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SCRIPTURE ON STONE

By

CHARU SHEEL SINGH

{ElMi?�

Adhyayun Publisher: & DistributorsNcwDelhn- H0002

Published byAD HYAYAN PUBLISHERS & DISTRIBUTORS

4378/48, 105, J.M.D. House, Murari Lal StreetAnsari Road, Darya Ganj, New Delhi�110002Ph.: 011-23263018, 011-23277156Fax : 011-23280028

E-mail: [email protected]

Scripture on Stone

© Author

[st Edition : 2007

ISBN-81-8435-019-8

Printed in India

Published by Hatish Chandra Yadav for Adhyayan Publishers &Distn'butorS, Laser Typesetting at Soitex Computers and Printed

at Tanm Oii�set Printers, .Delhi.

DEDICATED

TO

THE RUPTURES IN HISTORY

Foreword

Scriptures have become stones, and we too, who do notunderstand them. The hermeneutic quest though continuesstill. The vernal poems in this collection have autumnal tonesthat set us all as quest heroes. Movements forward in time,in very many vital ways, are movements backward by which

temporality is understood as history and culture is

experienced as a form of our tonal response to sensitive issuesthat effect man's ethical ambience. A cumulative loss of such

sensibility has, in turn, made us stones. The collection,therefore, is open-ended since the poems try to re-live historyin a neo-historicist modality of experience. Scripture is our

capacity to attain to the climaxes of imagination which mustbe transfigured on to a meta-apisteme which cannot onlycoalesce but also transcend. Scripture�s self-transcendenceis the essence of its figural lineamental wholes (mudras) thatit continually constitutes and evaporates in its journey tothe world beyond the word and the logos. The poems herere-constitutes a certain phenomenology of creativeconsciousness that appropriates and expropriates mediumsof expression and experience. The poems seem to suggestthat history�s interiors are defunct and the mainstreamdiscourses are manipulative versions of figures of

representation whose noema and noetic consciousness didnot really deserve the foregrounding and foreclosing intothe folio pages of history. Imagination definitely provides

viii

us accomodative biographies which we can re-interpret forourselves in order that the antique space evolves a kinshiprelationship with ourselves. Poems live or die to the extentwe make that space our own even though for a while.

Charu Sheel Singh

Contents

Dedication v

Foreword vii

1. Ram 1 - 21

2. Ravidas 22 - 31

3. Shabari 32 - 39

4~ Eklavya 40-475. Taj Mahal 48 . 556. Gandhi�ASa-iptétAScroll 56-63

7. Meera - 64 - 738. Buddha 74 . 879. Kabir 88 _ 9610. Ganga 97 . 108

Ram

Born in palatial rhythmswhose meter could not be

located Ram got intothis world or the world

got into Ram is history� 3unfiltered question sequester� dand isolated by itself unto

degrees unknown. The temporalsatiety made him breed

effigies of ideas thatcould never bear a fruit

on the tattered coat of humanitythat shrouded us all. I

Barricaded, jarred , and brokeninto the crimson solistice

of time�s endless fraternity,Ram revamped His being only asa vampire for the ladder Heshould have climbed up, He climbeddown as such.

It was time preceding itsown layers into a stillmore savage reality of beingthat the occasion for Vishnuto enter into Bhragu rishi�s

2 Scripture on Stone

ashram arrived. The devils had

catapulted the cosmogenic designinto ugly nets to catch the innocent

piety and jail it boxes closedand shut into eternity. Vishnu�s

patience overflow'd its own limitsin sullen times when prophetic wrathbroke into mountaneous zigsawpuzzles which were not tobe answered. The dustbin daredeliverryof religiously fake scoundrelsmade them escape into Bhragu�s ashramfor refuge. Vishnu pursued themlike a hawk riding the train to

eternity. The lady of the ashram,Bhragu�s soul-self and the rishi�s

perennial consort block�d Vishnu�s

way refusing to nudge evenas the God supreme threatenedto cut the filamental gloryofherfaceand lend ittothe

Proserpine below the remedial

portions of the earth.

Rishi�s wife preach�d Vishnuof protecting those who askfor asylum at which Vishnubroke into a jerky laughterthat became the seasonal humour

of the day. The God didn�t want

poaching and He could not beroasted either like pigmy falcons

upon the fire of monolithicconsciences. So He broke loose

chopping the head of the ladywho thought all religious virtue

tobehei�sasaright. Asthehead

Ram

fell upon sundry zonal transferabilityof sister locations, the sounds

spread wider than the noises

they submerged into the notorious

satiety of being.

Bhragu�s gestural posturesof sanmdhi got into the

navigational research whenhe found Lord Hari rocketinginterior sanctity of hisashram fold. Bhagru bowed inobeisance for the Lord

had come, seen as yet he hadnot the caterpillar fallof his wife�s head. The eyesbesmeared with tissues swollen

like mavericks on a monumental

stone, Bhragu glanc�d intothe wreckage of his own beingwhen he found his wife beheaded

by sudarshan, Lord�s holydisc that cuts as under to

pieces all misfits. Bhragu'sboundary of reason bade

goodbye to season and a

cursing galore ensued without

inhibiting walls that hadenormous bouqyets of gall.Vishnu appropriated the

tertiary body of curseswhich had a culture

tentacled at the bottomof every being. Vishnudid not let off the demons�meals both raw and cook�deven as He celebrated Bhragu�s

4

curvatured curse of gettingborn as Rama who must

suffer identical pangs of

separation as he himselfwas undergoing pained andforesaken.

If that augurs thebirth of a God, all

gods must have sinful

origins for tales likethat could be multipliedinto infinity caught in ashell. It was when

Dashratha enjoyed vital strokesof youthful majesty thathe went to jungles plunderinginnocent animals who had

a flesh identical to men.

Just as a culture breedsinertias of space sodoes it generate therefulcrum. The dove-like

dedicated though still young,a boy Shravan Kumar by nametook on his blind parentson a journey to pilgrimagein the forest regions thatwere our own body-flakes yieldingcakes if churned unto eternity.The chariot of the king of

Kings moved ahead on time�shorseback when Dashratha gotdown at a place soothing,

A calm and serene unto infinity.It was here Dashratha

mortgaged fiery wings

Scripture on Stone

Ram

if his imagination tothe airy colds that freeze

mortality to death. ShravanKumar�s filling of the

pitcher became a historyof tears when the gurglingsound made itself into

the semblance of an animalwhom Dashratha shot at

without a knowledge of his

being. Shravan�s bodilytropes became a choirthat one only wept singing.He could not quenchthe thirsty tongue of .his blind parents whothen- cursed Dashratha intoan agony that couldnot be escaped.Dashratha�s marital adventures

made trilogy a themethat grew into a vision of

quadruple concerns withRama setting the limitsof paradise and Inferno both.Rama grew up in shadeand shower into thebower that kingdoms areall about. But in theconflict between theritual of desire andthe completion of cosmogenicsublimation, the fettersenlumed all and rang upto the ears of godsand goddesses who then

6

decided to make it

into a war.

Brahmanic rituals yieldedh�tde but a wastage of

grain, butter and milkwhich the rishis did not

pmduce though made their

right to pull. V'shwam itrathe sage smitten by misdeedsof devils begged for godlyhelp as his ritualistic

leperhoire could notdrive away the army of devils.Vishwamitra�s sanctuary requesta: Dashratha did not goa begging and the kingocmsented to the

saintly desire which Timelamented as an earthen pot� sfire. Yagyans are oblationsfrom the self to the Self;the Idea gave in to theexercise and what would

have been became otherwise.Vishwamih'a� s initiation of

Rama and taxmana lasted 1111 the

caterpillar images of eternitywere made monolithic zones

out of cocoon-strawberies that

could not defoliate what was

exfoliated.

