NEAR

Near the Stone was the Tree
Near the Tree was the Bush
Near the Bush was the Grass
Near the Grass was the Earth
Near the Earth was the High Cliff
Near the Cliff was the Fort’s Tower
Near the Tower was the Sky
Near the Sky was the Void
Near the Void was the Cosmic Sound
Near the Sound was the Word
Near the Word was the Stone

Each was near the other
But Time was near none

FAR

Far from the Window was the Temple Wall
Far from the Wall was the Narrow Lane
Far from the Lane was the Water Source
Far from the Source was the Forest
Far from the Forest was the Settlement
Far from the Settlement was the Graveyard
Far from the Graveyard was the Garden
Far from the Garden was the School
Far from the School were Sins
Far from Sins was Poetry
Far from Poetry was Prayer
Far from Prayer was God
Far from God were Words
Far from Words was Absence

All were far
But close to Time –

THE WINDOW OPENS BUT NO ONE LOOKS OUT

The window opens to the outside: it joins the inside to the outside through sight. So that the inside remembers that there is an outside. So that the outside does not forget that there is an inside. The window is a simple opportunity for the inside and the outside to acknowledge each other. There is a sky above the house, but sometimes it is visible only through the window. Because of the window, the house remembers the sky. And the sky too becomes an insider by entering the house through the window.

The scene visible outside quietly enters the house through the window. By the same route, a small part of what is happening inside slips outside. Often we are able to see from inside the house, by means of the window, many such things that no one knows we’re seeing – neither the one being seen, nor anyone else. The window can be a secret lookout. An eye that sees and which no one else can see. The window knows how to hide secrets and how to let mysteries remain unlocked. The window can be dangerous.

Poetry is a window to the infinitude of the world. An infinitude that we would possibly not have recognized had that window not been there. If we want to, we can look out this window: we can see infinity. But the being of the window, of the scene and of infinity is not dependent on our looking. The window is an invitation to look. It may be that we take too long to accept the invitation. But this delay makes no difference because the infinity that poetry is a window to does not pass.

But looking is also doing – the view that one who sees from afar is not a participant is baseless. In looking, we become involved in the scene. Without us the scene is not complete. In looking at infinity, we become part of it. Poetry is not a boat for crossing the sea of life, it is the foolhardiness of trying to attain infinity from the vortex of this sea. It is the tireless attempt to bring that which is far and beyond, close.

BY THE RIVER IS ALSO A RIVER

Here, very close, is the river Rhone. On this side is Villeneuve and on that side Avignon. Not now, but last year we sat for a very long time beside it. If you stare at the water flow past while sitting on the bank, then it often feels as if the water is still and the bank is flowing. Sitting by a river is also flowing with the river: often the river is still while we who are sitting on the bank flow. Being near the river is being the river. In one of his poems Vinod Kumar Shukla talks of going to meet the ‘river-face people’. Maybe it is not just those who live by the river who become river-faced, we who sometimes and for a little while only are able to come and sit by the river, we too, if only for a little while, become river-faced. The river ignores no one: it drenches everyone, makes them a part of itself. Even those who go only for a little while become part of the river’s clan.

Just like the river, poetry has been with us for centuries. Waters come from everywhere and merge with it: it keeps emptying into the sea every day but never runs out of water. In poetry too, all sorts of images, word-play, descriptions and beliefs come from everywhere and merge. The way the river never empties of water, poetry never empties of words. Near the river and near poetry we cannot remain indifferent: if we approach them in earnest then we cannot escape being overwhelmed. We become included in the river and in poetry despite ourselves. The way the river’s splendor lights up our faces, likewise our faces shine with poetry. Continuity, both in the river and in poetry, showers our mortality with infinity.

A line from a poem goes: “What sort of river are you?” An answer could be: “The sort of poem you are!”

MUD-SOAKED SHOES

Years ago I read a poem by Tadeusz Różewicz in which there was talk of entering heaven with mud-soaked shoes. Then too, it was not the contrast, but the image of the shoes which attracted me more. From it emerged the picture of a working man, a hard worker toiling all day.

