Thinking along with JK

Thinking along with JK, mind is seen full of conditionings. Every act we do now, every thought which occurs, every view that the mind holds upon - all are, all have been deriving themselves recursively, layer upon layer of the past, my past, your past, our past. The pros is as much a part of this layering as the cons is. Nothing escapes, no theory, no school, no idea that has come down, however docile or daring, this matrix of conditioning. Even your spontaneity is sham-faced by the subtle prevarications of this chained lattice of conditioning. 'What survives?' is an extended link of this lattice.

***


Generally with any book on spirituality, whatever may be the school or whoever may be the author, whether in any religious garb or not, I find one uniform feature. That is, all these books are brain-washing in the sense, that these make you feel that that way is the only way or the only efficacious way or the only superior way vouchsafed unto humanity as the final path. All other ways are either wrong or only preparations to this path. Why every mystic wants to do that for his way is queer if we choose to think on that. Perhaps this vehemence occupies the vacuum of the lack of any objectively verifiable ground. Science fares happier on that ground.

***

Hall of Masks

We are in a hall of masks;
lost our heads long ago,
somewhere, hereabout,
in the midst of masks,
those should be lying,
lisping some unheard truths;
our masks deter our efforts
in finding out our heads
and shoot a thousand head-aches
of the heads unfound;
chinnamasta shies away
having tried and failed
to give us hints.

We are in a hall of masks
searching for a thousand reasons
instead of our one head that will count;
perhaps we are afraid we may find it
and postpone the chance of the unexpected;
the masks are in search of our heads,
to hide them and belie our eyes;
That one head, our beloved head
should reach us soon, in spite of us.

***
Srirangam V Mohanarangan

*

A Sangam poem

Eating plenty of plantain

of the rich swaying leaves,

along with the sweet shelves

of jack-fruits, resisting further intake,

changing gulps of honey-like water,

coursed with rich bouts of wine,

the monkeys find it impossible,

to scale the sandal trees,

and just doze off
on the beds of heaps of fallen blossoms;

effortless pleasures are aplenty

for all the living beings of thine hills,

easily got with no strain;

then forsooth, aimed pleasure,

is it so difficult for thee?

Bounteous beauty

and bamboo-smooth shoulders

branching off and entwining

as it were the heart,

ever pressing forth to thwart;

all for the sake of thee, if then,

she is tightly in guard by daytime

and you venture the night not sir;

the seasons fade fast away

and the wretched moon lingers long

down in the town.

***

(Translation of one Sangam song, 'what is that?')

Srirangam V Mohanarangan

*

'In the windy plains, O! Kannamma!'

In the windy plains, O! Kannamma

I rejoice in thy loveful thoughts

Lips of springs of nectar

Moonlight drips brimming eyes

Body shaped of pure golden hue

Till I last in this world vast

Make me forget everything else

Changing me into a celestial

You are my sweet soul O Kannamma!

I will adore thee for ever and ever

Sorrows gone and gone are the miseries

The moment you are held as gold

Pure nectar bristles in my mouth

When I utter your name Kannamma

In the fire of my soul you are the rising flame

You are my thought you are my mind aflame.

(Translation of Bharathi's song)

***

 
Srirangam V Mohanarangan

*

Poetry in a phrase !

Poetry in a phrase !

Poetry can happen even without words. If so, no wonder, poetry can happen even in only one word.

But nobody can doubt that poetry can happen in a phrase. Such phrasal poetic flashes are abundant in Sangam lore. One example we will see.

You are sitting in your garden house. It is calm, honeyed isolation. Surrounding trees chatter some age old jokes, which the wind recognizes.

The sheen of sprayed light, the skin of emergent twilight and the returning calls of the home-coming birds make the evening wine-dipped.

