season of closures 1

It is the season of closures now. The days are rushing towards the culminating last week of the year. In this part of the world, stars, in different shapes and hues, emerge from nowhere. A passing glance will get stuck at the decorated Christmas tree beside the couch. Newspapers are seeking the 'top' 10/20/30 ... stories to be assimilated together for the special world-this-year edition. The individual is re-opening the Pandora's box of long-shelved ideas and commitments. Resolutions for the new year are diligently being formulated in personal journals. It is as if, on the last day of the year, time will re-start from the beginning. Without a before, without an after; in medias res. 

As the liberal snowflakes settle on the nose, the eyelashes and the cap tops, another part of the world lives in memories. 

(to be contd.)

A view from last winter

On such seasons when the leafless branches allow for the lucid view of the horizon, all that you can see is the sky. A little ball of fire, thrown from behind the mason's monsters, climbing the cloud-creepers, invading the silence of the white lands, until it has pierced your soul. 

Image: pencil and pastel on paper, by self, a view of the morning sun in snow clad Budapest, painted on 17.12.2009.

rumbling crumbling

Temper flew like a free-spirited Superman. It simply had a mind of its own. Or, so I thought.

My father, till date, has given me a single advice - be patient. For me, however, to be patient was to be silent, and silence seemed to imply weakness. It seemed logical that being patient was to be vulnerable. Patience seemed to mean acceptance, and hence a way of permitting the causes of agitation and disturbances to continue approaching the self. Temper was a shield. A cocoon to save the self from the blows.  

Then, Professordadu (dadu means grandfather, in Bengali) said something about it. He said, if,anger empowers to create something constructive, then it is of use. Or else, it is best to dump it. 

THUD. 

Around the same time, I came across the poetry of William Blake. I got introduced to a strange concoction of poems which used simple language, as if that of children's poetry. That was my first experience with Blake's Songs of Innocence and of Experience.

front cover of that book, hand-painted by Blake @WEB

Blake had created the two sets of poems - The Songs of Innocence and The Songs of Experience - where, each poem in the first book has a mirror poem in the next. For, example, while a poem titled "The Lamb"

was part of the first book; its mirror poem in the second book was titled "The Tyger". The meekness of the lamb and the ferocity of the tiger are instances of the two "contrary states" that Blake wanted to express. In between preparing essays on 'how' the selected poems in the curriculum expressed "the two contrary states of the human soul" (the words are written above the two human figures in the given picture; "shewing" means showing), I was intrigued by the thought: are things truely so mirror-like in life? Does patience really imply weakness? Does being patient means the absence of anger? Do we really have no choice but to be either

The Lamb by William Blake @ WEB

Or,

The Tyger by William Blake @ WEB

  ????????

TO BE CONTD.

Puja Chronicles: the memory and the questions blend ...

Be it Deepabali/Diwali or, Halloween, the fearful and the dreadful are not kept at a distance. Each is a celebration of the duality of existence - of light and of darkness. The legends behind each is varied. The legends associated with Diwali include the mythical return of Rama to his kingdom after a period of 14 years; the mythical slaying of the demon Narakasura by Krishna (an incarnation of Vishnu); the return of Bali (the demon-god slayed by another incarnation of Vishnu- Vamana) from the nether-world, to dispel ignorance; the celebration of goddess Lakshmi and that of goddess Kali. Each of the myths involves the victory of good over evil, light being the symbol of wisdom, knowledge, wealth and goodness. 

Of all the rituals that I have seen, I feel intrigued by three specific rituals. 

The first is the act of praying to the goddess Alakshmi (see the post regarding this here). 

The second is the the lighting of the 14 lamps on the eve of Deepabali, which is said to be a custom that started when lamps were lit as the mythical Rama returned to his kingdom after 14 years. I didn't know of this myth for a long time and created a significance of it in my mind. I believed (and continue to do so) that the 14 lamps lit somehow signify the 14 generations of ancestors who preceded me. I had no idea of myths involving Halloween celebrations then. In the presence of the pumpkin being 'Halloweenified' by K_ and A_, I thought of looking up the legend behind the celebrations.

