Three Mahabharat Poems

Once, I had a book contract: six stories that followed perspective of six women characters from Hindu Mythology (Sita, Radha, Shikhandi / Amba, Anasuya, Shakuntala, and Satyavati). This contract was triggered by my story, "I, Sita," which was published with Freedom Fiction Journal. I worked, re-worked, and revised all six stories, tried to meet expectations of editors across oceans. My efforts, however, fell short: the editors dropped my project, claiming that they did not have the editorial support my stories needed. It took me months to acknowledge that my work of over two years has come to naught.

I now have six well-dressed characters, waiting; I watch them sitting around on my desktop, adjusting their clothing, glancing questioningly around, and I wish I could apologize. They no longer have anywhere to go. How do I tell them? These six characters are very strong women: diplomats, queens, warriors, lovers, yogis, all ferocious, two attained apotheosis, one even re-born as a man to exact her revenge. I, their messenger of ill-tidings, would not be allowed to exist in the same room as any of them. Whatever will they say? What will they do to me when they hear? Do I even have language to phrase what I must tell them?

Well-wishers and friends keep asking after the book contract; how far has it gone? When is the book being released? My head hangs even lower at these inquiries. A lot of  people had promised to be the first to buy a book such as the one I was working on. How do I bring them to where my characters await?

I do not resent the work, of course. I'd do it all over again, and gladly. It was a labor of love. I learned a great deal, both about the myths and the way I write. I am not the same. Perhaps that is enough. After all, in the final analysis, I wrote mainly for myself. The one person who truly enjoyed the stories has been me; I wonder at my whining!

Let me remind myself: I do have a few poems published. Here are a couple of poems. They are included in Swaranrekha, an anthology of poets from the Indian Subcontinent. Perhaps these voices will give heart to me and my muted characters.

I.

Gandhari Explains

My sons number in hundreds, like iron fillings

Almost indistinguishable, black and hard like my chosen darkness

The birthing was difficult; I prayed for death and release

Posterity wishes I had died, rather than birth what I did

I don’t, of course. I understand their necessity;

This black age needed them to prick itself with, to corrode from within, rust, disintegrate

This knowledge brings no hope, no comfort, no wisdom, no divine insight

I find the false light intolerable, like a transparent, insincere promise

Of a maybe-paradise-after-life if certain cosmic forces are benign

If I can embody ideal of good-wife, good-mother, good-queen

But these good-women cancel each other out, contradict each other,

Pop and blink each other out of existence when they try to be

I prefer denial, the softness of the blindfold, a chosen lack

To keep the balanced universe on its toes, force some boon,

The heavy price already paid in advance, like a flexible spending account

For I have known of my sons’ nature from the time they were a glint,

A splinter of shining metal, glowing darkly in their blind father’s eyes

Which only see his lot shortened, cheated, overlooked

No deity, demon, being can force me to watch in 3-D Kodak color

The slow destruction of an era dying in my sons’ faults,

Their thousand-and-one trespasses on divine patience

All their juvenile assassination attempts laughed off as boys-being-boys

Their malicious tricks and sneers they thought I was too blind to see, shards in my breast

They were indulged when they should have been slapped silly: an expense to be paid by

This world, the golden city my oldest rules justly, if not wisely

Do you wonder why I chose this blindness now? With a

Brother like mine, Husband like mine, Sons like mine,

Would you have chosen differently?

Yet do not call me cursed! I have that

Which Kunti, even, could not coax of the gods:

My dismissed daughter that you forgot, who did not forget me

Stoic and iron-willed, surviving father, uncles, brothers, cousins, husband

After the bloody apocalypse of eighteen days, I need only her touch to bless

My forfeit of illusory sight. The divine nephew, charioteer of victors and kin-killers knows

She is the kindness the cosmos was forced to surrender to my stubborn blindness.

II.

Ganga, Unable

The light confuses me, twisting colors, weaving hues

I keep squinting, unable to focus on a single dimension

Seeing too many tenses at once, unable to hold moments singly

Unable to dwell on a penumbra to tell if it’s dawn or dusk 

I should never have left my heavenly streams

There is such peace, such uniformity in darkness beyond space

This tellurian world demands I assume a safe domesticity,

Properly befitting my gender, scholarship, ancestry, origin

I try, tried modulating gracefully in sweet tones of wifehood, queen-ship

But these cloths, though silken and pliant like my waters,

Do not fit.