You fix your gaze on a branch. It is odd, the curves and the bends and the swirling botanical gustos. One parrot is sweetly repetitive. You wonder why. Perhaps to relieve you of the mystery, a squirrel sits in a lower branch, being tutored by the parrot for some uncertain future symphony. It is not there, the reasons, in the creatures' minds. But the poetry links it so. The parrot and the squirrel make an ideal tutor and the taught. What the parrot says, the squirrel tries to repeat in many unsuccessful attempts. It looks so in the poet's eyes. He expresses it in a phrase, so beautifully, in akanAnURu. 12

kiLi viLi payiRRum veLil Adu perunchinai

a parrot teaching a squirrel

the sequence of calls

on a wide branch of tree

(veLil - squirrel)

The scholars who have translated this line so far, including my friend Prof A Dakshinamurthy, have overlooked this poetry, which is there in the natural sequence of words. Instead they have gone around to draw meaning more congenial to the common sense as - the parrots mistakenly thinking the calls of the girls in the ranches as the calls of their own kind and the squirrels dancing - which goes too way afar to make the Sangam poet look so prosaic, whereas the line in its natural order evoke a terrible sense of poetry in a serene mood.

***

Srirangam V Mohanarangan

*

'El' dorado of Tamil

A rich man adorns himself with very many apparels. An able artist knows how to use the same material in so many ways.

A language should be rich and at the same time highly artistic. Only then such language can use various words for every distinct occasion and the same word in very many senses in different occasions. It is rare to see such languages in the linguistic spectrum of the world. Tamil is one such language, which is at the same time very rich in words and highly artistic in the use of them.

To illustrate this point I will take the word 'el' in Tamil.

This simple word of mono syllable carries about ten meanings. Is it believable? But it is so. And not only that - this same word carries diametrically opposite meanings also.

First we will take the meaning of 'el' - as 'light'. Kuruntokai 216 uses this word 'el' in this sense. - 'thodu aar el vaLai'

Again the same word 'el' also carries the meaning which is opposite in signification to 'light'. el = night. NaRRiNai 2 uses the word in this sense - ellitai neengum iLaiyon.

Again another shade - neither light nor night but evening when the twilight sets in. el - evening. KuRuntokai 275 uses the word in the sense of evening. - el Urc cErtarum ERutai inatthu.

Again the same word 'el' is also used to denote daytime. In AkanAnURu 266 'el' is used in the sense of daytime. - kaLLutaip peruncORRu el imizh anna

Again the same word 'el' also signifies the Sun. PuRanAnURu 157 uses it as - mImisai el padu pozhudin

'el is not only the Sun but also the sunlight or sunheat veyil. Pingalandai nigandu lists it as a synonym for 'veyil'

'el' has not still exhausted its meanings. 'el' can also mean the full day. naaL, which the nigandu lists.

All these are in one way understandable as signifying inter related things like light, day, sun, sunlight etc. But what to say, when the same word 'el' is used to denote the qualities like greatness or abundance.?

AkanAnURu 77 uses 'el in the sense of big, great, majestic - el vaLi alaikkum iruL kUr maalai

And Perunkathai 33 uses it as abundance - el oLip paavai

What is so awesome is the range of meanings both opposite in signification and falling beyond the major registry of meanings.

Such was the original Tamil, voracious in vocabulary and yet again adept in using the words.

Is it the 'el' dorado of Tamil ?

(my thanks to the dictionaries and anthologies)

***

Srirangam V Mohanarangan

*

On Poetry vs Music

Some thoughts on poetry vs music, which I shared back and forth in dialogues in googleplus:

Singing poetry is strangling the delicacy of poetry by the arrogance of music.

Poetry has its own music inbuilt which manifests in progressive coming back to it and understanding the poetry layers after layers. But when you set the music from outside, the words are forced to play a different role than for which they are intended in poetry, a role of danseuse to an external code and rhythm. Whereas in poetry the words blossom out petals by petals of their meaning levels. This unnatural and forceful appropriation of poetry to serve the logic and codes of music is what I call 'the arrogance of music'. In chanting also the inner world of poetic sensibility is sacrificed to the social formulas and codes of chanting and choir.

