POETIC ME and MARY OLIVER

WISHING YOU ALL A GOOD DAY !!

This Morning I read couple of poems by my favourite poetess Mary Oliver a Pulitzer Prize winning poet –

My Mary Oliver‘s - collection, ‘Felicity’ and ‘Devotion’ !!

She describes in her poem ‘Varanasi’ with simplicity and elegance her moments of truth – the words, the allegory, the rhythm and the metre used are so beautiful . Her poetic narration of those moments with its simplicity - of deep devotional and rapturous emotions with stillness, quietness, and calmness of serenity with all its insights is just an expression of – Truth, God and Beauty

( Satyam Shivam Sundram ) at its best.

THE POEM –

VARANASI

Early in the morning we crossed the ghat,

where fires were still smouldering,

and gazed, with our Western minds, into the Ganges.

A woman was standing in the river up to her waist;

she was lifting handfuls of water and spilling it

over her body, slowly and many times,

as if until there came some moment

of inner satisfaction between her own life and the river’s.

Then she dipped a vessel she had brought with her

and carried it filled with water back across the ghat,

no doubt to refresh some shrine near where she lives,

for this is the holy city of Shiva, maker

of the world, and this is his river.

I can’t say much more, except that it all happened

in silence and peaceful simplicity, and something that felt

like the bliss of a certainty and a life lived

in accordance with that certainty.

I must remember this, I thought,

as we fly back to America.

Pray God I remember this.

The other two poems by Mary – were in fact expressions of intellectual rumination over the Devotional Mood – First THE WORLD WE LIVE IN and second - WHISTLING SWANS. Both after reading look like a classic work of Art.

THE WORLD I LIVE IN is a dialogue of rationality and Faith – and poet favours faith ……. If you have angel in your head – you will possibly see one !!

WHISTLING SWANS – This poem was very close to me in sentiments – to my poem – DEVOTION AND SELF KNOWLEDGE – THE TWO WINGS OF SARASVATI’S SWAN - which I composed a couple of months back for my forthcoming book of poems . Because of this, Mary’s poem resonated with my calling !! The Poems -

THE WORLD I LIVE IN

I have refused to live

locked in the orderly house of

reasons and proofs.

The world I live in and believe in

is wider than that. And anyway,

what’s wrong with Maybe?

You wouldn’t believe what once or

twice I have seen. I’ll just

tell you this:

only if there are angels in your head will you

ever, possibly, see one.

WHISTLING SWANS

Do you bow your head when you pray or do you

look up into that blue space?

Take your choice, prayers fly from all directions.

And don’t worry about what language you use,

God no doubt understands them all.

Even when the swans are flying north and making

such a ruckus of noise, God is surely listening

and understanding.

Rumi said, There is no proof of the soul.

But isn’t the return of spring and how it

springs up in our hearts a pretty good hint?

Yes, I know, God’s silence never breaks, but is

that really a problem?

There are thousands of voices, after all.

And furthermore, don’t you imagine (I just suggest it)

that the swans know about as much as we do about

the whole business?

So listen to them and watch them, singing as they fly.

Take from it what you can.

I hope it was a Good Read !!

Much Love –

Sudhanshu