छिन्नमस्तिका

ध्यानम्

Millions of bards and stalwarts of prose,

Have previously tried to compose,

Their versions of this miraculous tale,

And some have succeeded where others fail

Among their number, O Father let me be,

Allow me Mother, to show what I can see.

This tale immortal of The Headless One,

I dedicate to my parents, to the Earth and the Sun.

श्मशानः

Our Mother, ruler of the nine-doored town,

Armed with a ladle and jewelled crown,

Protectress of life, mistress of time,

Fount of mercy and wisdom sublime.

Our Father who roams every realm,

Skull in hand and crescent on his helm,

Lord of the Endless, Himself the End,

His Grace, no one can comprehend.

Outside Her city, by nine gates bound,

Lies a terrifying charnel ground

'Tis the threshold between death and birth,

And play and illusion, sorrow and mirth.

Our wandering Father here finds repose,

And with our Mother on a deer-skin lies, 

Their passion creates, compassion preserves,

And their wrath dissolves all worldly ties.

रक्तपात्

 While They rested on Their bed,

Malice raised its ugly head,

Envy, sloth and empty pride,

Gnawed at Creation from inside.

Then giants and elves and creatures small,

Aesir, Vanir, Madyr all

Claimed Eminence and the spoils of war

And shook the nine realms to the core.

The Parents of the world couldn't bear

This sight of Creation in despair

Our Mother rose and drew Her sword

And cut off Her head of Her own accord.

The venom they spewed and the blood they shed

In their belligerence and hatred

Now flowed from Her neck as one stream

Her bodiless mouth opened in a scream.

And then the fount of Her blood divine,

She drunk as though as it were wine,

Her bellicose children stopped and stared,

For this sight had all of them scared.

दर्शनम्

Our Father who meanwhile lay unstirred,

Now opened His eyes and averred,

Behold young ones! Don't avert your eyes,

Contemplate Her sacrifice.

See how all wounds of foe or friend,

Equally doth Her heart rend,

No matter which among you wins,

All shall bleed if one of you sins.

You who clamour for Eminence,

Regard her and dispel your ignorance,

For the universe emanates from Her

And in Her alone will find its end.

Discard your envy, quell your greed,

Help your sibling in times of need,

Shed your lethargy, check your ire,

Lest you fall prey to your own desire.

Having quoth these words, He closed His eyes,

And Our Parents both dematerialized.

This tale of Götterdämmerung,

Was since that day forever sung.

Wangst

“Decadence hath many names,
And many of them I now answer to,
For when hoisted by my own petard,
Why blame should I the trickster world?”

This wasn't my idea of standing on my feet.
To be a lackey, who lacked servility.
To be the angry and reckless girl I am,
Rather than the sensible woman I thought I really was.

I am a cog in the wheel, a necessary one,
As I knew I would be one day,
But realized I perhaps too late
That necessity does not imply importance.

Another in my place would had more patience,
To either tolerate or quietly jump ship,
But alas! not I, I'm afraid to say,
Going quietly isn't really my forte.

So I take to Drama, and with much fanfare,
I proceed to undo all that I've done,
Forsooth I say, 'What is reputation!
If not the unfaithful shadow of true character?'

“It's not really all that much of a deal,
It was just a job that was well done,
By them, who made me hate myself
So much that just to spite the face,
I would very gladly cut off the nose.”

The Trite Tale of the Brooding Bloodsucker

GRAPHIC VERSION


4 fingernails, hard as diamond leave the bark of a tree scarred

MALICE BE MY ORNAMENT

Pan left to right on a ruined village with bleeding corpses on the streets

EVIL BE MINE PRIDE

Pan toe to head (in profile) of a silhouette of The Vampire Protagonist (our hero) – a tall young man on a wind-lashed slope overlooking that village

FASHIONED IN THY VERY IMAGE

He turns

I SHALL TURN THY TIDE

The moon rising over dark and creepy woods

THUS SCHOOLED IN THE SONGS OF THE WILD

A black and white photo in the flickering candle light – blood trickling down the top. Subject: our hero when he was still human, with his fiancée