Vishwamih'a's ritualistic

euphoria shaped portfoliocamera of Rama's beinginto military kinship relationswhere devils had to leave

Scripture on 510��

Ram

places for vernacular songsto stay and survive. Sages�showcase of desire bred

nostalgias again into foraysthat could no more be ~

debunked by shallow armiesof reason. It was an

era Ram inaugurated inthe courtyard bosoms ofthe nativity of tonguesthat should no more be

sliced into apertures offorsaken gimmickery of

gold.Time made the history ofsin loom large over the

canopy of flesh and Dashrathacould not condescendinglywait upon the endless zigsawpuzzles of life. The king� 5saturated love for Kaikeyeeoverflow� d the limits of

patience when she made the king~ yield to the boon he promised

and dance to the lyreshe made of ironic desire

singing tunes that wouldre-live death into the memoryof a bygone flesh. Dashratha�s

voluptuous canon did no

good to the familial zone of

destiny which was out forruins that no one could

bring back to progeny.Ram was not a volitional attributeof metaphorical inscape thatglides through the slip

8

of mental cobwebs. He was

a simple poetry of commonsense belief where magnanimityitself begs for a questionor two. The up�side-downand the down-side-up images ofhis being junctured at identical

points where from the path to

eternity was never in doubt.Sita followed suit and Laxmanainto the jungles they hadneither created nor deserved to

go in. Fathers cannot be .faulted and the sons must

obey till the doldrum upbeatsof life enmeshes them

into a frenzied existence of

its own. The godly and devilishcanons have always run counterto the galaxial climaxes ofthe seasons. One must finish

the hoary foxes of a daysooner than later for the

good to survive and permanentlystay.It finally tumulted whenthe logarithms of reasonoutwitted the house of patienceand Laxmana cut asunderthe yawning desire of

Soopanakhan who wanted tobe his land of dreamsin a perfidy of well-plannedscheme. Minor genesis becomesa major coup. The princes�torrid time made them

Scripture on 51501�

Ram

earn their bread and

painstakingly life renew.The pituary glands swelledwhen the crocodile emptiedits shell and enquiredinto the time of a day.In a glossy afternoon thedevil became a deer of

silken gold with Sita

endearingly revampedin memory asking Ramto fetch her one else whowould be a sad story.Rama was her beloved�s loverand lover� s beloved too.

He could not forsake the

churlish song of cuckooed

melody that aired Sita�swish to be there where

she might never have thought;mental pilgrimages boomrangand often decamp with necklaces

anyone would betterhadn�t got. Rama�s searchfor the entropied deer madehim frisk into forest-beds

that lad shrunken rivers

and ponds without water;the devil shrilled into a

grating sound which Sita

thought was Rama�s own. Her

anguish got into swarmingflies that crowed the bodyand mind mime. Laxamana could

not believe Ram to be where

Sita thought He was; his refusal

10

to depart brought a critiqueof lemon and sugar that Laxamanacould not gallop, so he drewthe adverbial line of sanctitycrossing which Sita mightmeet the disaster.

Histories are made and unmadeeven when godsakes are heroes;villainy devours us all andwe become a slave to agony.Sita�s girdle of playbecame a frying pan ona day when Ravan picked uplow-time and projected it as

high threading the brahminknot upon Sila�s magnanimitynigh. Cultural climaxesare goary debacles too andRavana�s brahmin nomenclature

befitted the theme of revengethat makes a simple narrativeinto a dramaturgical play.Ravana uplifted Sita

beyond the adverbial lineof sanctity which could notwithhold its adjectival claims.

Heights, depths and diametricaldistances echoed 'Sita�slamented cries into the wildernessof being. Rama�s journey backto the cottage found Him lostand dead beyond the cornersof eternity. Laxamana felt

conscience-pricking withinand the pain in his joints

Scripture on Stone

Ram

bmloe the continental harmonybeyond repair. Site's loss wastoo deep for team and the outside

forestry became the intemal

mayhem. Sim wept to thetunes where sea-depthsbeam to jungle inw agony:3Rama's godliness begged aquestion which was less

howery and more throny.Sita's empyrean gatewayb heaven Rama could not preservenor Laxamana who both cried invain �m self's tuneless domain

to discover Sita where

she never ever was. Ravana�s

joy blighted into the chimesof the clouds of jealousyand he tore apart the silken

gym of nuptial normativityreading into the shorelessclimaxes of cruelty. ForRam the day became a submergedcloud which said nothing while the

night hung its wires upon mountain

valleys. The mad-strife had

begun with a heart as deep-striken and grief-gottenas the parrot in a tapestryof years.Raina'a meandering pathwaysthrough the jungle did not

get across it. Ravana�s sugar-creamed body though hadsucceeded in hiding wellthe salt within, Evil junctures

ll

12

carry a good of its own kindwhile the good always standsin need of proving its existentialstories right. Ram could nothave given up the searchfor �Ra� is the Sun which endlesslysubstitutes itself while 'ma�makes the twin shores mergeinto eternity, the namesakeof a mother which groundscalm serenity. The Sun�s ownblindness begot questions too

deep for history to answer.The sun became a nomadic tribe

crying hoarse in shrubs thattorture.

Ravana�s gay ambience shookSita�s body of tears. Shewas a goddess though imprisonedin a valley of fears. Rama�s

godly stances said nothingnor conveyed answers tothe conundrums life had

become. One is better as

a man ifnota god for both

get dumped and duped bycavalcade designs that

only future can tell.

The extra-paced meetingbetween the suffering godand the limrick of eternitywas a propulsion towardsa conclusion. Hanuman gotall over the desanctified earthto locate Sita�s globalshreds into the palmistry

Scripture on Stone

Ram

of Rama�s hands. If God haddecamped with His godly googlyball, Hanuman restored itwith his mighty scroll.Sita was a script Ram hadto write and write againfor self-completion. Hanuman

got the fooiage right when He

got the paper and the penciltight. Scourging, Kicking,thrashing around localzones of the ground Sitawas resting on, Hanumansent the terror-waves

into the devilish corridors of

conscience. The mightywarrior of ancestral races .

would have ran through theRavana clan but for the

assigned burdens of the taskHe did not dismantle thedevils� portfolio Hask.He dropped the ring whichSiia wept to look at.Rivers outsoard their stickingshores while gruesome seas

salty and deep tasted the

sugar of love into the emotionalcascades of gaiety.Sita�s deadline to Ramato come and take her

back was climbing on the

bamboo-pole with no earthto uphold. The joy begotworry while the worry did not

get back to joy but multiplied

13

14

its tantrums of deceitfulfolios that have neither

heart nor even a ghettomorality that could give a

pseudo-sanctuary of roseS.Rama�s army of monkeysand a handful of other

jockeys made it absurdityof a war. Ram remainedan unclaimed brochure which

whose vemaculars no one

got into. If it was nota vernacular god the storywould have got intoanother kind of glory.As the God could notsubsume windy chariots ofHis being into a flightOver the depths of the highSeas, He gave telic lessonsto birds, squirrels, stonesand inebriated wings oftottering imagination. Stonesfloated while birds laid to1'est their own balmy nestsmortgaging all to Ram atheirLord and keeper of selves.God failed to bridge theyawning gap that posted�IUestions t0 Eternity. IfSelf-sustainability downtreadsPathways 0f being, who thenis the SaViOlll' and theheart's queen?0rice across the sea011 the platonic body of

Scripture on Stone

Ram

devilish debility, Ram waitedunto the limits of His patienceand that of Ravana planningsurgery of the checkmatedland which could not digestthe godly presence. Maritimeshores in the pond withinthe eateries of the selffell splinterless on the

canopy of the seasons whenHanuman burnt to ashesthe silken fabric and the goldenroses Genealogy became a victimof its own nursling nurserythat depunctured into an

anti-galaxial mode of being.Demons rushed one after theother 1:) catnh the monkey menacethat became a contagion of

thought even as everythingwas distraught. The concubine

debility of Meghnath surfacedafter a score of devils�deaths. Hanumana got beserkand His play image suckedthe greenery of enemy�s blood;Meghnath experimenmd with

'nagpash� and Hanuman gotchained in obeyance tothe God who held the breathof the girdle the Monkey-Godwas in.