Roman Jakobson sees progressive freedom of expression from the stage of phonemes into words to the stage of words set in sentences. But in prose and ordinary functions of language like reporting and narrating, the words are constrained by the denotative function, even though the connotative writes into the sentences more and more spaces of freedom. But in poetic function the language becomes almost self-referential and in one stroke it has become the stage, the player and the performance, all in one. The compulsion of denotation is reduced to the minimum. Roman Jakobson maps this progressive liberation of language in his book, 'Fundamentals of Language'. While discussing the two-fold character of language in the second part, his following words are significant, which play resonance with the Dhvani concepts of Kavya Sastras.:

"Thus in the combination of linguistic units there is an ascending scale of freedom. In the combination of distinctive features into phonemes, the freedom of the individual speaker is zero; the code has already established all the possibilities which may be utilized in the given language. Freedom to combine phonemes into words is circumscribed, it is limited to the marginal situation of wordcoinage. In the forming of sentences out of words the speaker
is less constrained. And finally, in the combination of sentences into utterances, the action of compulsory syntactical rules ceases
and the freedom of any individual speaker to create novel contexts increases substantially, although again the numerous stereotyped
utterances are not to be overlooked."

*
 
I will like to take one example from Victor Hugo,  a line which I like very much - 'L'homme respire, mais l'artiste aspire'. L'homme is man. 'respire' belongs to biology. L'artiste again the name of man in one function. 'aspire' belongs to the field of values - aspiration. Here what function the biology word 'respire' is doing? Man respires. Is it reporting? What use? Yea man respires. What of that? But V Hugo uses the whole first part as a preamble and foregrounding for what he is going to say next, as 'pakaippulam' - contrast background. The whole unit Man respires serves to focus our attention on 'but the artist aspires'. Aspiration is as essential and sine qua non to the artist as respiration is to the man, biological. Where will you point the occurrence of poetry here? In which word? That is why we have to consider that poetry is maximum freedom context of language, which Dhvani says in its own way - Poetry happens after the words are exhausted.

***
Srirangam V Mohanarangan

*

On the idea of Pierre Bourdieu..

Pierre Bourdieu, a French sociologist, very aptly expresses one concept of field research experience, in his book 'Outline of a Theory of Practice'. When in 1989 or so, when I was conducting a group of my friends in a cultural understanding practice employing phenomenological constructs, through a couple of years, to temples like Srirangam, Thirupathi, Kancheepuram and Melkote, the idea I was beginning to have then, was very near to what is expressed here in this book by Pierre Bourdieu.

"The anthropologist's particular relation to the object of his study contains the makings of a theoretical distortion inasmuch as his situation as an observer, excluded from the real play of social activities by the fact that he has no place (except by choice or by way of a game) in the system observed and has no need to make a place for himself there, inclines him to a hermeneutic representation of practices, leading him to reduce all social relations to communicative relations and, more precisely, to decoding operations."

*

The author speaks of the necessity of the theory developed to be at variance in some aspects from the object studied. The accountability question does not arise. The research has to fulfill the accountability criteria. The point is even if participatory exercises are incorporated into the module, still the faith commitments or the lack of them, make a large difference in the presentation. And in the research methodology, it fails at the start if you uphold the faith positions.

*

Existence of bias - regarding a thought of Mr Alex Watson

Existence of bias in research may not be totally eradicable. But awareness of such bias and that too self-awareness by the scholar himself is an efficacious corrective and check to that bias. Real research rests on such self-disciplines. Here is an example, which when read emboldens one's reliance on true research and its functioning towards knowledge. Mr Alex Watson is one such scholar, whose opinions make one think and rethink about the matter. In his remarkable book translating with a commentary Bhatta Ramakantha' work 'naresvaraparikshaprakasa', which is again an elaboration on the work 'naresvarapariksha' of Sadyojyoti, Mr Alex Watson writes the following words. (Bhatta Ramakantha, an early Saiva Siddhantist belongs to the later part of 10th century CE): "The fact that, in western scholars' encounter with Buddhism over the last two centuries, Buddhist authors have been interpreted as Hegelian, Heideggerian, Wittgensteinian, Platonic, Stoic, transcendental idealist, phenomenologist, and as akin to Husserl, Russell or Whitehead, indicates that, instead of letting the texts speak for themselves, we have a tendency to superimpose on them perspectives with which we are more familiar. This raises worrying questions about our ability to recognize what is unfamiliar as unfamiliar."