I DROWN MEMORY AND NATURE

People screaming in terror, running helter-skelter, seeking refuge in churches (or temples). A very scared woman (a la The Scream) pointing towards someone

PEOPLE KNOW ME AS THE DEVIL’S CHILD

A clergyman (or a Hindu priest) declaiming from a pulpit (or the steps of a temple) addressing a huge crowd. Pan out to the church tower (or shikhar/gopuram)

AND I CONTEST NOT THEIR PRELATURE

A bunch of kids (they could be in college) around a bonfire – camera seeks out our hero, dressed in jacket and jeans – dark colours, sitting apart from the crowd – final frame has the bonfire on the right and the hero on the left

PERHAPS THAT’S WHY, FROM THE DEPTHS OF HELL

A gust of wind, hero pricks his nose and turns – cut to The Hapless Belle (our heroine) who’s walking in

WAS SENT MY WAY, THIS HAPLESS BELLE

Hero stands up and looks at her

HER VISAGE SWEET, FOR NO FAULT OF HERS

Cut to hero’s eyes wide with shock

BURNS INTO MINE EYES

Heroine stops in her tracks, having noticed the hero

SHE KNOWS NOT WHY, BUT STILL AVERS

She opens her mouth, apparently in greeting, but the hero turns on his heel

OF OUR LONG-FORGOTTEN TIES

Hero throws away a corpse he’s freshly drained

KNOW SHE CANNOT MY EVIL WAYS

Flashback: Hero’s fiancée, from the photograph, revealing her fangs and biting him

NOR OF MY BLOODY PAST

Hero watches heroine surreptitiously from the shadows…

BUT WITHOUT HER SCENT I AM SPENT

…and she suddenly feels his presence and looks around, at which point the hero flees to the woods at preternatural speed and stops at a tree trunk, where he thinks of her and collapses to the ground

AND WITH IT I CAN’T LAST

The hero’s thoughts: torn between the gorgeous fiancée of the past and the beauteous heroine of the present

RENDERED HELPLESS BY THE VAGARIES OF TIME

Hero breaks something (a mirror?) in frustration – splinter cuts his hand – cut heals instantaneously

INURED TO THE STRENGTH OF THE AGES

Hero collapses to the ground screaming, looking towards the heaven

I AM CRUSHED AND ROBBED OF REASON AND RHYME

Hero on the forest floor, lying like the dead, the dilemma still looming

AND LEFT, A CARRION OF IMAGES

Heroine with a lantern, separating from a search party, makes her way to the very spot where the hero is lying prostrate

MEANWHILE SHE MAKES, UNINFORMED, HER AMOROUS ADVANCES

She stops when she reaches him and bends down (to take his pulse?) – he opens his eyes and slowly sits up, unable to move away or to take his eyes off her

UNSLAKED THAT I AM, I CAN’T HELP MYSELF, AND I RETURN HER GLANCES

Cut to a dark alley scene, heroine walking alone, street gang at her heels – she starts running

THUS DOOMED IN LOVE, THIS WAY OR THAT

Hero jumps out of nowhere, heroine walks into him – he steadies her and faces the bad guys

I ALLOW MYSELF THIS PLEASURE

Fistfight; hero throws the last goon bodily out of the frame

I THROW THE FUTURE TO THE WINDS

The couple embrace, the fiancée comes out of nowhere and looms at the corner of the frame, glowering at the scene

AND THE HERE AND NOW I TREASURE

ENDSCREEN: “THE BEGINNING?”

Mid-term Anthology

My encounters with verse this term were mostly of the order of doggerel. Here’s a few worth display. Written in the last few minutes before I left for home last term...

Thanatos

Water in my cupped hands
Trickles swiftly by,
I sit by myself waiting
For my time to die.

Last term it was HRP, this term, SRM. And so the cycle continued...