Devils are a cut acrossthe framing zone of Time;their debility derives fromthe loss of reason that

brings them treason. The firein the tail got devils� mind

15

16

into a barricading jail. TheLanka of gold catapulted intothe doledrums of intermediaryfolds that made the earth

into a reality paradigmof ashes molten and sold.

It was Rama's turn now

to reach the circle of

Destiny as Ravana toocould not have prolongedthe perfedious zone ofreason. As encounter betweenTime sacred and profanegot ready in full crimson

glory for death couldnot have done better thandie a thousand times to savour

graces which every bodycould say were �mine.� Thearrows flew all round evenas the two armies kickedand croaked upon eachother. Hanuman pelteddensities of monumental

stone upon the chemical

jargon of the soldiersof mortality who wereall laid to rest in

a lineage that wasfever-fret and a wheels

rattling rut. Remedialstructures were not

built over mental sanctuaries

that did not exist in the

devilish camp. Thecircle of reason had evaporated

Scripture on Stone

Rum

into clouds that neverrained. Ram could do no

better than kill Ravana

for the good to surviveand evil taint.

The sacred apertures ofSita's sanctified beingrose from the brazen therapyof seasons into the chimingshores of eternity thatRam was. The God-incarnate

now decided to decampSita�s linear figures intoa vertical zone of

conscience that cried hoarse

into normativities not

Rama�s own. Morality fixturesare not clandestine horse-

races that one wins or loses

in the notoriety of time.The socially-cultured fabricsof Rama�s being made himlove. what He should have

hated. Familial bonds arenot forms of expositorycommentaries; they are toosacred to be discussed even.

Ram could not follow ideal-

tops of this story; he followed

systematic folds endlessand crooked that made His

life hoary. The candle�beliefin Sita�s departure tofire solves less, multipliesmore into spaces that are

Yet to be habitated. An ideal

I?

18

Ram would better have provedthe burden of His own

sanctity before raising a

finger upon Sita's devotionalzone of being.Rama�s self-chanting within

got Him wrong-footed; the briersof his sacred vehemence

dislodg�d gears of curlyprotests from Hanumanaand others. Rama forsook

identical chords of

His being to the publiccanvas of morality whichis rotten from within.

Washerman�s cry was system�sand not his own; Ramadid not break the puzzling mazeof inverted utopias elseHe would have saved gracesof womanhood and its

purity. That was not tobe and Siia�s settlement

in the crocodilish forest

got her into a tenementof flesh that even time

detested to devour.

Lone in the suburbs thatbranch into myriad intermediaryways, Sim�s rest intoa rishi�s ashram gave hera platform of some sort;she gave birth to thetwo shores of eternitythat would get the blocks

right on top. Scriptural

Scripture on Stone

Ram

songs defeat their owncocktails of glory for theyare death ceaseless and

fathoms beyond mortality.Rama�s marketed fidelityto the social being gotHim into prisons He wouldnever have desired. He

muld not preach othersto put their houses in order;He sold one of His own inmarkets that never see the

lightof the day.Ram's mortgaged flightsbred nothing but obituariesof self that de-links itselffrom cosmic essences ofeternal peace. Untuterableas He was Ram made a Sitaof gold to releaseherbal poison from His

being. Imagined cocoonsdo supplement a worldof reality but not

graciously enough forthe object created is stillnot the object begotten.Ram�s sky�rocketing criesdeaden and slacken body-pores into inertias of space;Will the gold stick to itslustre or crack its enamelin indefinite trace? Historyis a barge and body thevernacular vessel with a

oonscienoe. Will someone

19

20

standardize morality rhythmsfor a Ram to becomeHis own Husband? Gurudomis not a sign-play of

self-consuming rules that

apply on others alone. The

inspiring whip to the

vagabond body of ritualrules must get a placefor Site without exercisesfor her clone.

'

Ram's journey back tothe city of His originswas a lacklusture cake of

submerged memories that .never fructified. The bloomingflowers became buds againand severely died. His ascendenceto the throne-an architecture

of stone-was a pigmy experiencethat had bottoms without

sublunary walls. Ram�s

petalbd glory of beingrested in Sin: His heartbeat;the king again had mortgagedHis conscience to the filthywinds that only breed contagiousdiseases. The individual

cannot be ablated tn the

foul fire of social nausea.

A caressing brushing of the

subject can let live a thousand

systems else the systemsare their own empyrean deaththat hget morning: in thename of nostalgias.

Scripture 01: Stone

Ram

The exterior Ram had lost

to the interior Ram and the

fabric facade of degeneratedsymbols could not bring Sitaback. Ram�s maddening criesand volatile searches made Him

into an earthquake of sortswhich could not be pacifiedexcept when Ram becamea sea again. Sita refusedto get back to where Ram wasfor her linear glory was soldon the pseudo-pyres of

sanctity. She was earth-bomand to one�s origin one mustreturn. Rama�s implorationswithin the cauldron of His

being belched fire incessantlybloody-red and crimson-gore;Ram�s loss of Himself to

'

Himself brought to drudgeryHe would better have escaped.The masterly wizardry overtwelve kalas and a concomittant

rudder of eight siddhis and ninenidhis made Ram still undergothe cruel cyclicity of

suffering. If karmas constitute

quintessential gems of anecklace life, one would better dothem than follow the system;karmas though can also be imposedand not necessarily bred; wouldOne answer this to inauguratea still gruesome new wisdom.

Ravidas

Slushy gardens ofcucumber self could

not have fathom�d

the interior depths ofa filthy rubbish thatthe boar ate even before

it held the tumingearth on the muzzlingtissues of its tusks !

Python snake or thecobra raised its fangslike valleys in the dark

deep shallow land thatforsook its identity notionsbefore mountainous regionsthat stood afar and beneath

like modern day rock-stars.

The genetic filamental mirrorshowed nothing but grew intoan effigy of its own mockerythat salvaged nothing-neitherthe system which became an

empty bolus nor theself which did not arrive

at all. Narratives precede

Ravidas

their own extinctintual idolatoryof seasons in search of

meanings permanently implanted.Ravidas became a cobbler byvirtue or vice that he

perforated in his yesteryears.

The bed-roll of timeenfolds cultural bed-rocksthat only bring tearsinto the global balls thatare in the eyes. Krishnait was who in thefreedom of self-joy and

into the sacred precinctsof Chetanand's Ashram where

the Yadav Rishi offered

Him Khichan� of love�

an inter-mixture of divine

consanguinties into thehuman territory of fresh.

As Krishna galloped the meal�mto the sanctity of heavenly breath,Dronacharya meditated upon Himfor a call. Krishna ran beserk

and reached where Drona was.

Looking at the Khichari-laoedhands of Earl, Drona

broke the earthly silenceand asked if all was well.Krishna�s hands approach thosewho need them leave alone Draupadiand the poor elephant whocried for help in the crisisof their being and God was thereto shame the scene.