There has been much debate about the relation poetry has to our daily working lives. From the insistence that poetry should accurately and with feeling depict this life, to the notion that poetry exists in its own world of fevered imagination and has nothing to do with the real world. But it is true that if there are images in poetry from the life we recognize, it is easier to relate to. These images though should not be mere imitation. If poetry does not minutely, imaginatively and in unexpected ways expand and rediscover them, then poetry will never become richer. The ordinary reader goes to poetry to sharpen and deepen his own awareness of what life feels like. But also to know what life can feel like. True poetry does not take us away from life: it makes our involvement in it deeper and more complex. But it gives us respite from the daily drudgery and anxiety. Instead of getting trapped in the everyday, we are able to go to a place not far from it which we were otherwise not able to see or know.

Poetry does not scorn the everyday: it does not ignore the drudgery of the day-to-day either. It excites or illuminates the routine of life in such a way that what is not everyday or routine also becomes part of it. If poetry is able to reach some mature understanding or vision or philosophy, it is only with the help of the everyday – by going through the unavoidable drudgery of the day-to-day. Poetry enters heaven with mud-soaked shoes.

THE GRASS CALLING OUT TO THE GALAXY

Chamber ‘M’ of the chartreuse I am in was made in the fourteenth century and for hundreds of years Christian monks had lived in it. Then the French revolution came and they were pushed out. Behind every chamber is a porch on which green grass grows. Opposite is a tall ancient monument where pigeons congregate. High above it is the sky.

The grass must have always been here. It must have yellowed, dried and then grown again. The grass here in this monastery is the same as time. Passing very slowly yet always there – just like the grass.

The grass is very low: often there is nothing else, only grass. As if nothing or no one is present nearby, only words: not words spoken by someone, but those gathered inside oneself, raging or timid.

Sunlight falls on the grass, darkness gathers, dew falls. The wind goes by caressing it. When no one knows, the grass looks to the sky. It may be low, nevertheless it talks to the galaxy which is grass growing in the porch of the sky.

The grass tells the galaxy what is in its green heart and the galaxy tells the grass of its glowing experiences. Poetry sometimes hears this conversation and remembers it. And through it we are sometimes able to hear fragments of this secret conversation.

Poetry gives us the location of many such conversations. If it weren’t for poetry we would not even have imagined that the grass was calling out to the galaxy.

NO NAME FOR THE GREEN LEAF

In the chartreuse there are many porches and courtyards. There, besides the green grass, are trees and plants. A few rose vines have tags saying that they are ancient roses. Who knows how many centuries old they are, but still eager to be green and to flower. In a centuries-old flowerbed there blossoms today’s rose, its green vine.

Adjacent to that vine is a tree. That too has a tag with a name. But the name is the tree’s. Its beautiful green-pink leaf lay fallen on the ground and we picked it up. All its veins show clearly. But it has no name of its own. It is not just another leaf: it has an unparalleled beauty – its aura is different. But is has no name: it is just a leaf of a certain tree. All of our features are similar but we all have different names. Man is more unjust to things than to other men. He does not give them the many different names they deserve.

Poetry resists this continual injustice, wants to redress the wrong done to things. It tries to give a name to every leaf. Poetry is the unconditional acceptance of the individuality of being. For it, everything is alive: the beloved, the window, the ladybird wandering in the grass, the forgotten leaf-covered statue of a god, the fallen leaf in a dense forest. It is the tireless, unceasing process of giving everything a name. Poetry does not group things into classes or divisions. It searches for a name for every form. If poetry did not make this attempt we would not have known so much that is unique. Poetry is not just the artistic conservation of individuality but also its moral conservation.

THE SUNLIGHT ASKED ME

Since morning today, water has been falling. There is a light rain and everything is foggy. It seems as if it is still night. Not a completely dark night, but a long dawn – there is light but it does not encroach upon the darkness. The sun comes a bit late anyway. Only after nine in the morning does it shine upon the grapes. On the window pane, a mist is settling. Nowhere is there a hint or suspicion of sunlight. Still, there is the wait for it. Without sunlight it is difficult to believe that the day has arrived. Our conversation with the day takes place through sunlight. If there is no sunlight, it is as if the day becomes dumb, almost speechless.