To my mind it looks but natural and creative also to read authors across times and cultures in parallel lights and in inter-textual interpretative understanding. But sometimes the comparison may become a noise rather than an enhancing music of mutual meditations. Perhaps to avoid such noisy mishaps Mr Alex Watson intends his note of caution.

Then what is the way out ? How to do remedial research which avoids such quagmires? He himself suggests a valid approach of sticking to the words intelligently.

"If we want the classical Indian traditions to reveal themselves, not our own preconceptions, and the voices of their thinkers to come across louder than our voices, our most powerful tool is philology. While we can never completely eliminate our own subjectivity, we can, as philologists, attempt to set it aside to some extent by sticking closely to an observation of the texts themselves, and, when interpreting, allowing our analysis to be guided by concepts and ideas derived from the text itself or other texts of the same general period and tradition."

Persons, who aim to be better and more better scholars cannot afford to pass over these words in haste.

***

Observations and thoughts of Srirangam V Mohanarangan

Begun reading 'My Life and Quest' by Arthur Osborne, Sri Ramanasramam, 4th Ed., 2013. 

I like the book for the facile style of the author. He is able to pack very many mental depths into his constructions. Of course he is very lame, when he tries to compare and draw a uniform line through the religions semitic and Asian. 

From his writings one is able to understand much about the war years and the silent and ebullient quests of human beings across the globe. The sweat of the continents and the spiritual breeze of the East, are shown in realistic terms by the author. 

Gone half way. I will be back with it to you after finishing. But a very good purchase, that too in this scorching heat, such a cool and soothing reading! 

***

I am growing more critical about such concepts like 'culture', 'tradition', 'heritage'. Sometimes those look nonsense to me. Every human being is individualistic and what he understands and decides in her or his life is the only thing that matters. All other word buildings are so many machinations of deceit, transmitted by default across generations, at a heavy and unpardonable cost of human well-being. Awareness breaks such illusion-eggs. Ignorance and sympathy and anxiety of belonging to the groups hatch such eggs of havoc. 

***

Here is one quote from Bergen Evans -- 

"In the last analysis all tyranny rests on fraud, on getting someone to accept false assumptions, and any man who for one moment abandons or suspends the questioning spirit has for that moment betrayed humanity." 

***

Anything that appeals to our reason, let us accept, even if a child should say it. On the other hand, anything that is repugnant to reason, let us reject, even though it might come from Brahma. 

-- Do you know who said this ? இதைச் சொன்னவர் யார் என்று உங்களால் சொல்ல முடியுமா? 

***

The answer is -- Sri Ramana Maharishi. 

Ref: Sri Ramana Reminiscences, G V Subbaramayya, 4th Ed 2014, Sri Ramanasram 

***

I thought that the Buddhist position regarding the concepts of change and unsubstantiality are quite unassailable. But Swami Vivekananda has very brilliantly shown how Advaita reconciles the positions of Buddhism vis-a - vis Advaita, in his four lectures on the subject of Practical Vedantha. Very brilliant ! 

***

Reality is really how many? Or how many aspects of reality make the total reality? Or how many phases of reality coalesce to form the whole reality? Dr Sir Roger Penrose says three such realitys coalesce or at least relate among themselves to form the totality of reality. The Physical reality, the mental reality, the mathematical reality. Then what is that REALITY which houses all these three? 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9Q6SWcTA9w 

***

இளைஞர்களுக்கு புத்திமதி சொல்றது என்றால் இது மாதிரி இருக்கணும். அதை விட்டுட்டு -- 

Epicurus in a letter to Menoeceus -- 

"Let no one when young delay to study philosophy, nor when he is old grow weary of his study. For no one can come too early or too late to secure the health of his soul. And the man who says that the age for philosophy has either not yet come or has gone by is like the man who says that the age for happiness is not yet come to him, or has passed away." 

***

எபிக்யூரஸ் அருமையாகச் சொல்கிறார் மண்டையில் அடித்தால் போல் -- 

And the impious man is not he who denies the gods of the many, but he who attaches to the gods the beliefs of the many. 

ஸூப்பர்!

*

"I do not want to get material life, do not want the sense-life, but something higher." That is renunciation. Then, by the power of meditation, undo the mischief that has been done.