24

Drona�s lack-lustre horizons

that shaped his interior

design could neither possessnor get into the extentialessence of Krishna�s foraysinto truth. Drona became a

burning ball as if a sub-divisional clerk getting offhis duty in anger. He

jostled Krishna down intohis own doctrinaire deceit

telling the God of His

pumpkin defilement as Hehad taken meals at aShudra's place.Krishna mocked and zeroed in

Drona for the empty cobwebhe was caught in for God nevermade the leaf or a petalof flower separate fromH'm being. Ego-centricallyerect, Drona went to Duryodhanawho, to sea-drown Guru�s

anger called Vishnu for justice.Chetanand and Drona invokedthe golden image of Vishnuin the hope that He wouldcome to the devoutly piouslap of glory wherever that

might be.

Drona�s invocatory rhymescould not usher a plant tothe surface of his own stonydesire which marginalised itself

by the crude feeling vesselthat he had become. Chelnnand

Scripture on Stone

Ravidas

invoked with the whisper of windystrokes that chime the placewhere Vishnu lives. Out of the

idol of gold Vishnu went

beyond the deserts of eternityinto the wholesome heart of

Chetanand killing disputeswith the bullets of his

fiery imagination. Krishnaappeared again on the

gliding statue of devotionallove projecting Chetanandthousands of years forwardon the roll of time. It was

Chetanand who put on the

garments of Ravidas�a Yadu rishiknown as a cobbler for reasons

history would not explain.The genealogical floweringupstaged its loom in time whenSoor Sen was born in the seventeenth

pilgrimage after Yadu whobecame an engraving unto eternity.Yadu generations� thirty-eighthpillar was Chanvar Sen in whose

lineage later was born Harinandthe grandfather of Ravidas.

Raghu the father and Karma themother chiselled the vessels of theirfilamental body into ahabitable tenement of flesh.Narada appeared with his

atemporal lyre singingragas whose spiritual notesdrove the dark under the sea

lighting lamps in the

26

corners of bones and arteriesof Regina and Karmawho scorched their bodytill the time the legacymight begin from within.

Duryodhnm and Drone burntin rage as Chennand's

pedigreed lineage had wageda horde of nerves withPamshram whose ego-centreswere bi-polar zones ofthe earth and the sky.As Parnshram'a anger burstinto unredeeming flameshe cursed Chetnmnd's familyfolio to become Shudras�the designation Chamar Senand Yadus were thereafter known.

Whenhr'storyoouldnotsearchiorredempu�onintheenlumingpagesdbmhemgitweptaveriisdesu�nycreamgavaccuminitsongoingrhydrm. HistorybowedibheadandMuslims

mgendereddrespeciescicivility butcheringcollagesr'naothedriedbonesoltrees. Sikandar

putRaidasinjnr'lfornotgettingproselytised;Krishna cameblu�m in

irorybldsofekeleton ,thought gifting grace:that put asunder hoodlum.

Scripture on Sign:

Ravidas

The muslim king reducedthe icon of his basement

plan to be appliedelsewhere. He begged for

forgiveness that was

granted for Raidas surfacedall over-from the airynothings to the mightestwar.

Chitborgarh queen summonedluminous spaces to askif Raidas would accepther metalic garland oflove and respect. It wasin her court that Raidas

was uplifted to gloriesthat could not be written.Brahmin priests though andothers of their thoughtrivetted to shrunken suburbsof the queen�s mind which

they likened to a bankruptzone. Brahmins� refusal to

dine with Raidas madehim dine with each oneof them in a distinct gameof seasons where one centre

multiplies into peripheralzones that acquire a centralityof their own.

The medieval layers ofKashi�s consciousness couldnot till the fallow landthat they had beware. Itwas a panegyric or the 1055f it is not known. History

27

28

stood to be corrected whenRaidas floataed Shiva�tin gason the distilled waters of

self-purity while lingasof chaste baptised foolshastened to drown deepinto the Ganges for those

imposers marketed sanctityon the skiddy beaches of anihilistic conscience.

Meera�s cogitated rainbow

being broke open the doorsand windows of her princelycanopied existence. Her surfacesof desire became ideationaldreams that led to the

kingdom of God within. Meera�ssearch for guru was amle interchanged costumesin euphorias of soulfulhve and sensuous budgetryof seasons. Broken and

torn, solitary and forlorn,Meera met destiny in the

breaking of her footwearwhich she requested Raidasto sew and save her from smear.Raidas saw beyond horizontal binariesinto elemental destiny. He

promised to sew the chappalas well as her being forshe had loitered enoughmasked and marred by devilishwheel of desire which went

beyond a centre and a

periphery-

Scripture on Stone

Ravidas

Kabir and Gorakhnath toohad the timbre of their

tempestuous zone open becauseof the Ashwattha tree that

' Ravidas was. The skin-saint

one the Kaya of Kabir intoa logical sunlime that went

beyond the reaches ofthe mind. The disciplesof Ramanand tore open the

puzzling chords of nauticalexistence that elopeswith the lady called theformless content, Nirakarasaints demolished canonsof sakara and sagunafor that entailed rococorituals that cyclically climbon the tree that is man

in a rapshody of shame.Canons are limberjack ideasthat lick their tongueon the chessboard ofa voluptuous mind which hasfomicabed with powera thousand times in the

hope of a retrieval intothe power sublime.Kashi is the caste-

menageric of coxcombed menwho uphold it as megroom of us all. WhenRaidas had a dip inthe Ganges, brahmins askedhim his caste. Raidas wasnot a pigmy of thought

30

nor a cocoon shred of smittenlarva of earth-worms thatsuck the blood without a

foreknowledge of cause.Raida�s reply shutthe canonised brahmins�

glottis epilepsy of images;Raidas was a Yadava whoseancestors went back to

Krishna, Yayati and Yadu;he himself was religion�smoving gentility of essence.Raidas made lotus offeringsof love on the temple that

�

he thought was the human

body. The inner candlesof knowledge shall cutacross local properties ofintimidating desire. God'3 one but forms multiple,why not preserve them allh get beyond the cradle?

Tradition made Raidasa scriptural saint ofmum�coloured shoes; he

enjoyed the hue and thelinen that coated ourbodies brever sunken!Raidas would donatefootweam to brahminswhose teat had brazenbronzes crankling a;if under the floors ofthe sea. As he could�Of go in the GangesOnce he begged a brahmin

Scripture on Stone

Ravidas

to offer rice-chucklesto the mother. Just whenthe brahmin floatedRaidas�s name on his

caricatured sliding tongue,Ganges gave back a bangleof gold to be given tothe uncouth Raidas. Rapturelessons bridged rupturousbodies wherev�r they laidtheir fountain-head oftruncated desire. Religionisnotasystem butalivingtissue that we must all encase

and bathe in. Raidas couldnot be killed by the dalitsof thought; humiliated thoughand vanquished ever, Raidasmade history live forever.

31

Shabarl

She was born ofa forest tree and

a flowing river intothe mountains high andditches nigh ! The

sagacity of devdar treesand the crystal transparencyof rivers had made Shabari

an innocent milk-cake

that was never tasted but

by the self-consuming fires

getting volatile for a

glimpse of Lord Ram.

