Light and Shadow

Light is young, the ancient light;

shadows are of the moment, they are born old.

'Fireflies' - Tagore

Flowers

In full bloom
oozing
fragrance of
bliss and innocence.

                                   In the pic: Anamika and Krishnapriya

Alone

From childhood’s hour I have not been

As others were—I have not seen

As others saw—I could not bring

My passions from a common spring—

From the same source I have not taken

My sorrow—I could not awaken

My heart to joy at the same tone—

And all I lov’d—I lov’d alone!

Then—in my childhood—in the dawn

Of a most stormy life—was drawn

From ev’ry depth of good and ill

The mystery which binds me still—

From the torrent, or the fountain—

From the red cliff of the mountain—

From the sun that ’round me roll’d

In its autumn tint of gold—

From the lightning in the sky

As it pass’d me flying by—

From the thunder, and the storm—

And the cloud that took the form

(When the rest of Heaven was blue)

Of a demon in my view.

Edgar Allan Poe :  'Alone'

Edgar Allan Poe - American romantic poet and critic, is widely regarded as the architect of modern short stories. Poe was the principal forerunner of the “art for art’s sake” movement in nineteenth-century literature. Born to parents who were professional actors in Boston, Poe lost both of them before he was three years old. Later he was raised by John Allan, a prosperous businessman from Virginia though his foster father never legally adopted him.

Poe was brilliant at academics, but he had to leave his studies at the university due to inadequate financial support from Allan. Soon he enlisted in the army and published his first collection of poetry, 'Tamerlane, and Other Poems.' His first few works went totally unnoticed within the literary circles.  In 1836 he married his cousin, Virginia. Later he rose to prominence through several journals that he edited during 1840s.

Poe was not only a superlative author of poetry and fiction, but also a literary critic whose level of imagination and insight had hitherto been unexplored in American literature. After his wife’s death from tuberculosis in 1847, Poe became involved in a number of romantic affairs. While arrangements for his second marriage were going on, Poe arrived in Baltimore in late September 1849 and on October 3, he was discovered in a state of semi-consciousness; he died four days later. His last few days remain a mystery.

Poe was fascinated by science and technology. He made marvelous chronicles of science fiction which later became a type of literature in twentieth century.  His premier works remain intrinsic to the idea of modernism many years later. The 22 lined 'Alone,' written in 1829, left untitled and unpublished during Poe's lifetime, is often interpreted as autobiographical, expressing Poe's feelings of isolation.

(Photo from Cherai Beach, Vypin Island, Cochin)

La Belle Dame sans Merci

"O, what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,

    Alone and palely loitering?

The sedge is wither'd from the lake,

    And no birds sing.

O, what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,

    So haggard and so woe-begone?

The squirrel's granary is full,

    And the harvest's done.

I see a lily on thy brow,

    With anguish moist and fever dew;

And on thy cheek a fading rose

Fast withereth too"

    "I met a lady in the meads

    Full beautiful --- a faery's child;

Her hair was long, her foot was light,

    And her eyes were wild.

I made a garland for her head,

    And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;

She look'd at me as she did love,

    And made sweet moan.

I set her on my pacing steed,

    And nothing else saw all day long;

For sideways would she lean, and sing

A faery's song"

 "She found me roots of relish sweet,

    And honey wild, and manna dew;

And sure in language strange she said,

    'I love thee true.'

She took me to her elfin grot,

    And there she wept and sighed full sore,

And there I shut her wild sad eyes

With kisses four"

   "And there she lulled me asleep,

    And there I dream'd --- ah! woe betide! ---

The latest dream I ever dreamt

    On the cold hill side" 

"I saw pale kings, and princes too,

    Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;

They cried --- 'La Belle Dame sans Merci

    Hath thee in thrall!'

I saw their starved lips in the gloam

    With horrid warning gaped wide,

And I awoke, and found me here

    On the cold hill side"

La Belle Dame sans Merci (The Beautiful Lady Without Mercy) is John Keats' celebrated ballad which was subjected to numerous interpretations. It is a simple story of love on a bleak winter landscape. The lady who is erotic, attractive, fascinating yet deadly attracts lovers only to destroy them by her supernatural powers. 

The fourth line in each stanza is deliberately shortened which gives a slow movement to the ballad. Kates' repetitive yet simple language coupled with economic usage of words and an underlying supernatural tone makes it a classic.
(In the photo - Jibin, Harikrishnan and Praphul)

My roots will set off to seek another land

"I want you to know

one thing.