Swami Vivekananda 

ஆன்மிக வாழ்க்கை என்ன என்பதை இரண்டு வரிகளில் முடித்து விட்டார் விவேகாநந்தர். 

***

Custody of cow-girls !

Trying to translate Kaliyan is a good way of meditating on Thirumal.

Is not meditation itself a way of translating the human into the divine?

So shall we start working at his song Periya Thirumozhi 10.6.1

எங்கானும் ஈதொப்பதோர் மாயமுண்டே?

நரநாரணனாய் உலகத்து அறநூல்

சிங்காமை விரித்தவன் எம்பெருமான்

அதுவன்றியும் செஞ்சுடரும் நிலனும்

பொங்கார் கடலும் பொருப்பும் நெருப்பும்

நெருக்கிப் புகப் பொன் மிடறு அத்தனை போது

அங்காந்தவன் காண்மின் இன்று ஆய்ச்சியரால்

அளைவெண்ணெயுண்டு ஆப்புண்டிருந்தவனே!

Re assembling them according to Sandham

எங்கானு மீதொப்ப தோர்மாய முண்டே?

நரநா ரணனா யுலகத் தறநூல்

சிங்கா மைவிரித் தவனெம் பெருமா

னதுவன் றியும்செஞ் சுடரும் நிலனும்

பொங்கார் கடலும் பொருப்பும் நெருப்பும்

நெருக்கிப் புகப்பொன் மிடறத் தனைபோ

தங்காந் தவன்காண் மினின்றாய்ச் சியரால்

அளைவெ(ண்)ணெ யுண்டாப் புண்டிருந் தவனே.

Thirumangai Alwar expresses his wonder at Sri Krishna, comparing his present advent with his old acts.

This child is the self-same person, who came as Narayana and Nara and explained in full the Book of Piety.

To explain that book why should he come in two forms, Narayana and Nara?

To explain is not simply to give advices, to give upadesa. To explain means ultimately to do and show. Narayana gives advice, He gives upadesa. Nara does that and shows. Both are instructive and demonstrative. If both are not done then there becomes something missing from the Book of Piety, Vedas and more so Agamas. To explain fully missing nothing means to make known not only through words but also through deeds. Abstract idea and the concrete life.

So Alwar is wondering, this self-same child is the one who came in twin form, Preacher and the Practitioner. Then how docile he looks as if he does not know anything which he did in the times past!

Not only that it is verily He, who at the time of dissolution, in order to keep all the universe in His belly kept open big His mouth long enough for all the hills and dales, fire and earth and seas to go and get lodged in his stomach.

But what a wonder! it is this very child, who now is tied by these cow-girls as a punishment for stealing butter and caught in the very act of eating it.

What is the meaning of this! Such an ontological greatness! And again this puny domestic triviality, this sham act of butter stealing and bound in custody by the cow-girls!

Anywhere have you known

anything matching this

illusive wonder!

It is verily He

who came as Narayana and Nara

to explain the Book of Piety

missing nothing, through precept and practice.

Not only that, it is verily He,

who kept open His mouth

long enough to swallow all the worlds,

hills and dales, fire, oceans, sun and moon

earth and sky and everything.
 

Here and now, He is bound in chords

Of cow-girls,

kept in custody by these girls!

***

 

Kapil's advice !

In the heart of a living thing

consciousness has to awaken

before the cosmic divinity to respond

just like in a living soul

you dont call it life

even when it breathes and imagines

but only when the conscious soul

wakes up

so sifting the consciousnes

from the body mind and senses

meditating, devoting

one should be wise in knowing

that alone through renunciation.

(reading Kapilopadesa)

***

Happy Nammalvar!

There are ever so many canons and literatures and great books in the world. Every book will be so unique and will be catering to some aspects of the Man. But such books or canons which are substantially wholesome and satisfying the core aspirations of Man are few in number. I mean such books reading in which you need not be broad-minded towards them every now and then. The world over, I think such books are sparse and distanced in time and topos. One such canon, to my experience is Bhagavat Vishayam. It is universal in its vision and radical in its pervasion. You need not be born in any particular place, time or family, to become a subscriber to the world of Bhagavat Vishayam, a world of Tiruvaimozhi and its five commentaries and three notes. It is enough if you can closely read Tiruvaimozhi in full, in contents, intents and extense and become involved really with the text and lose yourselves in the exploration of its inner spaces. I find unique doors opening whenever I enter its portals. But I am not a subscriber to its faith. I am only a close reader and an avid delver into the meaning-depths. Once inside it is so self-sustaining and refreshing. I cannot but thank the great Tamil poet, Nammalvar, to have delivered it and Nathamuni and Ramanuja to have nursed it into such a big, lovable Baby. Shall I say Happy Nammalvar!.....

