A poem for troubled times

 

Today, as I reflect on the past days and more to come, there is a slight perturbation which stirs my thoughts. But I keep myself going and try motivating myself so that I don't despair. There are some days when my words are sufficient but on other days, there is always poetry.

Here is a poem that I have been going to when thoughts of fear assail:

Everything Is Going To Be Alright, by Derek Mahon

How should I not be glad to contemplate

the clouds clearing beyond the dormer window

and a high tide reflected on the ceiling?

There will be dying, there will be dying,

but there is no need to go into that.

The poems flow from the hand unbidden

and the hidden source is the watchful heart.

The sun rises in spite of everything

and the far cities are beautiful and bright.

I lie here in a riot of sunlight

watching the day break and the clouds flying.

Everything Is Going To Be Alright

Hope this poem lightens your day and brings cheer to you in these grim times.

Take care and stafe (stay safe)

You will always be the one I'm thinking about when somebody asks me who I'm thinking about . . .

You will always be the one I'm thinking about when somebody asks me who I'm thinking about . . .

Merrit Malloy

Imperfections

(from The People Who Didn't Say Goodbye)

Why is it that you wanted me more on

the night I was leaving

than you ever wanted me

before?

Does pain bring people

closer together than

pleasure?

Are we more afraid of

living together than of

dying alone

Does distance unite people more deeply

than familiarity?

It is as though our hunger

is to be hungry and our real need is

to be missed

It's no accident that the songs

that sell the most

are sad 

One Of The First Things We Have To Learn

No matter how long she held on

to those people she lost

No matter how hard she tried

to get them back

Not one of them ever

returned to her

We must be careful

not to relinquish our future

to people who won't

be there

One of the first things

we have to let go of

is not being able to

let go of

anybody

I Won't Call Him

Knowing what you need

Is more than knowing what you want.

It's a kind of clear-eyed wisdom

To see what is worthless

Its touching on someone

Who you know won't turn away.

It's reaching for something

That's really worth the climb.

And it's learning to let go

When it isn't.

Knowing what you need

Is more than knowing what makes you feel good right now.

It's knowing that the same thing

Will make you feel good again.

I won't call him.

Something You Can Count On

I want to tell you

in a few words

what I could not tell you

in too many

I want you to know

that it will be hard

to live without you

again

You will always be the one

I'm thinking about

when somebody asks me

who I'm thinking

about

Sights of Summer 2: Indian Laburnum/konrai/kannikona/amaltas/golden shower tree

Our campus is quite a sight in summer with splashes of golden in the form of Indian Laburnum konrai (in Tamil), scientifically known as Cassia fistuala and another tree which I will discuss in my forthcoming posts. For long, I have been thinking of this particular tree as a resident of Kerala since my amma always used to mention that this flower appears during the time of Vishu, the onset of a new year according to the Malayali calendar. I was reintroduced to the tree when I saw a mention of this tree in the Sangam poems. It did not matter much to me then for I did not then know that the tree my mom mentioned and konrai were one and the same. Years later when I married a man from Kerala, he pointed out the flowers to me and mentioned that its name was kannikona. Then rereading the Sangam poems, I realised the konrai and kannikona  were one and the same. The flowers look beautiful and like the raw mangoes, they bring joy to my mind and senses. They hang in bunches and from a distance one, can see splashes of yellow and some green of the leaves. I find it rather difficult to tear off my eyes from the trees while I spot them during our evening walks in the campus. These trees also dot my College campus and whenever I have to go to the canteen, I slow down my steps so that I can take in the beauty of these golden showers. These are the most photographed trees. I have resisted clicking pictures for I might miss the pleasure the moment has to offer. I therefore will post pictures sourced from the internet.

These trees are also found in large numbers in Goa, Tamil Nadu and Kerala; Wikipedia tells me that this flower is the national flower of Thailand.

The flowers proudly seem to celebrate the colour of summer in their shade and spritely demeanour. They also remind me a lot of the daffodils that can be spotted during summers in England. Yellow is the overlapping factor between the two flowers which are otherwise quite different in terms of the size of the plant and the structure of the flowers.

For your reading pleasure, I share a poem from the Sangam age translated from Tamil by my teacher and mentor Nirmal Selvamony:

Stupid, surely, are those large-stemmed Laburnum trees

that mistook the unseasonal rains

and put out, on their branches, lush, pendulous racemes

even before the monsoon he spoke of

when setting out on stony arid paths.

 (koovattanaar, kuruntokai 66, Sangam ilakkiyam 1: 616)

 

In the short poem, the girl is getting restless waiting for her lover for he promised her that he will be back by monsoon when the Laburnum (konrai, kannikona) is in bloom. The girl sees the flowers bloom before season and is forlorn and lovesick.

So, here I share another sight of summers in Goa/India.

Image 1: Internet
Image 2: Internet

NO TITLE REQUIRED BY WISLAWA SZYMBORSKA

There was a time when I posted poems that I enjoyed reading. I wanted my readers to read those poems as well. Today, after a long time, I present to you a very soulful poem by Wislawa Szymborska, a Polish poet. This poem was brought to my attention by one of my former students. In equal measure she is a lover and writer of wonderful poems. I am glad that I had the privilege of being her teacher. If you have noticed, this poem has been resting in the side-bar of my blog for a very long time. The periphery has taken the center. Hope you enjoy this work of art.

It has come to this: I'm sitting under a tree
beside a river
on a sunny morning.
It's an insignificant event
and won't go down in history.
It's not battles and pacts,
where motives are scrutinized,
or noteworthy tyrannicides.