Here, in this old Christian monastery, it is peaceful. Ancient piety, with its secrets, fear and silence. When sunlight comes it feels as if some connection has been made with the outside world. This monastery too is liberated from its old seclusion by the sunlight. When there is no sunlight, then not even the sound or chirping of birds can be heard. A cold wind blows, but it is outside. When there is no sunlight then even the colors of things dissolve into the sweeping grayness. Sunlight is an opportunity for things to reveal themselves in their many colors.

Because of sunlight we know time. But sunlight goes right through time. It covers our past, our present, our future, as if all at once. For it everything is at once, not one after another. All our time gathers in the sunlight. Today there is no sunlight and so this monastery is in the fog of the fourteenth century and we are on the slope of the twentieth. Tomorrow, when there is sunlight, it will shine on all these centuries, on the gap between them and on us, all at once. Sunlight has no history: it liberates us from history too. Shapes, ideas, constructs, customs, forms, desires, all keep changing but sunlight does not. The sunlight now is the same as it always was and the same as it always will be.

The sunlight doesn’t talk to me directly. It talks through the grass, the shapes of buildings, the flowers, people, children, women, birds, shadows, etc. and I feel as if the sunlight has asked me something or said something to me.

A GOD IN YOUR LUGGAGE

A poem by the French poet Alain Bosquet ends with these lines:

If you have come here to stay
Then don’t forget to bring
A god in your luggage

Reading this poem here, in the dwelling place of some fourteenth century monk in this chartreuse in Villeneuve, is almost a sin. Although poetry is above sin and virtue. There are very few poets who claim to be virtuous. Even the saint-poets often say things like ‘no one is as devious, wicked and lustful as me’. About Milton it is famous that he wanted to justify the ways of god to men in his epic. Despite that, Paradise Lost justifies the ways of the devil instead of god. Sin is more attractive to poetry than virtue. In sin there are perhaps more possibilities to explore and discover the world in its entirety, in all the colors of its being.

Poetry thinks of everything as a creation: nature creates a lot of things, the rest, man creates. God, deities, etc. are also his creations. Poetry puts the whole stuff of man in scales: it keeps track of what he takes on his travels. It knows that gods are not self-begotten. They are needed, but they have to be created. They are not there already: wherever we settle, that place needs some sanctity, some impenetrability. That is why poetry tells us to not forget to bring a god with the rest of our belongings. The way we need grain and water, taste and smell, joy, etc. to live, similarly we need sanctity. But it will not come by itself, nor will anyone insist on giving it to us. We will have to bring it with us. In the end, we create our god ourselves. He is our own secret. Poetry keeps reminding us to bring and keep with ourselves our sanctity and our secret.

KNOCKING, BUT NO ONE AT THE DOOR

Here, in this Christian monastery turned into a monument, there is incredible peace. Hours go by, but no one passes through its long deserted corridors. In the day, some tourists’ voices can be heard: sometimes the laughter or screams of children. If someone comes, their footsteps can be heard a long time beforehand and for a long time after. It is so deserted that, in the words of Ghalib, ‘if you die there will be no one to mourn or cry.’ This really is ‘such a place’ where ‘there is no one.’ Maybe there is god, a holy fear, maybe the hovering spirits of Christian monks, though not one of them gives proof of their presence. The chamber’s door remains closed and no one comes up to it. Still, now and then, it feels as if someone has knocked. Very lightly, the way children sometimes mischievously do and disappear. We can never be completely alone: maybe because we are afraid to. We want to get rid of our loneliness, our solitude, our isolation: we want someone to call us, talk to us. We want someone to remember that we exist despite being enclosed in this solitude. We do not want to remain locked in this edifice of our isolation that is why, now and then, we hear a knocking which is not there, when there is no one. We ourselves are knocking on the door of our solitude. That is why we hear knocking, but no one is outside the door. Sometimes we want to come out of ourselves just to meet ourselves.

Is poetry just such a knock on the dense solitude of the soul? It inspires us to open the door and go meet ourselves. It is not a knock of time, or a call to attention, or one that tells us to get ready to go somewhere. It does not alert us to danger. It is a knock of being: it is a knock that reminds the inside of the outside. It is a knock that connects permanence to presence. When we ignore the knocking of poetry, or when we can’t even hear it, then either an unbreakable harmony has formed within and without us, as in a deity or a saint, or we have stopped living in our solitude.

(Translation: Rahul Soni)