***

Plotinus and Drg Drisya Viveka

Many have heard of Drg Drsya Viveka of Sankara. - The philosophy of the perceiver and the perceived. In the cascade of the successive perceiver-perceived stratification, it follows that the perceiver in turn becomes the perceived by another perceiver, which yet again becomes the object of perception to another. The chain goes on and the Ultimate Perceiver remains unperceivable by any other. It is a fantastic concept I like in Sankara.

While reading something I came across a quote from Plotinus, which is wonderful and says exactly the Perceiver~Perceived theory of Sankara. And it is also current in the circles of Neo-Platonic philosophy, that Plotinus experienced more than once the state of ultimate mystic ecstasy, transcending his self-identity. Here is the quote;

"In this state of absorbed contemplation there is no longer question of holding an object in view; the vision is continuous so that seeing and seen are one; object and act of vision have become identical; of all that until then filled the eye no memory remains."

***
Srirangam V Mohanarangan

Observations of Srirangam V Mohanarangan 7

Sri Ramakrishna wrought many miracles. Not the miracles of matter but the miracles of comprehensive understanding and empathetic integration. He took the directness of feeling from the paths of faith and combined it with the broadness of engaging in diverse discourse of the philosophical scholarship. And he made the welded way not a front of debate but a market of engaging appreciation and involved conversation. His very deceptive simplicity in what he has done unprecedentally is very much intriguing. It takes a long meditation to break his simple codes. Vive la Kali!

***

(From the Observations of Srirangam V Mohanarangan) 

* 

Have you ever stopped and thought about 'what is pleasure? what is enjoyment? joy? happiness?' How pleasure and thought tie up? 

A very interesting discussion is here in this conversation between J Krishnamurthy and Mr Anderson.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OeOS5seSl_I 

*** 

My book in Tamil on Bhagavath Vishaya, viz., 'பகவத் விஷயத்தை எண்ணும் போது' is coming out in a short time. I have written this dedication page in that -- 

"யாரைக் கற்கும் போது 

எந்த விஷயம் புரிய வருகிறது என்பது 

அறிவின் தேட்டத்தில் விந்தையான கணம்தான். 

அறிவுகொளுத்துவோர்தாம் 

உண்மையில் ஆசிரியர்கள். 

அயின் ரேன்டைப் படிக்கும் போது 

அரிஸ்டாடில் புரிந்தது; 

அரிஸ்டாடிலில் ஆழும் போது 

விசிட்ட அத்வைத தர்சனம் புரிந்தது; 

எனவே யாருக்கு அர்ப்பணிப்பது? 

அந்த யவனாசிரியருக்கா? 

அல்லது அயினாசிரியைக்கா?" 

Translated it runs thus -- 

It is a strange moment to say, 

What subject we come to understand, 

When? Reading whom? 

Studying something seemingly different? 

Who makes us understand, 

They are the Masters, really; 

Reading Ayn Rand, 

I came to understand Aristotle; 

Delving into Aristotle, 

Visishtadvaita Darsana became clear; 

Then....to whom am I to dedicate? 

To the Master from Ionia? 

Or to the teacher Ayn? 

***

Nature's Religion

We like certain things. We are not able to like something else. We hate even some things. But all those things are existing in nature. Perhaps if they are wrong in some respects, by the very fact they are wrong they are put to task. Either they learn the lesson the hard or soft way or if they persist they pay the penalty or undergo punishment. But they are not hated by nature. For if they were, then even for a wink of an eye they could not have existed. But they are permitted by nature and allowed to face the game pro or anti. In the family, in the streets, in the town and everywhere we exclude some and include some. 