Amen

Adder's bladder, eagle's eye,
Roofie tainted apple pie,
The merciful YHWH hath looked my way,
Now my days go happily by.

Also written in the same class, but expressing dismay over PRD (tools), BFM (terror), Marketing (Ronin) and STM (games), was this.

Alas!

Tools of terror, Ronin's games,
Sissy knights & brazen dames,
The poetess me is made undead,
By this topsy-turvy chivalry.

I was sitting next to Mausami, hoping to keep her amused with these verses, when I happened to look back and found that the interest of even the twin rubies was ebbing away.

But who?

Sparkling water loses shine,
And muffles his gay song.
The season I try to keep amused,
But I can’t hold on long.

Another day, another uninteresting lecture, I wrote my notes on a brand new notepad. The title for this poem stems from the fact that I found an interpretation for this poem (3 actually) after I wrote it.

Hermeneutics

Colours on a tinted paper,
Rarely appear true,
But lack of paleness scarce affects,
The richness of their hue.

Same lecture, different theme - the सुभाषितानि

Maxims

The darkness of ignorance,
Doth many fancies make,
A halter thus innocuous,
Appears as a snake.

Fear inspires reverence,
Reverence desire,
All hope of seeing light,
Is extinguished by such fire.

In striking similarity to my HRP course, I found myself unaccompanied by my trusty file in many an SRM class, the first time due to the fact that I’d just returned from the Visarjan of the Goddess. Fortunately, every time this has happened, I have managed to make a fair and duly embellished copy of the notes. The yields:

Full Moon

I first glimpsed my true love,
Alas on such a fateful day,
Although my shafts had hit him true,
They’d wounded him the wrong way.

The Refuge

Every once in a while, comes a time,
The most prosaic must resort to rhyme,
When the mind cares not for the mores of the gross,
And the soul is lost in depths sublime.

For the uninitiated, in Greek Mythology, Hypnos (sleep) and Thanatos (death) are twins.

Hypnos

O Somnus Deo, Lord of rest,
Don't you put my powers to test,
For how may anyone well-disposed,
Refuse thy charms and make protest?

In an inanely trite STM guest lecture on entrepreneurship, it hit me harder than before, that I wrote just to keep the cogs in my head running...

Quality

I'm bored and sleepy,
I really need to leave,
I can't help but writing,
In such quality.

My prose is dying,
My verse doggerel,
And yet I can't stop writing,
Such dense drivel.

My eyes are drooping,
My hand is disarrayed,
But I've got to keep writing,
Or I'll be dismayed.

Another lecture, different passions, different meters...

Poverty

Heartstrings ache & gizzard growls,
At the sight of pleasure, scowls,
How may I faultless my soul placate,
And reconcile to my poverty.

Jealousy

When the scorching hype,
Burns not the actor so lit,
Shadows cross my life.

And one fine day, I was suddenly the most sought after person. It was RAJAXI night, and I found myself without pen or paper or Bare Act in a Law presentation class. So I borrowed some, and decided to keep myself engaged. Four doggerel verses later, something sensible came out. The first and last one describes peoples' various attempts at creativity, and the reactions that some of them face.

Classroom Battles

Beautiful minds fill the rows
flanked by comrades.
Armed by notions several
they fight for grades.

Attempt at Sense

Ennui pushes my pen
Inanity flows as ink
Such is the sorry result
When I write before I think

The Law of Pleadings

So if you got a valid point,
Don't you bogey that joint,
For the law of pleading is misleading,
And will all your pleas ignore.

Cows with Guns

Towering folks short on guts
Face cow-dung
Big promises and bigger buts
Will be hung

After that I swore to end my romance with doggerel. This means that I rarely give in to my urge to write nowadays. But then promises like that don’t last long. Here’s one describing a friend’s SRM ppt.

Measures

Water minus fluidity,
Chills me to my funny bones.
I bare my teeth in mirth,
To conceal my slaked thirst.

Sometimes the sight of ointment (salve) can bring you pain. It happened to me, making me write this...

