolve around technology, though technically we are still revolving around the Sun.
But I’ve been thinking of the reverse situation. Children equally spoiling their parents, stuffing them with tech gadgets they cannot adapt to. Again reasons being varied, ranging from providing them safety, connectivity and recreation, or simply to make up for the fact that they aren’t around to give their ageing parents the company they need.
Gifting the elderly a Smartphone while they are more comfortable with a basic phone is still an understandable excitement. But burdening them with devices that are complicated in usage is equal to punishing them. Give them only as much as they can enjoy. Give them only as much as they can take. Anything more will only make them feel miserable. Our idea is to make them happy rather than making them feel inadequate. With depleting energy and memory all they need is a peaceful life and helping hands. The next best thing to being around them is surrounding them with simple tools, things that will make their life easier. If you have done that then that’s all there is to do. The rest might just boost your conscience.It’s a good thing to take the help of technology to improve the lifestyle of the elderly. It’s all fine if you or someone is around to help them out of sticky situations. Else it’s like pushing them into an unwarranted adventure. Your time is the best gift you can give to the elderly.
Not a yacht bring me a rowboat sit beside me and hold my hands let’s gently sail down the memory lake. My little boy not a yacht bring me a rowboat.
A wee book of poems, some new poetry and short stories old into writing, rolling a blog felt more like an extension, yet another dimension. I did do some homework, as in browsed and read a number of blogs. One feature I noticed was common in them. Blogs were more about loud thinking.
If genre writings are, say, peeled diced and ready to eat packaged vegetables, blogs are more like plucking them fresh off the farm. Earthier and right from the heart. It’s very subjective, but I relate more to the rawness in presentation and expression than to the spic and span I–challenge-you-to-find-an-error kind of writing. A blog post seems more appealing in a straight-from-the-mind mode. It’s like the excitement of getting your hands on a manuscript before it goes through the grind of publishing. Not to say I don’t have a taste for error free writing or edited stuff. But I can always pick up a bestseller or a favorite author off the shelf to fulfill such a need.
I don’t know if blog posts must be deprived of the polish, but that’s how I like them, more natural and spontaneous. Wandering amidst the posts must feel like walking through tall grass, prickly and tingly up to my knees, rather than walking on obedient manicured lawns. Blog posts, as far as I have noted are breezy in nature. Some blogs talk about grave matters such as mental health, economic and political issues for instance. Not that what’s said isn’t significant or intense but that’s how the content is presented. Not necessarily hitting us in the face and hammering the seriousness of the issues down our heads. Blog posts don’t intimidate the reader. They are more like friends who simply walk with you in your myriad moods and know well how much of them you can take.
When you almost agreed…that inner voice cautions otherwise 😀
I hope you don’t find any contradiction here 🙂 On that note why must I not try my hand at creating a meme from one of the cat pictures from my album! Here’s to my first ever meme! Cheers and have a great time blogging.
db's poetryscape 