The grammar of civilitythey said she knew notfor her tribal originshad made her a �Lucy� ofsort. The monogamic shudra

entropy was not bizarrebut a sprung cloud of mortalitythat hid the gem thatshe was. Winding waysas zig-saw puzzles broke notinto open skies; narrativesbecame secretive beyond the

Shabari

cacophony of seasons into aritual of desire that never

took place.The grammarians do notknow Shabari�s youth nor

parentage; they only know herto be a shudra girl whowas grown old as if outof sin. Rishi Matanga�sdisciple lived in Ashramacorridors that were crocodile�sden for the rulers of civility.Shabari became an ugly sculpturefor the speedsters of culturewho sold God on the markets

of London while New Yorkwaited in abeyance and abandon.Her body joined pilferagedthat never substantiated them-

selves out of the rubbish sheherself was as they thought.Wordsworthian 'Lucy� junkedthe senile doors of her crookedfate into Blakean �Chimney�Sweeper� �a child we "gavebirth to but only todisown. Shabari was the

composite fruit of society�scollective being who wantedan ushering but was uprootedeven before she could

bloom. Desiin�d canopiesshroud petals in the effortsof their dreams. Monoliths are

chunky tattooes of thought thatcannot forbid destin�d waysthat are wrought.

34

Earthquake images eruptedin Rama's being as Hesearched for Sita within

the pores and filamentsof his body. Leafy forestslook�d sleepy, denuded anddead for God became

mad without His own

image that would have

begun a genealogy ofnarrative over the planetarybodies, earth and skythat would have rested then

in their creative fulcrum high.Tlmt was not to be

and Rama the would-be

King wander� (1 through theforest as if in a ringwithout wings that adove would fly withinto the heights of alimitless sky. Rama andHis brother wept all over

asking stones, trees,briers and bees if Sita

was ever seen. Negativesatiety jeapordised smallchunks of hope withinthat were lost as winds to

the ephemeral world.

Rama could not but continue

the search in the junglesof His own memory whenHe reached Matang Rishi�s ashramwhere Shabari had the weightupon her of a million of

Scripture on Stone

Shabari

years which could disappearonly with the Skylarkcontours of Rama�s being.Rama searched for Sita as

Shabari enunciated endless

ages into His image thatwould fructify a day. Timeas Bhairava zeroed in like

an old man with a stick in

his hand asking Shabarito renovate inertias of spacefor the groom had comeand endless had been the

waitings.

Rama�s arrival did not

evoke drum-beat but surelya cultural retreat for the

deserted street spoke volumesthat love could only devourand transcend into a localitywith a new errand. Shabari

could not compound the foldedfolios of her being asthe epiphany had comeeven at the hermitage thatwas a slum. Shabari�s

meandering run went beyondthe reaches of the sun for

her God had arrived within

the notoriety of the sensesfive.

Shabari was a dalit, adown-caste lady withan inverted uphill; Ramawas a Kshtriya god seekingSita~His heart beat in

%

the shrubberies of His

mind where Shabari was

found stealing a coupleof nuptial threads thatwent across the breast

of Rama�s tertiary foldsof silence. Puzzled still,Shabari became a scriptureon the stony walls of her

being that divinely movedin a million of years inthe agony of love andthe berries of tears.

The berries that Rama

ate were smitten, as if

by a devilish sorceressof love who went blind

and did not know the offeringand its kind. Rama foreknewfrom the surreal cores of

His enlightened being whatShabari was all up to.Berries were her tears broken

into the tokens of a necklace� memOry that would jinglerhymes enchanting agesbeyond eternity. Laxmana couldnot know the essence

of religion beyond the garbageof caste-season-a reasonwithout rationale and aseason without acupuncturinggall.

Sage Matting/s ardentdisciple widespread intothe hermitage corners of

Scripture on Stone

Shabari

her being could not believethe surface she stood

on for the moisture in

her eyes made her changeinto a marvellous rainbow

of multi~coloured dyesthat can only stiffen intosilken embroidery of themolten gold from paradise.Shabari became a hill-topwherefrom she showed Rama

I

the Kishkindha rangeswhere Hanumana lived as

the source-key to the

discovery of the earth-goddesswhose seperation from Ramahad made Him pea-nuts,barleys and rice that nevercook'd in the pyramidial .

- being that Rama had become.

If contraries are to '

become saving graces in the

genital proportion of being,love should etch and carve

its figural lineamental bodyinto the temple heights ofthe soul that ever shall be.

Shabari and Rama are

swings of a pendulum where. what one sees, the other

Cannot see. Dalit talesbreed malignancy pocketshighly-bred narratives neednet impinge even thoughthey might have created them;Shabari was a tribal and

3:7

38

a shudra too who outsmarbed

history� 3 piercing shafts

changing herself into a

galaxy of stardom nest.

Valmiki the first poetand Shabari the lone poetessof love were shudm incarnates;Kevat did not Lag behind inthe legacy that was majority.Yet Tulsi found them no

better but good for clubbingalone and lynching. Enoughwater had flown down the

Ganges; the river wept overits progenital burdens anddecided to sink below and

beneath the hanging gardenswho still are sourced in the

mental jewellery we more disfigurethan make unlike a shaman in

search of divinity mansions.

Was Tulsi a poet-freak,the lack-lustre humour ofseasons who could never

get to the essence ofreason? The voluptuous ligamentsof his being had once madehim into a hawk who pickednothing but the cold mortality offlesh in bizarre accidentsof carnal love. The beloved�s

fiery censor on Tulsi did makehim a shudm after all. If Tulsicould transubstantiate thenShabari too must not have

gotten behind the roots of the

Scripture 011 Stone

Shabari

trees that clutch. Tulsi�s

social vision was still a python�smonth while Shabari�s was as endlesslyliberating cacophony of tears.

Humility has always won overthe crow-consciences whosoever theymight be. If Tulsi could

scarifice his all for Rama

why could he not abandonthe sacred portions of his beingto the inbreathings of life whereall is Rama whatever you see?

Eklavya

Eldavya sucked tribal

simplicity with a forward glanceupon his native chords of

identity. The loving treesthat grew around and bushes that

encircled his being neverforesook their greengardener� s infancy for himnor prohibit spontaneity tobe jeopardised into a malignantpool of water.

When Eklavya grew into the

rhyme and rhythm of a

sky-rocketing tree straightand simple, he sent hisarroWs to eternity fromthe rainbow of his beingthat was a pleateau ofall assimilated conscience.

Eklavya was guilty of a

jargon that was civil, distinctwith a nomenclature of its own.His cluttering bones eruptedinto shows that the gluttonouscivility could hardly inbreathe.

Eklavya

Temple melodies became shudra callsfor misogyny that could notsucceed into the growth ofdevdar trees.

Eklavya�s shots into

peripheries divine madehis arrows burdened with

songs on a tyre that remained

unsung. If beauty and lovecould see themselves for what

they were, they would notencroach upon ratios who

by mistake became gurus gruesome.The hery pots of Eldavya�spious mortality of beinglimpingly went into the sacrilegouslysacred ashram of gum Drona

begging for tutelege thatcould not fructify for historyitself had become a harlot

and a witless dunce hittingEklavya with its severe punch.Trees do have their correspondingroots just as river-beds have their

quagmirish folds of shudra silences;Eklavyas and Dronas have identical

origins in the chilling windmillof a life ever on the run; earthysimplicity cannot eat some one�s fleshinto the dustbins of a classy

� mess. Guru�s denial for pupilagemade the universal rest withinthe shady shrouded localityof being wherefrom one hasexists not available to mindsobscene.

41

42

The rambling wheel ofhistory did not allowfor a footage into its

temporal folds even thoughYadu kshatriyas kidnappedglory by creating a historyrather than being created

by it. Drona�s refusalcould not limit devotional

sounds of hymns Eklavya sang;pupil's fidelity and

tearing zones ofbelief in Drona made

guru a bricollage of sortsfor his guruttva was gone to

Eklavya while the grassyearth of his beingdovetailed with Pandavas.

Imaging is a linen ofmulti-coloured hue

while perception is a

blockage into empiricalmodes of reality that

only makes monolithsthe supple tangible ways.The mud-icon glaredwith life-elements

that brought graces from

eternity scales of justicetranscend their own periodicityinto the tiny shredsof pastured suburbsthat foresake not thecommitted nor devourthe intentional prodigathof his ideational existence.