And yet I'm sitting by this river, that's a fact.
And since I'm here
I must have come from somewhere,
and before that
I must have turned up in many other places,
exactly like the conquerors of nations
before setting sail.

Even a passing moment has its fertile past,
its Friday before Saturday,
its May before June.
Its horizons are no less real
than those that a marshal's field glasses might scan.

This tree is a poplar that's been rooted here for years.
The river is the Raba; it didn't spring up yesterday.
The path leading through the bushes
wasn't beaten last week.
The wind had to blow the clouds here
before it could blow them away.

And though nothing much is going on nearby,
the world is no poorer in details for that.
It's just as grounded, just as definite
as when migrating races held it captive.

Conspiracies aren't the only things shrouded in silence.
Retinues of reasons don't trail coronations alone.
Anniversaries of revolutions may roll around,
but so do oval pebbles encircling the bay.

The tapestry of circumstance is intricate and dense.
Ants stitching in the grass.
The grass sewn into the ground.
The pattern of a wave being needled by a twig.

So it happens that I am and look.
Above me a white butterfly is fluttering through the air
on wings that are its alone,
and a shadow skims through my hands
that is none other than itself, no one else's but its own.

When I see such things, I'm no longer sure
that what's important
is more important than what's not.

From periphery to the centre

For a long time now, this poem has been sitting in my blog's side-bar. I was amused by the poet's ability to present a serious topic in such a lighter vein. Read the poem and tell me what you think:

A FEW WORDS ON THE SOUL

BY WISLAWA SZYMBORSKA

We have a soul at times.

No one’s got it non-stop,

for keeps.

Day after day,

year after year

may pass without it.

Sometimes

it will settle for awhile

only in childhood’s fears and raptures.

Sometimes only in astonishment

that we are old.

It rarely lends a hand

in uphill tasks,

like moving furniture,

or lifting luggage,

or going miles in shoes that pinch.

It usually steps out

whenever meat needs chopping

or forms have to be filled.

For every thousand conversations

it participates in one,

if even that,

since it prefers silence.

Just when our body goes from ache to pain,

it slips off-duty.

It’s picky:

it doesn't like seeing us in crowds,

our hustling for a dubious advantage

and creaky machinations make it sick.

Joy and sorrow

aren't two different feelings for it.

It attends us

only when the two are joined.

We can count on it

when we’re sure of nothing

and curious about everything.

Among the material objects

it favors clocks with pendulums

and mirrors, which keep on working

even when no one is looking.

It won’t say where it comes from

or when it’s taking off again,

though it’s clearly expecting such questions.

We need it

but apparently

it needs us

for some reason too.

~ Translated from the Polish by Stainslaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh

Image: Internet

Just for laughs and thoughts :)

 If I see something that I think my readers will enjoy, I cannot but post it here. This funny poem had me in splits and I thought why not share it with you. Hope you enjoy Michelene Wandor's poem.

 EVE MEETS MEDUSA

~ Michelene Wandor

Medusa. Sit down. Take
the weight off your snakes. We have
a lot in common. Snakes, I mean.

Tell me, can you really turn men
...to stone with a look? Do you
think, if i had a perm -
maybe not.

Don't you think
Perseus was
a bit of a coward? not even
to look you in the face

you were beautiful when you
were a moon goddess, before
Athene changed your looks
through jealousy

I can't see what's wrong
with making love
in a temple, even
if it was her temple

it's a good mask; you must
feel safe and loving
behind it

you must feel very powerful

tell me, what conditioner do you use?

I would love to hear what you have to say on this.

The enigma that is the song-writer's mind

The last five years or so, or is it six. Ah! no worries about that. For quite some time now, I have been very interested in the lyrics of some of the songs I would like to listen to. Simon and Garfunkel, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton and the like have wonderful lyrics and I always want to know more about the process of the creation of some of their lyrics.

Now if I call them poets, I can't be more right. Sample this:

It's a still life water color, 

Of a now late afternoon, 

As the sun shines through the curtained lace 

And shadows wash the room. 

And we sit and drink our coffee 

Couched in our indifference, 

Like shells upon the shore 

You can hear the ocean roar 

In the dangling conversation 

And the superficial sighs, 

The borders of our lives.

~ From  "The Dangling Conversation" by Simon and Garfunkel written in 1966

Isn't this sheer poetry? A magical weaving of words. This might not be a great example but the lyrics definitely has soulfulness in it. This quality always makes me to probe why the song was written and what were the social or emotional conditions behind it. I don't much find lyrics as this in many of today's songs. Maybe I don't listen to  much contemporary music. 

Now this leads me to ask questions like what is the difference between a poet and a song-writer? Apart from the very obvious 'song has a tune,' what are the other differences. The lyrics I have quoted above even have a rhyme pattern in some of the lines. 

The internal landscape of a poet and a song-writer are interesting to study and I am truly thankful to the internet which has enabled me to peek inside a song and travel the lanes of the song-writer to find out about the birth of a song. And I am not surprised when a University has included the songs of Bob Dylan in the literature syllabus. 

If you read how Freddie Mercury wrote Bohemian Rhapsody, it will amaze you. It was a difficult piece musically as well. It was their magnum opus. It reminds me of opium-intoxicated poets writing about ancient cities with their splendour and charm.

But after all this the question remains: What is the difference between a song and a poem? Tell me what you think.

From Selected Poems of Antonio Machado

Wanderer, your footsteps are

the road, and nothing more;

wanderer, there is no road,

the road is made by walking.

By walking one makes the road,

and upon glancing behind

one sees the path

that never will be trod again.

Wanderer, there is no road--

Only wakes upon the sea.

Translated by By Betty Jean Craige, University of Georgia