If you think it long and mad,

the wind of banners

that passes through my life,

and you decide

to leave me at the shore

of the heart where I have roots,

remember

that on that day,

at that hour,

I shall lift my arms

and my roots will set off

to seek another land"

"... but

if each day,

each hour,

you feel that you are destined for me

with implacable sweetness,

if each day a flower

climbs up to your lips to seek me,

ah my love, ah my own,

in me all that fire is repeated,

in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten,

my love feeds on your love, beloved,

and as long as you live it will be in your arms

without leaving mine"

Pablo Neruda - 'If You Forget Me'

My Worship of Sorrow will be over

"When birds return to the nest

In the shadow of the evening,

When the bell of evening worship is rung in the evening

Then this life will lit up its last flame-offer

And my worship of sorrow will be over.

And my worship of sorrow will be over"

.

"So many words of my so many days

So many yearnings in so many ways

My mind is full of these things now-a-days!

When in the sacrificial fire

They will burn like the stars

And they will rush towards the sky ignoring barriers

Then my arrangement will match sunset’s color

And my worship of sorrow will be over"

Tagore - 'My Worship of Sorrow'

My Tears

"The hush this evening seems to expect a footfall,
and you ask me for the cause of my tears.
I cannot give a reason why I weep,
for that is a secret still withheld from me"
-- Tagore : 'The Fugitive' --

'I, and Silence, some strange Race'

"I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,

And Mourners to and fro

Kept treading -- treading -- till it seemed

That Sense was breaking through --"

"And when they were all seated,

A service, like a drum --

Kept beating -- beating -- till I thought

My mind was going numb --

And then I heard them lift a box
And creak across my soul
With those same boots of lead, again,
Then Space -- began to toll;"

"As all the Heavens were a Bell,

And Being, but an Ear,

And I, and Silence, some strange Race

Wrecked, solitary, here --

And then a Plank in Reason, broke,

And I dropped down, and down --

And hit a World, at every plunge,

And Finished knowing -- then --"

 ~ 'I felt a funeral, in my brain' : Emily Dickinson ~

One of America's greatest poets, Emily Dickinson (1830 – 1886), led a life of self imposed seclusion. This offbeat lifestyle almost cut off from the society created an aura around her life and literature, often celebrated and romanticized after her death. Though she was shy in social situations her poems have an amazing capacity to move and provoke. Most of the time she spent in the family house in Amherst, Massachusetts and rarely met people from outside. Yet in the closet she was an artist and accomplished musician. A prolific writer, she wrote more than 1500 poems and countless personal letters to a chosen circle of close friends.

Emily Dickinson remained a reclusive spinster all her life  and died at the age of 55 from Bright’s disease, which was caused by kidney degeneration. Doctors opined that the accumulation of stress throughout her life contributed to her premature death.

She wrote hundreds of poems every year, yet never published a book of poetry during her life. Emily wished her poems to be burnt after her death. But her sister Lavinia ignored this request and handed them over to Mabel Todd and Terrence Higginson, Emily's long standing friends. Ms.Todd use to refer Emily as "a lady whom people call the Myth". With their help the first edition of Emily's poems were published in 1893 which was critically acclaimed all over the English speaking world.

Since 1900 Dickinson has remained continuously in print.

'Once more to think what it is I am remembering'

"I, too, often shrivel the grey shreds,
Sniff them and think and sniff again and try
Once more to think what it is I am remembering,
Always in vain. I cannot like the scent,
Yet I would rather give up others more sweet,
With no meaning, than this bitter one.

I have mislaid the key. I sniff the spray
And think of nothing; I see and I hear nothing;
Yet seem, too, to be listening, lying in wait
For what I should, yet never can, remember;

No garden appears, no path, no hoar-green bush
Of Lad's-love, or Old Man, no child beside,
Neither father nor mother, nor any playmate;
Only an avenue, dark, nameless, without end"

-- 'Old Man' : Edward Thomas --

Philip Edward Thomas (1878 – 1917) was an Anglo-Welsh poet.

To One in Paradise

"And all my days are trances,

And all my nightly dreams

Are where thy dark eye glances,

And where thy footstep gleams—

In what ethereal dances,

By what eternal streams!

Alas! for that accursed time

They bore thee o'er the billow,

From love to titled age and crime,

And an unholy pillow!

From me, and from our misty clime,

Where weeps the silver willow!"

-- 'To One in Paradise' : Edgar Allan Poe --