Paucity

The sight of alien salve
Opens sore wounds.
Yet even lowly salt
Remains to them elusive.

All in all, life's been good. Winter has given up the stage to summer, with spring visible only in the deciduousity of the deodar trees. I've given in to the dangerous habit of extreme sleepiness, while ensuring that no one, not even me, can blame yours truly for lack of diligence and enterprise. As the countdown to the end of this term starts, I wish all my companions (willing or no) in the journey of life, as much self-awareness, as they can tolerate.

A VERSatile Term

It all began with the SIP. Was the process as random as it was touted to be? I pondered about it. Finally, I came to the conclusion that...for all that I can say or do, I’ll get what life drifts my way. But in spite of that I’ve a boat to float, and distant lands to explore...

The Drift

A boat to float, an axe to grind,

Some taken, some left behind,
For all that I can do or say,
I’ll only get what comes my way,
Both truths I have to reconcile,
And not get stuck in life’s turnstile

One fine HRP class, the day we were taught the R & S plan; my attention flickered for the first time with dangerous intensity... Soon I was dreaming of Vikram Seth’s Frog... Neither stones nor prayers nor sticks, Insults or complaints or bricks...

Dwarfed by the Drivel

Drips, feathers, and thumbscrew leathers,

Putrid words and two-pronged swords,
And all the things that get the soul to shrivel,
Are all outdone, they’re dwarfed by the drivel.

The next class... Induction & placement... I was suddenly reminded of Prof. Prithviraj H. Soni...

Faulty Faucet

Filled frustum with a faulty faucet,

Lynches lustre from a lucky locket,
Pious plea from the profoundest pocket,
Requests release from this reeking racket.

The same class, different rhythm... Nitwit, blubber, oddment, tweak... In response to the gassy ppt.

Global Action Strategy

Idle thoughts will leave no trace,

Little substance, too much space,
What head or heart or soul divine,
Can tolerate such gimmickry?

The Equivocator

Kiss the snake and smooch the frog,

Feed the swine and slay the hog,
Put even Janus to such shame,
That he resorts to heresy.

The aforementioned person’s  response to mid-term feedback...

Payback

Six score people and three more,

Take the cue and fuel uproar,
Poor old dusty rusty James,
Dances merrily on the flames.

Then I woke up after the ad hoc fast I observed in honour of the completion of PMIR batch placements; I felt weak (a hitherto unobserved occurrence in my experiences with fasting), so I had needed a nap. The next day I missed my beloved repository of poetry and assorted class notes (a really handy notepad along with a notepad and pen holder). I searched high, I searched low... alas! It was gone...

Grief

Syllables weep and letters cry,

Words fall dumb and ideas die,
Grief for those who are now long gone,
Puts those expected on standby.

They died not from the cold without, but from the cold within... And so I pondered about the true source of my hatred and suffering...

The Cold Within

Hated icons sting the eye,

Torture eardrums, neurons fry,
But seeking source, I come to find,
Not the cold without, but the heat behind.

Mad at the loss of my random limerick rhymes, I clutched at their fast disappearing remnants...

Water In My Cupped Hands

Rhythms of my past ruminations,

Echoes and odd emanations,
Balderdashy exclamations,
Lost to my lamentations.

Succession Plan... I drifted to the fall of the Angel Castiel. But the poem was completed in the first AFM guest lecture.

Vagus

Decadent lanes in cities plagued,

More from devices than vices base,
The entrails, limbs and life blood suffer,
From the tortuous traitorous train of thoughts.

These three directly followed Vagus, on the same occasion.

Blind faith

Rosy hues turn into the colours of gore,
Veils vanish between the morrow and yore,
When doubtful fire melts not the wax of sin,
The wick burns out; there is darkness galore

TAXI

Take a look beyond the veil,
Where voices die & letters fail,
What mortal heart not made of stone,
Can be so averse to verity?

Unheard Tales

Floating leaves on a silent stream,

Pass their lives in equal silence,
The world cares not for their silent scream,
But turns away in deafening silence.