They keep slithering about, like the king’s promises,

Get stuck and break apart, like dark suspicions,

Whisper severe doubts along deserted palace halls,

Remain opaque and unyielding so my fluid self is cloaked

 I sit here, at the window seat, my hands idle

The mynah on the mango tree screeches sweetly as she despoils the fruit

I must leave soon; I see the forbidden question squatting on the sunset

Unspoken as yet, but imminent, inevitable, like you, my newly conceived son 

             I only want to keep you formless within me, my taintless child, spun of waves and swords,

Like this ageless song snatched from the tenuous plundering bird;

You don’t agree and insistence on proper whittling distresses me

I am relieved when the bird flies off to desecrate other unripe fruit 

A lucid glance at my husband shocks as I rise in greeting and recognition:

For when I see the king through my variegated veil, I am unable to un-see

                               The obsequious timeworn son behind the temerarious impulsive father.

Finally, here is one of my favorites. It was posted on this page some years ago and is included in my book.

Arjun at the Swayamvar

Being best friends with the divine doesn’t help

The same old intrigue and desperations led me to this contest and fire

My arrow, though true to its mark, is fueled by mortal sinew and blood

The eye it snags spits out tissue and nerve

The whole exercise feels like a hoax, a bad deal with too-tiny small print

But the Fire Princess seems oblivious to any cosmic conspiracy

Seeing only the promise and comfort of my muscled shoulder, my twinkling glance

Admiring only the sensuous garland entwining my bronzed epithelium. 

I lower my eyes (she is shorter by a full head) to hint at my noble humility

She exchanges a quick glance with her brothers, one divine, one fiery

Seeking assurance for the rightness of her choice, the propriety of what is happening

I too look around, but my brothers have forgotten me in the moment

They all are busy blinking tears, of victory, of gratitude

You’d think I’d blinded them when my arrow targeted the fish eye.

They do not smell the fog of envy that clouds the Hall

It stings my eyes as it rises to the canopy and darkens the skies 

 I wonder what sightlessness descended when my arrow pierced that eye

The contest feels weighed, like loaded dice, a veneer covering a warning

A clanging prothalmion sung as prelude to apocalypse

My shoulders sag under the heaviness of flowers as I lift the bridal garland with sure hands

And hang my head to accept the burdensome future of a dying age.

It is my hope that these three voices will remind me how much I loved the project, the stories, and the characters that emerged and began speaking. I am very fortunate that I was allowed to hear. Telling is complicated and could take long. After all, it took my characters all of my life time to reach me! But if they can reach me across the oceans of myths and millennia, I am hopeful that my telling may yet reach out those who await it.

The God of Monsoons and Peacocks!

The afternoon is dim with clouds. I cannot hear the TV because of the rolling thunder. The cats just burst into the kitchen, glaring accusingly at me, holding me accountable for the wet, rumbling day. It is a perfect Janmashtmi! Today celebrates the birth of Krishna, the god whose skin is the inimitable hue of rain clouds.


There are many celebrations scheduled all over the world, in temples, in homes, on streets. Agile youngsters will crawl over each other to make human pyramids high enough to reach a pot filled with yogurt and curds, tempered with honey and basil, hung high above traffic lights, swinging at unimaginable altitudes. The crowd will cheer as the smallest child reaches the pot and breaks it open, spilling sweetened yogurt over everyone, scattering marigold petals around the world. Loudspeakers perched high on street corners will blare filmi music, for there is plenty of that which revolves around the child god. Babies will be dressed in Krishna costumes and fed treats, much to their alarm and delight. Complete strangers will color each other in gulal, erasing separations in a singular joy that celebrates life, recognizable as it is ubiquitous.


I remember this day every year, though I have stopped celebrating it ritualistically since my child is all grown up and not in town any more. But this was a day I used to look forward to as a child. The preparations would begin days, even weeks before. Our Guruji, the Kathak teacher, would assemble todas and thaats constructed around the exploits of the young Krishna, as he stole freshly churned butter from pots, saris and clothes from bathing gopis, and hearts from the entire population of Brij land. We would learn permutations of rhythms, and as we owned those new combinations, we felt the joy of anticipating the festival. The children of the street would put together a show of dances to be performed on the day. Families would create elaborate, colorful jhupadi or hut exhibitions, depicting scenes from Krishna's childhood, and these would be displayed for a week.


Our street was also the playground for the children of the families that lived along its banks. On nights leading up to Janmashtmi, children would gather after supper and play would continue deep into the night, long after the living rooms were converted into bed rooms, lights blinked off in apartments, and women emerged on front porches with grain to pick through and vegetables to chop for the next day's meals. Stories would be told about Krishna's life, tales of enormous trees who were really monsters; mouths that opened to show a view of the entire cosmos; poisonous, many-hooded serpents who could be conquered with a dance and a bargain; and, of course, the eternal raas lila, the roundel that accompanies Krishna stories everywhere. Mothers deliberately left out freshly butter, along with other treats, so that their children could "steal" these when they returned from school, and when the household smiled indulgently at the child, they were really worshipping a god.