Religions gather as many persons as they exclude, all in varying degree. 'If you are this then you are ours,otherwise not ours.' Society tolerates certain people and terminates some. Various gods grace some and resent some. But all those discarded elements are still in existence. carrying on, in their own faulty ways towards self-defeat or correction. Nature shelters them and gives them full scope to face the game with no rules altered, in total contexts of gestalt. 

I think nature is a much more greater sage than any sage born, much more divine than any divinity incarnated, much more humane than any human institution instituted by human beings or customs. For none are excluded from the gambit of nature, even those condemned by the gods and the divines. 

Nature, she is the great teacher, patient with all, persistently teaching all, shaping all to the destination, she alone knows what. 

She, the Nature, is the greatest religion with no boundaries. She is the greatest prophet with a really universal message, constantly in revelation. 

Should I say she is Kali, may be she tolerates my naming as she tolerates many naming her in many ways in ignorance or dim visions. Why? I will just call her Nature as she is. Shall I salute her? How? For no rituals except the singular act of knowing and being right, is service proper in her wide open chapel of the universe. 

But she is, she is, she is.... just over there, here, everywhere, gathered all of us, good or naughty, friends, alien or foes among ourselves. To all she caters to all she gathers. Kali, Time, is it thy name? Shall I call you by that? No. why should I limit the limitless.? Who am I to put any stamp on you? You are your own self. Who can name thee? But please, sometime, when it pleases you, will you tell me your own name? I will keep it a secret, telling none, if that is part of the game. 

*** 

Srirangam V Mohanarangan 

The Observations of Srirangam V Mohanarangan 6

I find Swami Tapasyananda's translation of Srimad Bhagavatham, a treat in itself. It is not just a translation. He goes into the nuances of abstract very ably. His choice of words and expressing the subtleties in right measure of elaboration add an enhancing charm. It seems never an excess, I think. The memories of meeting him and talking to him many times during 80s and 90s make me nostalgic of the Chennai Math. What a sweet old man he was then!

***



Just now I am returning from Navarathri Puja in my friend's house. Beautiful lights, decorations, sweet smells, feminine charms, such warmth and affections, so tasty dishes - Wov! we make a Festival of Senses and through that create a mood of the Supersensual. After initial hi hi s, the mind begins to zoom into the bhakthi aspects. And slowly the mind begins to travel towards rarefied levels. Oh ! What a contrivance our forefathers have hit upon! Hats off!

***



The ultimate attainment is Advaita
Not knowing this,
should I suffer
More and more in mind,
being torpid
like the dull-heads
Swayed by the ghost of I ?
Oh Thee!
who are Pure
and the Total Whole,
Out and out against all blemishes,
Limitless,
Ever in the self-nature,
Never becoming alien
to the bliss and power
of the intrinsic Self-nature,
Thee!
who art the One,
flourishing
in the fructified Grace!

-- Tr by myself of Thayumanavar's song.

the original --

அத்வைதம் பெறும் பேறு
என்று அறியாமல்
யான் எனும் பேய் அகந்தையோடு
மத்தமதியினர் போல
மனம் கிடப்ப
இன்னமின்னம் வருந்துவேனோ?
சுத்தபரி பூரணமாய்,
நின்மலமாய்,
அகண்டிதமாய்ச்
சொரூபானந்தச் சக்திகள்
நீங் காதவணம் தன்மயமாய்,
அருள்பழுத்துத்
தழைத்த ஒன்றே!

***

ஸ்ரீரங்கம் வி மோகனரங்கன்

Do we ride him?

Do we ride him? Nay...we but draw him!

She loves him so much.

But the lovers seldom talk in the same parlance. When she so much feels endeared, he strays away somewhere in his thoughts, preoccupations or even for the sake of her necessities. But she feels piqued!

What this fellow...! He doesn't know my anguish. He seems to be cold and drifting..!

She talks in an oblique language. Yea most of the Sangam poetry is like that. Tangent hits but deft shots.

She just juxtaposes a real riding chariot with a toy chariot or thEr.

The poet calls it, the toy chariot as 'siru maa vaiyam'.