Scripture on Stone

Eklavya

Gumttva emanates as much out

of the lotus-folio of a

guru �5 being as it circumambulatesthe non-perfedious localesof zonal consciousness. Eklavya�sguru was Drona for sure andthe pupil could digestno more on this score. Drona .

did not know the ions ofelectric wobbling nor didhe feel the pulse ofterrestrial bodies where

guruttva resides. Unawareof changing courses jinglebells chime and reach intohe saw Eklavya once

arrowing his energy towards

impiety and non-cosmogenicself. Drona could not

believe what the tendrils of his

eyes saw. Anxiety and mistrustmade him stand on a

crust that could have falleneven before it could

itself erect.

Nunnery pot-wholes chipp�dinto arcadias of Drona

who felt fallen, denuded

and deforested within his own

mental gates of memorythat could neither enliven him

nor resuscitate. In a

crimson anguish that couldhave become bloody-redany whisper of the momentDrona summoned Eklavya to

44 '

Scripture on Stone

enquire of his guruthat made him the invinciblethat he was.

Drona�s winged chariotflew below its own

surfaces when Eklavyaunplummeted the sacreddecor of his guru�swisdom that was none other

than Drona's own. Congeriesof space became reddishand blew as Drona�s cauliflower

being in anger flew. Hehid the rancourous pathologyin the corridors of his mind,when he saw his own mud-

image he became astonishineg blind.

Belief is a bride beautiful

and sauve; it seeks its groomin the devotional hymns ofVedic glory. Drona� sunseasonal worry concemedthe leafy wine of his

gurudom for Arjuna to

stay at top, Drona mustnurture Eklavya� s flop.Sincerity mocked soulful

mngibility of its own

rhythm. The devdar treethat Eklavya was couldsacrifice to flames

his knowledge and beingif so desired.

Guru�s crow ideas becamean effigy of gurudom for

Eklavya

Drona had neither the willnor the courage to drill

Arjuna in a war of attritionwhich would have clearlybrought the sedition. Afraidof lurking clouds� dangerouspathways to the lovelinessof Truth, Drona ask'dfor guru-dakshina which,whatever, Eldavya could not serve

relegated Guru into a historical dark.Submission beyond knownlimits of thought and disciple�sself-loss in Guru made Eklavyamad in devotion. History againbecame a harlot as Drona

begged for Eklavya'sarrowing thumb. Gurudom

wept into shame as Saraswatisunk below depths thatthe earth stands upon.Guru is not the nameof a shrub that is

thorny to others; gumis a lotus canopy thatshowers umbrella petalswithout distinction or

gore. Drona lost thediamond gold of a momentin history which wouldhave made him immortal; hiscompany of Kauravas didhim no good but drownedhis name in the winds� chill.

Eldavya offered hisblood-ridden thumb in

46

the full devotion of hisconscience. Drona didn�t

groan in pain as he hadnone. The protagonistof history became a lizarddriven to smokes of time.

History rolled back as consciencehad died on the snow-mountains

that never melted into the

soul-fountains. Drona gotthe thumb and Eklavya bledin more senses than one.

His sinuous origin did himno good and his surrenderexceeded limits of all

known truth. History� 3bhck dungeons often crowdlocalities of truth. The

difference between Shahjahan�sbutcher-y of mason�s handsand Eklavya�s cutting of thumbresides only in thisthat the one ordered butcherywhile the other begged for it.The unsung heroes becamevictims of system�s cardinalratios and of their own

perfections in art. Artcannot live in kings or

politics-wedding guru�srudderless wings; it is

humility in total�a magnanimitythat caused Christ� 3 sacrifice.

Eklavya had a mothertoo and a father but

guru�s place is a

Scripture on Stone

Eklavya

self-sketch unto eternity.The mother dreamt of Everest

glory of arrowed regionsfor the labours of his son;she shrank in petrifieddooms day while the fatherbecame a statue of stone.

Eklavya did not know his

moorings, became a deaf anddumb who would ever remaina motless crumb never hopingto get back his thumb.

47

Taj Mahal

Are you the capillaryconscience Taj? Whose

palace, destiny what?

Mumtaj begot fourteenvemal flowers from the

depth of her being but

beauty became a chimeraand the game of alost scene. Bouquets are

many, Mumtaj is one-simple,separate like an icechocolate on the mountain

top.

Glories are not begottenbut born within. They cannot

by camels of desert comparablelandscape swans glidingon the exteriors of

water that all of us are!

When memory and love joinour inbreathings with thosethat get out from our ~.genealogical surfacesconstituted thousands of

Taj Mahal

years before, history takesa look on itself and

changes into forms ofmolten gold and silvery lyrethat upstages bamboo-polesthat shroud the nuptial beingthat is Mumtaj.Shah Iahan combined thelover and the husband

maintaining necessary portfolio� distances that go to churn

poems out. One doesn�t growas a poet; the processbecomes the poem somewhereon the middle of theroad or at its end-corners.

If beauty is hung like

necklace-pearls on the

golden beams of desire,love would become thehther cuckoo singingchurlish songs of empyreandays.Love connects nothing with

nothing as the Upanishad syas.We know little of narrative

songs that Mumtaj sang or

wept over. Did she liveher liie or that of Sare-

Iahan�s Shah Jahan is prettyunsure hr the Tajthat she wore could bea capsuled captivity thatno one could heal ormake a mandate into history.

49

50

(glistening talks hidethe secrecies of shroudthat masquerades itselfas Prosperpine in theunderworld or like

myriad petals of amulti-cultured marigoldthat grows on soils where

Mumtaj lived away fromthe progenital burdens ofShah Jahan?

Shakuntala fell intothe dire ditches ofa cursed valley of tearsthat Durvasa dug for her.Shakuntala epitomed theVitals of her celetial

beauty to the holy~Winds of the Kotdwar forestsWhile Durvasa rode on

Stately elephants thatSucked nuptial bloodWithout nocturnal serenityof transcendental bliss.

Shakuntala�s cogitatedbeing submerged into thedepths of an hungry seathat needed Dushyant to fillthe cup of its mountainglory by the elixir thatDushyant was. He ateyew berries even thoughforgetful of Shakuntala

that waited to be aDemenu'v.

Taj Mahal

Love is not a swan-songof reverbating Gangaof passions. It is

baked, roasted andchilled like the cakes

of meat on the fire of

self. Lover is carved,etched on and engraved onthe marble statues that

Shakuntalas become. Dushyantasloitering in vain over acarcas of ideational tomb

that never was but ever

shall be.

Mumtaj could not be

yelling in the hellish

gore that Shakuntalaoutlived into a passionatezone of seasons. That love

is an alteration of veebhatsa

and an overcoming ofthe compartmentalized shorewas not known to Mumtajwho grew into the tendershadows of the benum bing treesthat lit the candle into

sensory minarets that crazilyenamour the twinkling hubof star-lit domesin an azure sky. Fortitudewas regress tor Mumtajfor she was a lotus breedwho knew not of thorns;who build canticles of

glory into a nihilistic nought,

51

52

Mumtaj grew on thesilken lyre that crowscannot sing upon. Shakuntalawas lyre itself who outbreathedbamboo-poles of hercrucibles of journey intoan everlasting songof memory. Mumtaj bred butShakuntala became a motheringcanopy of seasonal talethat lovers sing in thetabernacle of their ever-

growing sagacity. Sakuntaladid not need polyphonyof marble ideas that

could grow into a monument;she abandoned the jerkynuances of her achingcemetry of love in the

galloping pavilion whereoblivion is become a forest

memorabilia. Mumtaj laycalm into Shah Iahan�s stickypair of hands thatheld her on the last pigmydesire. Mumtaj�s Skywardlooks brought eternity� into a choppy song of timethat is drawn out for

ever

Shah Jahan sketched churninggolds of em pyrean imaginationinto tiny fragments of timewhere lost echos of

Mum could devour mummifiedstories into the marble songs

Scripture on Stone

sz' Mahal

of glory. The land thatwas her keliedscope to beautybecame a green top surfacewhere square ideas of

harmony and rainbow proportionEd to the archetectonics

of a vision which promisedethereal space to mergeinto flakes of grass thatstood on the land spread

. unto eternity.

