Once i was a poet

July 2008

I used to be an avid reader at one point of time gorging upon anything I cud lay my hands on. I like poetry, short stories and novels, exactly in that order. I read novels but only upto ninth grade after which my attention span shortened as happens with any teenager. After all who had the time for 300 plus pages when u had the Biology book in hand with the reproductive system and the anatomy of girls explained, a chapter that I finished at the beginning of the academic year itself – at that age they were far more interesting. Besides u had outings with friends (read new found freedom) and to an extent serious stuff like academics and career (yeah, I was a good student upto tenth grade – its only later that somehow the seriousness died). But yes, short stories and poetry find a place in my heart to this day. My favorite short story is ‘Love across the salt desert’ by K.N. Daruwala. Incidentally it was a part of our English curriculum in senior high. It told the story of how a ‘Najaab’ brought ‘Faatima’ into his village crossing the Rann of Kutch in between. The day Faatima entered Najaab’s village, the rain swept away three years of drought.

Coming to poetry, there are two that are my all time favorites. ‘Upagupta’ by Rabindranath Tagore (the original Bengali one and not the English translation by Tagore himself) and ‘Buddha’s Death’ by Romesh Chander Dutt (a Bengali again).

‘Upagupta’ (click here for the original Bengali rendition) is a brilliant depiction of human emotions. In it, one of Buddha’s disciples Upagupta, while preaching in Mathura meets a very beautiful prostitute who tries to lure her. But Upagupta being the sacred man that he was replied that he will come to the whore some other day when she would need him more. The lady probably mocks Upagupta to let such an opportunity pass by. Decades pass. The prostitute is now old with gravity having taken a toll on her skin. She has nothing to offer now. Her youth has faded away and her entire body is polluted with disease and pestilence due to her past lifestyle for which she has been banished outside the walls of the city. Alone, old and in great suffering, the lady lies on the ground silently awaiting her death. There she meets an old man who takes her head in his lap and caresses her forehead. Astonished, the prostitute asks the man that who was the merciful one that still cared for a human being the whole world had discarded. The man replied, saying he had come to her as promised years ago as she now needed him more than ever. The old man comforts her till the prostitute dies in his lap to the best of what I can recall. Tagore wrote the original poem in Bengali as ‘Abhishar’. Later he translated it into English but it wasn't half as good as the original one. According to me Rabindranath was to poetry what Sarat Chandra was to literature. He is any day much better than Shakespeare (I really dunno why the world is ga-ga a about a man who stole his plays while working as a curtain puller in a theatre company in Avonshire).

My other favorite poem is ‘Buddha’s death’ by Romesh Chander Dutt. Again it was a part of high school curriculum. It was one of the poems in the book ‘Flights of Fantasy’ that we had to study for the boards (ICSE students will know better). It is a solemn tribute to the greatness of the Buddha. The storyline goes as such – The Buddha preached across lands in his young days along with his friend and disciple Ananda, his message of truth. In praise, all the heavens showered flowers and incense upon him, hailing the greatness of this man. But the Buddha tells his friend Ananda that he cannot be pleased by showers of sandal and heavenly praise, but rather, by the devotion and truth in people he preached. The Buddha didn't seek glory in such things.

Years pass and the Buddha is now old and weak and lying on his back waiting for death to come, with his friend Ananda by his side. The Buddha is now approached by a Brahman (man seeking wisdom in this context) who had come for a far off land to meet the Buddha and seek wisdom from him. Ananda stops him saying that the dying Buddha was not in a state to preach and hence the Brahman should return. Buddha overhears this and tells Ananda to let the man come, saying that the Buddha never returned anyone empty handed. And thus at the cost of inflicting pain on himself, the Buddha taught the truth to the man and passed away. The whole theme of the poem was like - Even in death, the Buddha had passed his test.

One of my paid jobs as a youngster before I formally took up employment happened soon after I had given my engineering entrance exams. There was a considerable gap between the exam and my first day in college. An earning opportunity presented itself during that time that not only gave me money sitting at home but also brought out something that I am somewhat proud to this day.