The day that culminated in SIP wetnite... A highly productive and successful day... Another trio

Brainless Rapture

Amos wounded by his own shaft,

Had set his eyes on Psyche,
So when we began the HRP draft,
We traded brains with a monkey.

An ode to my dear friend Aditya Gupta...

The sage Kashyapa had two wives,

Diti & Aditi – with two lives,
One brought forth demons, the other gods,
One ate snails, the other gastropods.

সিয়ার 

জাতে মাতাল তালে ঠিক,

যে না ভজে তারে ধিক, 

পিতা সম পালে প্রজা,

নিয়ত কিন্তু নহে সজা

And then I wrote a few verses of purely academic nature, till one day the “poetic attack” grinded to a halt...

Claviceps purpurea

Rocking candies, fluffy clouds,

Seeing music, tasting shrouds,
Whatever infected my sweet prose,
Feasted also on my poetry.

Saddened by the demise of my VERSatility, I sat next to Ruchika, out in the open, after the Law exam, to pen down my least favourite pieces...

For Amrit, the Sworn Enemy of Verse

My friend Amrit, he hates a rhyme,

And I worship all verse sublime,
To make him mad, and ruin his day,
I sent these five lines his way:

“Each word that makes a verse,
Each beat that makes a rhythm,
Every crystal that is not amorphous,
Is an illusion of order
In a universe destined to chaos.”

Ode to Lucifer and the First Born

When Lilith raised her lone head,

And did not to her equal succumb,
She left us both wiser and dead,
And left Utopia to the dumb.

Because it is in hunger that we seek the truth,
It is in bareness that we weave its semblance,
It is in the depths that we are cleansed the most,
And it is the bringer of light who keeps us from eternal darkness.

As an afterthought, I wrote an alternative, rhyming version of the second stanza, which reads like this:

Because only the hungry can succour find,
Only the wounded can heal their kind,
Only the depths can truly scour,
And the bringer of light keep us from the dooming hour.

Since I’d just written a law exam, I asked myself if crime paid or not. I decided that it did.

Scot free

Eaten sugar, told lies,

Given very bad advice,
Done every offence in the book,
Look dad! I’m still off the hook!

And then I thought of free will, and the debate on its existence...

The Marionettes

One by tail, the other by horn,

Sowed the kernel, reaped the corn,
Reduced all creation to finger puppets,
Alas! Found to oneself strings attached.

Epilogue: The lost notepad was found (this post wouldn’t have been possible otherwise), and I await my last exam, expecting a last spark of such productivity. All words fail to express my love and gratitude towards my friends (and to those who have unknowingly or unwillingly benefitted me), for making this term so awesome.

PS: When in doubt, remember G for God, G for Google

Me, in verse

What I do, wherefore and why,

I know not and the days go by,

Here that I am, whence did I come,

Where will I go, these are just some,

Queries that I have, and forsooth,

I won't flinch in the face of the truth.

When it's play, it's just that, a game,

But done for a living, it's not the same,

By the time I knew, my days were spent,

Upon my resolve, I had to repent,

Disgraced by the Monarch, and out of spite,

I left Sangraal for the Jesuits' light.

My hand, my pride, the place I reside,

I am within and beauty outside,

What I see, I get the same,

If I lose it, I am to blame,

Strange bedfellows, my mind and me,

An empty manger, not a place to be.

XL Suuktani

I wrote these shlokas in the Crederity PPT. I'd be happy to know if anyone could translate them before I post their meanings. I'll add more shlokas and their translations soon. (Plz excuse the lack of halantas, and Kudos to the Google people for developing such an awesome transliterating interface)
आकर्ण्य यस्य सुस्वरं, द्रष्ट्वा यस्य वदनं |
त्रिश्णाम नाशयते येन, तस्मै सद्बांधावे नमः ||


कोमलं हृदयं यस्य, शोकनिवारने रुचिः |
मतिमान बलवन्तश्च, तस्मै वल्लभाय नमः ||