I was in for a surprise when I realised that the legend of remembering the ancestors, that I had thought of as the explanation of the 14 lamps-lighting ceremony as a child, is eerily linked to the beginning of the custom of Halloween celebrations! Traced backed to the Celtic custom of celebrating Samhain, Halloween has its origins in the belief that on this day of the year, the border between this world and the Otherworld becomes thin allowing the passage of spirits into the human world. The spirits that could harm were repelled by carving out hollowed faces in turnips (pumpkin was adopted at a later stage for the same function) and placing them at the entrance of the house/ at windows; and, by wearing costumes that were repelling. The lamp placed within the hollowed turnip/pumpkin is symbolic of the souls in purgatory. 

It left me perplexed and humbled to feel that the Alakshmi, the 14 lamps and the carved face on the pumpkin on Halloween are connected by this inherent idea that the positive and the negative co-exist simultaneously. Life is not a shade of black and white. When the prayer to Alakshmi is offered, the act is that of humble request to the 'goddess of misfortune' to leave. When the Halloween pumpkin is lit with a candle, it is not to ward off the spirits of one's ancestors. Goodness and evil, darkness and light, hope and frustration (and all the antithetical ideas that can occur in your mind) co-exist in a strange sense of simultaneity. 

The idea of simultaneity is also evoked in the act of worshipping goddess Kali, which is the third ritual that intrigues me during this festive days. Kali has a terrifying form. The mythology of Kali is beyond the scope of the blog. You could have a look at  the wikipedia article on Kali. To an individual who does not understand the complex symbolism, Kali appears to me to be the confluence of all the oppositional ideas. When in the battlefield, the mother goddess, in the form of Kali is fierce. Her form can repel an individual. All that the mind tutors to believe as bad and ugly is present in her form. In popular iconography of Kali, she is naked; her tongue hanging out as she steps on her husband, Siva; she wears a garland of severed heads; and carries in her two hands a sword like weapon called kharga, a severed head while the other two are in the abhaya mudra (a gesture bestowing fearlessness) and varada mudra (a gesture bestowing blessings). She is usually depicted as dark skinned. The apparent opposites blend in this iconography. The violence of expression cohabits with the benevolence of bestowing blessings. 

It is possibly this simultaneity of the opposing forces/worlds that makes Little Miss Muffet of the household so excited to celebrate Halloween. In her innocence, she does not find the difference between what the adult world would designate as 'good' and 'evil'. Perhaps, this is the wisdom, that, inclusivity is more potent than exclusivity; maybe,this is the 'light' that dispels the 'darkness' of prejudice.

As the season of Halloween and Diwali passes this year, this humble blogger continues her journey towards that light ... an apprentice journeying to realise the celebration of that 'sound' which was 'noise' before....

 (Concluded)

Image: candles lit at the Esztergom Cathedral in Esztergom, Hungary @ self.

Puja Chronicles: questions in the mind ...

There is a strange custom among some Hindu households that perform the worship of goddess Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, on the day of the festival of lights. Before prayers are offered to Lakshmi, an idol made from mud, accompanied by the urine of a cow are taken outside the entrance of the household. Prayers are offered to this strange goddess, goddess Alakshmi and is requested to leave the household. Children of the household, beat bamboo sticks on kulo (an instrument used in villages for husking paddy/rice)¹ with all their might so that the bamboo sticks are broken. They sing a couplet in a completely out-of-tune format :

alakshmi biday hou / ghorer lakshmi ghore eso 

alakshmi go away / lakshmi of the household please return.

- a prayer in earnest by the adults, sung by innocents.

I was always intrigued by this phenomenon. Why do the rituals demand a prayer to the one who is unwelcome, a prayer to the one who is associated with filth and misery, a prayer to the one of misfortune? Deification of the negative forces is not uncommon in Hindu mythology. But why pray to it, before the prayer to the goddess of wealth and prosperity is performed? 

*****

Halloween has always seemed ominous to a child, feeding on Hollywood interpretations of it. This year as K_ marked out the eyes, the nose and the mouth on the pumpkin, I looked on and thought, why the pumpkin is made to look dreadful on Halloween? (Either way, it is dreadful for all those who dislike its appearance on dinner tables in different culinary versions) Or, to cave in the question - why is Halloween thought to be dreadful at all? Why do kids dress up (and yes, some adults dress up too) in something sinister and hop around the neighbourhood asking for 'Trick or treat!' ? Why celebrate something that evokes fear in the minds? Why is the Little Miss Muffet of the household so excited to see A_ carving out the pumpkin so that it gains that fearful dimension? 