There was an old retired professor of Oriya who lived downstairs. After retirement, to keep himself engaged, he had taken up an assignment with the National Book Trust to translate selected pieces of Oriya literature to English. The man was learned and somehow we got to sit in the evenings discussing literature and trading whatever we knew of our domain. In the course of these evening discussions over tea, I learnt a lot about Oriya literature, mostly medieval, but of other periods too. Believe me, I never knew that Oriya literature actually had a beauty of its own. To cite a few examples I learnt about Bhima Bhoi and Bhanja Sahitya (literature written by Upendra Bhanja, an exponent of Oriya literature). Some of the stuff was a discovery in itself. For example a book by the name ‘Baidehi Bilaasa’ has its every word beginning with Ba (a syllable in the Oriya alphabet) including the title as one can see. Or for that matter there was a poetic novel where every line was a palindrome. I remember the opening line which was like – ‘Sari nahi kaala kaahin naarisa’ meaning my time is not up but where is the lady of my heart. This line is a palindrome in Oriya. I also read another piece where the lords namely Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva were praised. If u dropped the first letter of each line the praise goes to Brahma, the second to Vishnu and the third to Shiva. I also had some insight into the ‘Gita Govinda’ by Jaideva on which the entire Odissi dance is based. According to a recent and well proven stream of thought, Radha was not a living character but a mythical being who had been first written about in the ‘Gita Govinda’ which is basically the tale of the courtship of Krishna and Radha as reflected in Odissi dance.

On the other hand I told the old man about what I knew about English and to some extent Bengali literature and he seemed to relish it and from what I figured, quite impressed. One day, the old man said that he was contemplating of not taking translation assignments anymore as it was taking up quite a bit of his time and besides, he din need the money anyway. I used to be free in those days and thought if I cud try his job. I told the man so. He replied that I cud try translating a small piece as a trial to see where I stood. I did. I remember it was the translation of a brief 12^th century text written about the prevalent social, political and religious beliefs of that time mostly centered around 'Jagannatha' (the predominant deity in Orissa) and the devadasi system, by a ruler of the Ganga dynasty that ruled this place at that time. I remember handing it over to the old man with eyes full of expectation, more for the upcoming opportunity to make a fast buck than the praise for a good job that I thought I had done. The old man reviewed it for a day and in the end said I exceeded his expectations and I cud start earning. I dived into the job head and shoulders. The next few days kept me very busy. I used to work late nights too. Each day I encountered words written in archaic and poetic Oriya I had no clue about. Wherever I needed help with these words, the old man readily helped. The translations took me around a month after which I knew the end of the job was near as the entrance results were due soon. The old man liked my job and I can say to this day that some of the stuff in NBT is courtesy yours truly.

I din take up another assignment as I wasn’t sure if I cud complete it. But the turnout of the job was that my stock of words in poetic Oriya had increased to a substantial extent. It was then the thought suddenly occurred to me – Why not translate my favorite poem to Oriya! Incidentally Buddhism was more of an offshoot of Hinduism until Ashoka conquered Kalinga. It was from here that Buddhism spread all across the world and has today become a religion in itself with a following that far exceeds Hinduism.

Although it was exactly the opposite of what I had been doing all these days, I did it. It took me three days. I tell u what, translating a poem is much tougher than writing a poem urself. The biggest challenge was to keep the theme and the mood intact. I showed it to the old man who liked it and said I had done justice to the original one and jokingly said that I was encroaching upon his territory. The tragedy was that soon after I lost the school book which had the original English poem (my guess is that the folks at home sold it to the man who bought old newspapers for recycling). Days went by and I did try to recover the original poem but met with no success. Soon I forgot and moved on.

A few days earlier while cleaning up some of my old papers in my file, I suddenly came across the translation. It brought back some nostalgia at least. This time I decided to search the original one in earnest. I Googled the stuff and found it. I have reproduced both the original English poem and my Oriya translation below. For those who don’t understand Oriya, the English poem wont disappoint u believe me. And as for those who know, they obviously can enjoy the best of both worlds.