I remember looking forward to outings, especially, since clothing, ornaments, and peacock feathers created specially to fit the divine infant would be sold on city streets, along with Janmashtmi treats, and each street corner boasted its own jhupadi. During recess at school, talk revolved around the most decorated jhupadis and where they might be found, and the peculiar delicacy each family cooked during this festival. Even the curriculum at schools did not remain untouched. We had quizzes based on the Krishna Lila sections of the Mahabharata in General Knowledge classes; Krishna-poems abounded in Hindi classes; a bhajan, a devotional song by Narsinh Mehta would be included in our usually secular prayer halls that began the school day. Our school, too, had its own cultural program to celebrate this festival, and a special students' council would be established to oversee the jhupadi our school sponsored.


As I consider the wet afternoon thundering with elephantine roars, I ponder on the fact that every year, on this day, it rains like this, at least once. Of course, it is quite possible that this is no coincidence or divine design, just the usual weather pattern the year follows. However, as I raise my cup of tea to the God of Joy; I am grateful for the memories his birthday has granted me. These memories remind me of a world gone by, of times that have revolved away with the earth's circumambulations, leaving behind an aftertaste of sweetened yogurt I am no longer allowed.


I watch a yellowed leaf drift lazily through the drizzle and imagine it a marigold petal. I believe the joy I take in my tea this afternoon is as true as any I have felt during midnight street games, the newly owned thaats, and the inimitable taste of white, soft, freshly churned butter. If I concentrate hard enough, I am sure to inhale the fragrance of sandalwood my grandmother used to smear on the idol of the infant god of monsoons and peacocks.

Journey Home: The Beginning

At last, at last, finally, I have crossed the street and can again call this house mine. My salvaged possessions perch at the edges of rooms trying to fit in with the sofas and bookcases and chairs my friends' generosity has adorned the empty floors with. I have comfortable seats, windows the cats routinely navigate through, a busy, crowded alter, my own victuals, even some fire extinguishers standing guard over the kitchen (where the fire had begun and the damage worst).

My soul-felt, heart-true gratitude goes out to the world at large, to the incredible support structure which I had not realised had grounded me so solidly, and to all powers and wishes that have enabled and culminated in this hour, on this seat, in a house that resounds with these languages, cadences, and rhythms, which does not belong as much to me as I do to it. I have known a self without this house and all it is, and I know her to be a lesser self; I feel as though I have acquired comfortable girth, the extra invisible limbs that connected me to walls and teacups and tables.

Today, the one image that hovers over this post is from John Donne's poetry, and I thank him for giving it. Of course, patient reader, I allude to the comparison between a pair of lovers and a pair of compasses that ends his "Valediction." Ever since the house fire last October, I have been rudderless, directionless, unable to stand upright, my fix'd foot broken. Today, the fix'd foot leans and hearkens, and even though sometimes it runs obliquely, it certainly makes my circle just, merely by being here, by standing so firmly.

It took me almost 11 months to cross the street, but now that it's done, I can't believe that I was displaced in this manner. I am thinking of a few lessons I've learned:

The first lesson I've learned is that nothing and no one is ague-proof. I should have spent a little more of my soul when I was Reading Lear. However, this comes with the realisation that one's being does not reside anywhere but within, and that the essential self is salvageable.

However, the most important thing that has happened is that I've seen the face of divinity in the deliberate kindness of people. This burning has changed every part of my internal being and compass and I shall always carry this fire within myself.

It is through these eyes that I consider this house I inhabit, that I am told is mine. However, it still doesn't recognize me and everything about the space is unfamiliar. I look for a space that can never be, like the house called Horizon, where I learned of my first self, the house that is no more. I look around me and without meaning or wanting to, I look for the house that is gone, but I only see it as a shadow behind these brand new walls, my salvaged books, the newly configured living spaces and I do see an extra shadow beneath them. I suppose the shadows are behind my eyes.

I must leave this seat now, continue my journey to distant spaces, for numinous goals I cannot yet imagine. I shall re-equip myself with my oars, texts like The Odyssey, Mahabharata and Ramayana, that tell of endless journeys that begin when the travellers reach what they remember as Home, lands that banish native beings, then call them back, and forever test their worthiness to perch on spaces that define them.