Halloween at home

1 'kulo' is defined as "winnowing fan; a bamboo winnowing fan; a multipurpose household implement; a  

    sacred adjunct to almost all folk rituals and ceremonies in Bengal" in 

    the The Quilts of India.. Nov. 5 2010.

To be contd.

Puja Chronicles contd. A Bisarjan on Dashami

Pre-script - definition of Bisarjan according to Samsad Bengali-English dictionary is "immersion of the image of a deity"

 

Every year the idol is carried down the broken stairs with inappropriately dazzling neon lights pouncing down them. There is a crowd of faces that can't decide whether they should express the grief at the end of the carnival or the chilling fear of losing someone. The idol of the mother goddess in the avatar of Jagaddhatri ,meaning the One who bears the world (a festival similar to Durga Puja, most grandiosely celebrated in  Chandannagore, a town near Kolkata) has been the centre of all the joy and laughter for the past few days. She is the reason we got to meet our friends and family, whom we haven't met for over a year. The end of the festivities means an empty dalan (a broad space within the house), with a singular lamp lighted in front of the empty dais on which the idol was placed. The end of festivities means a strange emptiness amidst the pedestrian duties in the household. The end of festivities means the chilling knowledge that the one who will be holding the idol from behind, just before the idol is given bhasan (immersion of the idol in a water body),  is most dangerously placed.

*****

The idols are usually given bhasan with their faces looking skywards. They are not slumped into the water face down. The individual standing behind the idol can't be seen by the other fellow bearers of the idol. There is a dangerous possibility that the idol will fall on him, resulting in his drowning.

*****

The laughter of the last few days, or, even of the last few moments - when everyone was travelling in a hood-less vehicle with the idol from home to the ghats (stairway leading to the river), sounds of the voices singing and of the conch-shells, interspersed with the occasional frenzied cries of "Aschhe bochor abar hobe!" (We will have this fun again in the next year!) - now transforms into panic-stricken shouts rising above the beats of the dhak (a drum-like instrument used during the pujas in India). They are cautioning the individuals carrying the idol - 'Watch out that step! It's broken!' ; 'Don't stand behind the idol directly!'; 'Be careful!' All such panicky cries would be subsided by a few calm voices. One of them was his. 'Don't worry, I am there.'

*****

Dashami is the last day of celebration held in honour of any of the deities in Hindu mythology. The immersion of the deity is accompanied by the distribution and exchange of sweets. Why would one think of celebrating the end of a festival? Why would one have sweets after immersing the deity into the oblivion of the water world? Possibly because the act of bhasan means the continuing cycle of creation, procreation and destruction. Like the trinity espoused by hindu myths - Brahma (the Creator god),  Vishnu (the Protector god) and Maheshwar or Shiva (the Destroyer god). The bisarjan (i would translate this not merely as immersion, but as 'bidding adieu') is also a part of the festival; just as death is a part of life. Whether we want it or not, humans will be born and they will die. All that remains is the essence of the life that an individual leaves behind. 

*****

Dashami of the Debipokkho had always been a little saddening. It meant the end of no-studies schedules while I was a student. It meant that all the gorgeous dresses will now be packed away. It meant that all the freedom of living off the street food is lost. It meant the end of incessant parties and doing nothing all day long. This year too, Dashami has saddened my heart and my soul. The voice that said 'Don't worry' has received bisarjan from all its worldly noise. Long after his song has ceased, souls like mine, which heard and saw him weave those brilliant patterns in life, will echo his songs. Who he is you may not know. But what he is,  you will fathom if you think about an individual who inspires you, whom you love, who makes you smile and who encourages creation in any form. Imagine an artist you love. You will know. Imagine an individual you love. And you will know. 

RIP C_K_.

Image Courtesy © Subhaneil Chakrabarty

     

Puja Chronicles contd. : A film and a poem blend with the deity

How can I explain the rhapsody of thoughts generated by El ángel exterminador (The Exterminating Angel) by Luis Buñuel that I watched yesterday night? Logically, the discussion and/or my thoughts on the film should be filed under a less frequented blog that I had ceremoniously created especially for some of my other passions : http://passions-of-a-pligrim.blogspot.com/. But, I feel, this film has a strong connection to my present condition.

No, I have not achieved angelhood and I do not face extermination or act as a similar agency :) It is simply the fact that I am, like hundreds and thousands of other Bengalis, missing the fervour of the Durga Puja back in my hometown.