She taunts him saying, 'aray! baba...we are not lucky enough to ride in the chariot. But at least like children we are playing a chariot game, drawing the toy through back and forth in the halls of our house. What to do?

Like that, may be, some in this town, are lucky enough to ride this man. He also may bear their burden. But poor we! we just do little formalities of everyday affections and loving services, all very simple in his eyes.

The carpenter has made this toy chariot,
The boys can't ride in that.
So they make themselves happy
By drawing the car here and there.
Like that we are not lucky
To live full joint life.
But every now and then
we feel blessed
by doing small sevices
thinking that he likes them
But we feel happy at least
So we think
since the bangles are tight.
Oh don't you know him?
He of the town of public pond.

(Kuruntogai, Poet Thumbiser Keeranaar)

***

The Frost in a Kiss!

A Frost in a Kiss!

A honey-bee searched for long and at last found a golden chance. A flower brimming with honey.

Round and round it came. Zoned to the flower. Sending signals all sides and return signals show the coast is clear. Rest assured, it wooed the petals and lo! drank the nector. No end it seems, the stalk is full and flowing still!

But fate had its terrible sadistic strain. Just about at that time, a bit of frost rolled on to the bee. All its movements marred. And the lover of honey is barred from the acme of joy. There was a smear of derisive smile, called frost.

This imagery Sri Harsha Deva employs to elucidate the fate of unconsummate love.

In his Priyadarsika, there is a sloka :

sanjaata saandra makaranda rasaam kramena
paatum gataccha kalikaam kamalasya bhrunga:|
dagdhaa nipatya sahasaiva himena chaasau
vame vidhau na hi phalanti abhivaanchitani ||

Round and round a bee was rimming
The Lotus in blossom full
The juice was aplenty
The bee forgot itself in drinking the honey.
Marred by the fall of inopportune frost
Lo! stranded in the half drunk joy's misery.
When fate wills otherwise
desires fall short of just the fruit.

*

May be some lover was about to kiss and missed.
May be the tide repulsive.
The mood estranging.
The enchantment broken in the mid
Like a glass cup by the finger slip.

Sri Harsha Deva should have been a good lover. That means he should have missed a lot and not have missed to give a deep thought.

***

The Poet of 'Tuft of Light'

The Poet of 'Tuft of Light'.

Have you seen a search light in utter darkness?

All things are immersed in darkness. They are not visible. Their texture, color, dimensions and calibre, all these are shunt by the lack of light.

May be great forts, may be great castles, or penthouses, so what?
Darkness knows no discrimination.
It is light that discriminates between various aspects and things.

In that darkness a search light swings from one end to the other. The thing, may be a Fort, or a Castle in a row of houses, comes to light and all its details are sung out by the revealing light. The Castle glows in all its visible aspects.

But when the search light passes on to the next thing angling in, the fading out Castle loses itself into oblivion and lo! the new thing blooms into focus.

One poet has made use of this phenomenon of 'Tuft of Light' viz., search light to describe the effect of a beautiful damsel of a woman on various knights assembled in a suitors' hall.

The beauty is Indumathi. The poet is Kalidasa.

He calls it "Tuft of Light" Deepa Sikha.

He says Indumathi was like a Deepa Sikha passing on the rows of suitors, who were seated like Human Fortresses on high seated thrones. When she accompanied by her maid came by the seat of a suitor-king, the maid was coming out with all details of the king. In expectation and anguish, the King was all glaring in anxiety. But lo! when she passed on to the next suitor, this king lost all his shine and focus, to be usurped by the next one in turns. It was like a Deepa Sikha moving on in dead of night and thick of darkness, lighting one Fort at a time to be shunned back to darkness while passing on to the next object.

sancharini deepasikeva ratrau
yam yam vyatheeyaaya pathimvaraa saa |
narendra maargaatta iva prapedhe
vivarna bhaavam sa sa bhumipala:||

In the mid of night
moveth a tuft of light
Verily it was she
Along the suitors' line
whoever was she coming near
glowed like a human fortress
in all galore and greatness
alas! to sink in gloom
and oblivion as she passes on.

***
(I thank the friend who asked me this doubt - 'why Kalidasa is called Deepa Sikha Kalidas?)
*