The labour narrative was

writ over twenty burlesqueyears for time was a

mockery-icon even as it

projected a beatific vision;the opal beauty and marblevision re-grouped Mum's bodyinto a Malta! that all of us

are.

Thousands who carried

loads of lime and sand

over the basket oftheir tiny land were not �

vagabonds after all. Theyhad their Mumtajs� tooin the dustbins of their

capillary fountains ofthe mind that never flowedor glow'd. Love is nota structure of desire buta confluence of riverswhere he and she and

they come and bathe and

go transported beyondthe channel gate.

53

54

Shah Jahan encapsulated safa- �

jahau in Mumtaj's sabbaticallove that he scriptured intothe text that is the Ta},but men who built thatmonumental song of everlastingyea did have their Mummjs�under the bed-sheet of their

mental carpets which theycould never unfold. The

persian beauty went unseen,hidden for ever for thehands that made her wereCut into a marble piecethat became a quagmire.Is that the lover of

beauty? Cried dimensionsint!) (he ratioed conscience0f Shah Jahan. He could

listen for why heshould? He had murder� (1millions of Mumtaj's thatcould have grown into trillions0f Tajs! love is notI tattooed locale nor a

Shivering calf of emptyuniversalism. It Is circulatingblood beyond cockney ideasthat create a phone which

morphemes mortality intoa live syntax. Love isan engrossing juncture ofbeing that eternally assimilatesthe ever-segregated intoits tertiary fold of sanguinehagination. Could Shah Jahan

Scripture an Stone

«Tay�Mahalleamitnextinorder

inscriptthenoumenalityof the text? Love could

notbeagrowthoflivestockwithhnorcanitproclamlitsextindion. Allsuction

pointsmustjommtnmimretstintkisstheskyandkillthedistinction

-55

Gandhi� A Scrip and a Scroll

Rain didn�t pour itsmuzzles out nor the sea

attained in depth whenGandhi was born across thesea-waves of life that

sung lallabies on the pigmycorridors of a countrythat waited to be a nationbefore Gandhi�s deadly cremation.

Gandhi�s birth blisteredtears of woe in the eyes thatwere launched as enlightenment,the nation broke intotears for Gandhi�s destinywas sealed into the shot ofa bullet that was arrowedfrom quarters who couldnot devour a fatherlybeauty of Mohandas and thedevotional commitment of aKaramchand.

The ransacked pigmies ofconscience zoomed for they

Gandhi -�A Scrip and a Scroll

had inaugurated a newera of problematical crackers,Gandhi was not killed but

murder�d by brutality within usthat could not savour the graceand the lustre of ideas

Gandhi advocated. The tornadocharacter and the blistering swordof Gandhi ideas were masked in

garments of peace and lathiornaments of desire. The loin-clothcontained endlessness of tradition�s

eternity while his half-clad dhotimounted to Everest regionsof the soul�a true white

man�s burden of mysticalcalamity.When Gandhi learnt script,he made his body the canvasof an idea that was one

divided though into Allah &Ishwar which became rudimentaryportions of his being asthe flower emanated from thenavel strength of kundalini

yoga. Scripts are made toutter existential truth

and truth was what Gandhi experimentedwith throughout the chaurangi lanesand the round table ways of his life.

II

When the seed from Porbundargrew into a syallable, the

language of temporality yawnedinto an evening song that �was sung in South Africa where

«In-

57

58

zonal consciousness of a

compartmentalized beingunmasked itself like a linen

cloth uncovered from the pig�smire of bones or the flies

skirted away from the rotten

figments of stinking meat.

Gandhi�s topsy-turvey talland ticket collector� s

venomous gall were two extremesof a deserted island thatGandhi was to inhabit.The temporality of languagejilted and junked into fresco ideasof unwanted disease. Gandhi hadhis God alive still but pumpkinideas had to become sermons

on stones so that biblical sanctitycould make them scriptural. Gandhi

gotbackintotheact, histongueas straight as his lathi, unbendingto seasonal interstices, clearat its goal. That seed thatbecame a syllable now grewinto an idea, that, once possessed,will not give itself up. The

temporal grooming of languageescaped the birth of a .

seeds of rebemon were imphntedin sequential temporality that GandMlearnt {tout his masters.

in

Energy caskets and from alesacral plexus allure m the _

.1 mipum and vishudda�, these stages

Scripture on Stone

Gandhi-A Scrip and :1 Scroll

earmarked Gandhi's journey fromthe land of eternity intothe devilish zone of ideas

where he learnt the primary lessonstint shall chisel freedom out

of slavery.Gandhi's expulsion from trainwas a blessing in disguise,a ritual of horror becoming a legacyof sacrifice. But heroes arenot born as easy as that for Gandhi�stravek into the inner courtyardsof the country did beg a

question that, as yet, was largerthan his being. If cultural

bricolages divide and destroycaste-equinoxes and masked religiositycan do much worse.

One could still writes a poemwith heart divided but heart broken

finds no recluse.

The tathagata�s pot-hole journeymade him romance with the

idea of freedom. Gandhiextended the portfolios of his

being into ashramas linkingthe politics of desire withthat of renuncza� tion. We can

only live keeping the senseof perpetual death alive intoour polity. Gandhi made his

body a vajra�kaya of sortswhere self-continence resonatingwith devotional hymns withinbecame the watchwords of a nationthat was yet to be.

59

60 Scripture an Stone

Gandhi turned freak fragmentsof his being into a bodyof resistance that yet seemedEexible to the roots. Hebecame a slow-fire, deafeningand deadening into a brick-Idinof uncompromising ideas of freedom.He jettisoned Simon Commission justas he burnt a false body ofanti-freedom fabric that hademasculated the whole country.He queried tabernacles of frostingtax upon Indian salt that gaveus a few healthy breaths oflife and learning. His ashramasbecame a pilgrimage for thosewho made India a temple offreedom and love and work.

Routes to Truth are multiplefinding a shrine even in

enemy� s locality of hearthand frame of mind. The bodily geographyfollows suit. Thus came Meera

and the likes of her to romancewith Gandhi the man whom

they discovered Gandhi the nation.Gandhi wanted to supplementlegacies of slavery with those of loveKarma~ liturgics. He kept on

writing a script thatcould not become a scroll; Indiaremained unfinished, unwritten,half-naked, standing likea nigger upon the encroachingplatforms of destiny.

Gandhi� A Sm�p and a Scroll

Gandhi burnt his body

of Jesus where fragmentsbecame portions of destinythat could only unearth

global villages within.

IV

Gandhi thought script tobe a noun which it

hardly was. All nouns are abstractideations of eternal time

in India, so the script couldnot redeem them. Gandhimade it a verb and thatwas when h'm energy reached

djmi-cakra gravity of seasons.The oblations of the bodily pyrenow carried a meaning thatcould not be an aporia Gandhiwas reborn upon the cylindricalreality of his ardhanarishwm

being. There is no celibacy withouta feeling for the �other�. The�other� is not a juvenile mysterynor a totem or a taboo; itis a living culture ever tobe lived. India had less

identities and more differences;the �other� is a formuh of

making differences as identities.India is not a body but the ideationof an idea; it is not to beread or understood; it isto be lived. Living is thewhole we all share and


survive in. The whole isdividable into a mosaic of conveniencebut the parts do not configurethe whole again even though they mayreconstitute it.

