DEATH AND LIFE
PROF. KOTA S.R. SARMA
Oh, many a strange account of Life and Death!
One more. The Scene: Belated Evening Road.
And there’s a seemingly silent third one too,
But like a longing, linking ‘terza’ rhyme!
Invested though with rich and radiant view
In the hallowed sundown glow, as if sands of Time
Run out, they hurry (I pace – with wistful watch).
Life wears, to suit the changing moods of clime.
A light green cardigan. What a marvellous match
The pearly buttons thereof–the top six–make!
Of a slightly different shade (delightful catch!)
The seventh one hangs – a note that’s out of tune.
She seems to walk – walk off her legs – untired.
What gender is Life?
’Tis feminine. Oui, La vie !
But, who would bother about the light details
Of Life’s attire but him, who, sneaking, makes
Conceited glances at her, the robe-on-her,
To ‘her’ from ‘him’ – a prided birthday gift?
Well, Life is lovely, all-bewitching, sweet –
Appeased when cross, buttered and creamed when dry.
Of course, Death must be he – a virtuous he:
But, Saint of Assisi, how he is Sister, say!
His suit is gray, his wakeful gait is grave:
His face is long, his eyes are sleepy red;
His arm, when raised, does almost touch the seat
Of Heaven –Ein’ feste Burg ist unser Gott!
He holds her – what an owning attitude!–,
His forearm arching round her graceful waist;
She seems to like his longing mounty palm.
She makes three floating steps to one of his,
As if she stretches her yielding self between
Repeating, rapid, silent strides of Death.
We cannot say what’s pointed out to her:
She looks with widened eyes and raises them
To his speaking face, fraternity framing laud.
Truth is a follower of Life and Death. So close
A “Supra-Conjunction” – to ’tween apart!
And Truth is dressed in white as white can be.
Some say ’tis ‘he’, some
say ’tis ‘she’; ‘Tu Whoa’!
There’s a feminine charm, if one may look from front
And masculine traits – studied in
full profil.
Though Truth’s a shoulder-bag, ’tis
a’ la main!
Whene’er Life lifts her face to words-from-Death,
Truth slips in a silent note, in the satchel, anon!
Life must have certainly heard what Death has said
That Truth has surely caught and bagged-in all.
At times, Life’s reed-like lips are seen to move;
Their partial “dialogue” fully vocalic though,
Is strangely a tottering tutti–clipped in the end!
Why, Death, to stifle Life that dies to live?
Is it Life that cuts out Death – “Death thou Shalt die!”
Whose is the constant dying message, ‘Life, live long’?
We may not hear he-spider’s strangled cry,
But surely can the mother-wasp’s dying joy.
And shan’t we look into the bag that Truth has filled?
I had with me my cunning camera set –
When they were standing, facing the sinking Sun.
I clicked, like a spy, and had much gooseflesh on.
In the silence of my bolted hotel room, I found
Tableaux vivants – a lot detailed, but flat
In black and white, imagining missing depth.
See! Lost Dimension, me – in dreamy depth.
TO WAKE
Two falling leaves, one after one.
Come reeling down, with equal speed:
And oh, they both, like players outrun,
Are lying silently down. Indeed!
Now, o’er them wafts what unseen Wind.
When one of ’em is raised, as if by a hand!
But the other one, still to the ground is pinned!
With wondering looks – divided – I stand!
From “The Return of
the Rambler”
NOTES
[The poet deems it necessary to provide notes, as the poem contains quite a few foreign words and expressions which are difficult to comprehend.]
EPIGRAPH: (lines from Studierzimmer, Goethe’s Faust, Part I).
Dear friend, all Theory is gray:
The golden Tree of Life is green (in translation)
4. terza (rima): used by Dante Alighieri, in his Commedia; adopted here, as may be seen in the three triplets (lines 3 to 11).
12. seventh one: (standing for) old age: ref. to the ‘seven
ages of man’ pictured by Shakespeare in As You Like It.
14. Oui, la vie: (Fr.) meaning “Yes, (the) Life”. French
Grammar, which has only two genders for classifying all nouns, has ‘Life’ in,
the feminine (la vie).
22. St. Francis of Assisi used the feminine form of address for “Death”.
26. ‘Ein’ ... (Ger.) Our God is a strong Fort. This line is taken from Martin Luther’s famous hymn in his Klug’sehe Gesangbuch. (1529)
39. Tu Whoo: The hooting sound of the owl, as if the wise bird is trying to know the nature of Truth (the words, French and English respectively, meaning. ‘who art Thou?’).
42. a la main: (Fr.) ‘in the hand’. Whereas in English we use ‘in his/her hand’, the French idiom omits the possessive pronoun in such places and simply says ‘in the hand’. The suggestion is that Truth is impersonal.
48 “dialogue” fully vocauc though: This is a finding by the author: it seems that “dialogue” is the shortest word (in the English language) having all the five vowels (vocalics). Namely, ‘a’, ‘e’, ‘i’. ‘o’ and ‘u’. The last two vowels in the word (i.e., ‘u’ and ‘e’) are silent (though they have appeared in the course of the history of the word), as hinted by ‘clipped in the end’ occurring in the next line.
49. tutti: (Ital.) a term of Music (ety., mase, pl. of tutto. all), used for directing all instruments/voices be performed together. The suggestion conveyed by the phrase ‘tottering tutti’ is obviously the silence of Life and Death in the final stage, viz., Absolution.
51. Ref. to John Donne’s famous
Sonnet, Death, Be Not
Proud.
53. Ac. to the observation(s) of Zoologists, the female spider kills and devours
54. the he-spider. as soon as the young ones are born, the male silently dies.
In the same way, the mother wasp, as soon as its young ones are born, whirls and wheels, thus making sound as if in joy for the birth of her progeny, till it becomes exhausted and dies.
60. Tableaux vivants: (Fr.) live pictures.