I felt miserable till the Mahalaya (the last day of the fortnight preceding the Debipokkho). Ever since that day, I have chosen to be pro-active in managing my missing-the-puja-blues (the why and the how of this radical shift is another story altogether). To come back to the film, and the idea behind the idea to have a scribble about it here, I realised today (I had a faint feeling yesterday of this upcoming realisation) that the film profoundly is about the necessity to be pro-active in life. And, that realisation crystallised in the mind as I was reading Yasmeen's beautifully powerful poem - Take a stand  (click on the link to read). Her words kept throwing me back to different scenes in the movie :

...

you can't change what happened
but you can choose what you see
so step out to your balcony
breathe...and hurl the skipping record
into cheering rush hour (I will be there)
close the past, open the loop
create the space     

...

life has no meaning
but what we assign
made real in time and space

... 

And, it is then that I realised what I heard the film say to me.

The celebration of the warrior form of the mother goddess shows her annihilating a demon. Her eyes are simultaneously fierce and calm and they look straight into you (if the deity is sculpted in the traditional form):

Photo copyright: Abhiks in Flicker

(If however, the deity is sculpted in the artistic style, you will see her eyes angled variously.) This reminds me of the concluding section of Michael Ondaatje's Anil's Ghost where the master painter is painting the eyes of the Buddha. He feels a strange penetrating glance...

Maybe it is all in the mind...

Actually, it is.

The mind has the power to create and to annihilate. Whether we choose to crib over spilled milk or take a mop to rub it and go on with normal activities, it always has to do with us, and no one else. It is easy to point fingers at others/ other things and find an explanation of the same. It is easy to completely abandon will power of the self to the will of the unexplainable deities and things. I do not intend to argue for or against the existence of the divine being here, but, is it not a saying that god helps them who help themselves? 

We are social beings and each of us have a unique set of beliefs. But the primary belief and faith that we need to have is on the possibilities that lie deep in us. The prayer to the mother goddess, uttered during the course of the festival of Durga Puja, is, in reality, an invocation to that self in us which hides in the guise of obligations, necessities, social customs and other such authoritative needs. The demons will always be there- within and without- but we have to be pro-active in slaying them. That is possibly the path of advancement. That is possibly the path to divinity. Slay ignorance with wisdom. Slay slavish dependence on others with self-empowerment. Slay fear with the courage to walk through it. In the eve of Mahasaptami (the seventh day in the Debipokkho), Buñuel, Yasmeen and Durga seamlessly weave this realisation in me.    

Postscript: This is a foreword to my thoughts on the film El ángel exterminador (The Exterminating Angel) by Luis Buñuel. More discussions and/or thoughts about the film in particular will be posted here tomorrow.

Copyright of the poem quoted is owned by Yasmeen Najmi. 

it's raining and windy up in the head

when and if,

you see a clear blue sky,

you will not believe 

rainbows can

climb that high.

yet, 

when they smile,

you believe

they can fly,

and, that

is the reason

the cheshire cat dies.

Image: a rainbow peeping at my window, Budapest

                                                       

Nandini ...

There are faces
that shine in the moon,
translucent in peace
with stars on their lips
and flights in their eyes

Some dreams
trickle down
the palm of the soil...
and bring the gurgles near
tumbling over
the conch shell's sphere ...

As honour sheds its darkness
and lust spreads its doom,
As hope springs in flowers
and boats in rainy streams
cross the oceans of silence:
the little beam of soul
steer us back to the moon

... the translucent robes of peace
with tenderness in eyes
a silent hymn they sing ...

can you hear the song?
can you feel it clear?

Image:
Photo of The Divine Comedy - Paradise
Canto 8 The Highest Beauty of Beatrice
by Salvador Dali
Wood-cut 1960

i have a well in me...

a gutsy dream once overheard a desire.the desire in that instant was wishing for a well, different from the fantabulous classic wishing wells of the forever-fairy-tales. and yet it was, after all, a wishing well only. the desire was for a well that was dug till the centre of the earth, with a brightly lit tunnel leading to the luminous centre of the universe. the gutsy dream ventured forth and asked the desire: why was it wishing for such a fearful well? the desire smiled with an honest intent and said, if i can not dive in the sea of fears that i harbour in me, how will i find the true centre of my being? when i desire this well, you see a dreaded dream; one that you would call a nightmare. but, if you look deep enough into that well of unholy dreams, you will see the light at the centre...