Buddha’s Death

Thus in many lands they wandered,
Buddha and his faithful friend,
Teaching truth to many nations,
Till his life approached its end.
And they say, along the pathway,
As the saintly Master went,
Fruit trees blossomed out of season
And a lovely fragrance lent!
And that flowers and sandal-powder
Gently fell on him from high,
And came strains of heavenly music
Gently wafted from the sky!

But the saintly master whispered
To his beloved and blest,
“ ’Tis not thus , O friend Ananda!
That the Buddha’s honored best.
Not by flowers or sandal-powder,
Not by music’s heavenly strain,
Is the soul’s true worship rendered,
Useless are these things and vain!
But the brother and the sister,
Man devout and woman holy,
Pure in life, in duty faithful,
They perform the worship truly!”

Night came on and saintly Buddha
Slept in suffering, sick and wan,
When a Brahman seeking wisdom,
Came to see the holy man.
Anxiously Ananda stopped him,
But spoke Buddha though in pain,
“He who comes to seek for wisdom
Shall not come to me in vain!”
And he to the pious stranger
Told the truth in language plain,
Taught the law with dying accents,
Stopped and never spoke again!

Romesh Chandra Dutt.
1848-1909

The translated text has a few words in Oriya which the average Oriya reader may not understand. So before reproducing the poem here are the meanings of a few Oriya words used in the poem:

Tathaagata – Another name of the Buddha
abirata - at peace with, content
mudrita - sleepy / dying eyes in this context
mahakaarunika - the most generous
bipra - brahman
pranipaata - salutation, surrender
abaruddha - abrupt ending

I had named the translation as ‘Buddha Debanka Mahaparikhya’ meaning ‘The Buddha’s Test’

Sisya gahane bohu sahachara saha, Goutam Tathaagata
Kete janapada bhrami bhrami abirata
Prachaarile se parama sata, Mahabaani ahinsara,
Upanita hela sese taanka bela, abasara ghenibara.
Sakale dekhile, prabhu Buddhanka gamanakaale,
Mannjarithila phula taruchaya, pathe pathe akaalare.
Barasila dhire chandana renu, patha hela surabhita,
Aakasu aasila bhaasi, sulalita sumadhura sangita.

Eha dekhi prabhu Buddha na hele trupta, bhaasile bachana dhire
Suna Ananda mara priya parijana, ye sabu nuhe sanmaana mara tile.
Phula chandana, madhu sangita taana,
Na haba ethire ma aatmaa upaasana.
Hrudaya jeuthi kalusha mukta,
Subha karma re jaa jukta
Sneha bhakatire sikta jeuthi mana,
Jathaarta puja seithi ma hue jaana.

Buddha jibane, abasesa dine, aasila grahana bela,
Hoile se khina byatha bichadita, tanu hela durbala.
Hele asakta gamanare, bisraamile tarutale,
Hoile sajyasahi,
Esamayare aasi upagata hele, Brahmana jane tahi.
Kahile sisye aasichi mu duru, gyaana aaharana aase,
Jibi Buddhanka paase.

Sisya prahara Ananda bhaasile, pherijaao tume ebe,
Prabhu Buddha ta asakta ati, gyaana kipari ba debe.
Mudrita nayane mahakaarunika, hoi gale bichalita,
Nele nispatti debe upadesa, jadiya thile pidita.
Kahile turate sisya priya Ananda ku paase thaari,
Aase je mo paase, gyaana abhilaase, byarthe na jiba pheri.

Aasile bipra Buddha samipe, karile se pranipaata,
Sumadhura sware, sarala bhasare, sunile dibya sata.
Ehapare krame, maha prabhunkara, swaasa hela abaruddha,
Mahaparikhya re hele uttirna se mahapurusa Buddha.

While the old man is no more today, thanks to the job he gave me, I did something that makes me somewhat proud to this day. Hope u liked the poems.