V

Gandhi�s conch-shell body evolvedinto the thousand-petalled lotusthat was Indian idea of freedom.Nations may live, nations may die,so too civilizations but Gandhisare not born every now and thenlike fictional romances thatcloud memory-gates for a while

disappearing then into the

airy nothings of the anti�herons

of a day.Gandhi left it iior others in

carry it out but they junkedit into slavery again. Gandhi

began Harijan mating insalubriousmass of history into the elevated

portions of the land but hisdesire became a rudderless shiptrying tn fly when it could hardly swim.Gandhi founded Vidyapithas, theone at Kashi too. The politicalantennae though brought miseryto the secret narrative of

our secular education. Gandhi haderred or we E not known. Wecould not follow virtues oftruth and renunciation is prettysure.

Gandhi ~A Scrip and a Scroll

Gandhi was not a god but alimrick just as all of us are. Hisave senses spoke well, saw enough,ours did not. The tragedy is notin the making of a nation but inits sustinance. Could we sing againthose churlish songs of seasonsthat make our bodies a

lively landscape of unitivedesire. Let us share agoniesinto the light of a day so thatthe scroll could be writtenas a nomenclature that wouldunearth the secret of out being.If Gandhi is to survive asa nation and a narration

we have to bury negationsinto a new kind of quality summation.Gandhi is the script as well as

scripting, let us live fictions as

reality where treachery anddifference go adrifting. Thatis Gandhi in a coconut shell-an unbrella is an embryothat augures for the future well.

63

Meera

Within the ruby wallsof Chittor, out of thecrimson reality of theendless desert, Meerabone herself unto a lotus-

seed that became a drunken

version of sunfloweringgalaxy of incredible tearsthat made distances of

horse-riding intent and spacesa bridal choreography thathas ever groomed since.

Cuckoo cocktails can

hang on the flexible choir-

songs like wires upon a

bamboo-pole. Smithy� sideational pottering malleateditself out of the joints oftime when the figural flakesof Meera�s immanental beingshaped themselves into an

oyster story of zipsum, miceand seeds of pomegranates. Love'slustre could be a darkling aurafor many as history cuckold:

Mecra

during dungeoning darkuntil a meteor shoots into

the rhythms uncanny.The palatial walls cook�srice in the balson memory ofMeera�s princely parentage.Meera paly'd with windsand sand the chorusof her cerebral beingeven when her limbs had

not seen the sun-rays totheir prime bloom. Itwas in the vicinity ofher suburban self that .a bowl longing upliftedher conscientious questand dropped a questionalattire on her groomingChest.

When Time got idealSpaces within the structureof its joints, Me era�s

questing thirst lmdedher into rhythms her own.

Motherly burdens of lovelyanswers boomranged whenMeera unfolded the mysticalSecrecy of clownish seasons

knowing that her nuptialankles shall ring into

nursery chimes in Krishna�s

courtyard, the god-supremeand Meera�s lovely episteme.One teases oneself intoattritional attire and lifebecomes a sea-saw puzzle

65

56

of self-committed crimes.Meera had it the carer wayround fm' she madethe misery suffer andherself grew 'mtn aninvincible dime.

One doesn�t grow into

Papal limits of normativityzones without ditheringand suffering pilferagesnot one's own. Meera�s

Plincety origin only foretoldsuicides as forms of

Societal blunders thatneed amends and awakeningfl�om a tattooed slumber.Meem�s love extendedPortabilities of conscience;11� could not he Otherthan what it waS-an

Meem outran walls ofhe: parental agony skimmingWe into a self-crackling�One of tears. Krislma�s

c0w-boy1'15h tantrums andMa lexicology made herget into soulful gears.Meera�s fabric sensationsPM into a tnlic ambience�mt made space a mockeryof itself; Krislma's

Mara

peacock pervading madeplanetary songs a mustardseed of some essence�Meet:ate it becoming a frenziedoelf.

Meera's journey beyondthe Chittor deserts ofher being made her a cloudof floating destiny. In aculture of heroes, heroinesbecome deserts and stoneslike Ahilya. Meeru chose tobreak iron-threads of historystill through love thatchannelbed bodily gatesto �kaivalyu.� Mathurabroke silences as Vrindavmechoed tinsel notesof memory long lost m altar:of fire and wind. Rupturesof history get into subh'nemudras betokening ecstasyand agony together. Meera�onetonymicel transfet madeher into a celestial songthat the earth could only myInd hlte without over succeedingto create.

The terracotta burdens o!Meera�o oeizural questmumed space into alotus seed that she Was;her marriage to Kristen,'M� thought 5 an

m that Meet! should

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68

overcome to become a

legible female. Krishna�s

figural desert yieldedtears of magnese andbrickbats of disease.Meera outgrew darklingsof blind-folding entropyclaiming Krishna to beher husband and lone

glory-Civilizations grow madnessin methods of their pebbledesire. Truth is akin tonaked children bathingby the sea-shore sand orthe river�banks of conscience.Meera could not be dislodg� dof her Krishna project evenwhen married to Rana's

closets. The metal imageof Krishna she stuck fast

to her chest-regime thatcarried burdens of historyhiding nefarious mythemes.Rana�s progenital burdenshad a biological themethat masqueraded itselfas a zipsum song of love;Meera breath�d a lotus

air that made the swanswim into the cudgelsof a dove. Rana�s familyskirmished into gratingcries that agonise physicalrepertoire of social beings;Meera could do little ignited

Scripture on Stone

Meera

as she was by a fireseldom seen. Rana sent

poison with an insidious. intent to call it a day,

Meera laughed as she drankit in love. Krishna sipp�dthe milky ways to death

chiselling opal roadsto eternity. Meera, forsure, could not be deadfor she murtured Krishna

unto the limits of infinity.Broken into tokens of

non-entity, Rana gave upthe matological concerns he

sought elsewhere. Meera�s

flight into the nocturnal self-bred nostalgias that

originated Radha memories.Meera�s ancestral gaiety brokethe rupture of time as shede-salinated herself

of metallic ore into a

a freedom of its own safety.Meera�s earth-rendingsearch for Guru drew

her to sylvan localesof cooked Kashi that

continues to reap theharvests of seedssown once in times '

beyond caterpillar zone.Kashi foregrounds seed-syllables that grow into

bunyan trees and peepal�a time frame that reaches

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70

ethereal conscience of

Ashwatha. Kashipura it

soothing, traIISpaIent, pure.Souls leaving their bodie9had a day here as ShivaSquatted in mudras onlyHe could know. Shoal-Tankeshwar He was who

gifted salvational hymnsto the souls whose bodiesshrink.

As the circular empyreanof Kashi emanated from

the pieces of sultry earth,the mud became Parvah'drenched in the sweat

of concentric obeisancefor Shiva who had planehryvirat of cosmos enshrined

upon His being. Shivaseemed to ascend whereas

He descended into the interior

folios of the Parvati�earth

Scripture onStOne

Meera

of her body she inhabited;her�s was a crimson-tale

of humility and love thatblasted cogitated regimeinto inertias of space.As Meera's search deepen'dinto dawns of many aneras, dusks eloped in-between and ages ditheredinto the slip-shod songsthrown into the river� 3bed or sea.

Guru�s clumsy attire overtookworld�s rubbish into its

fold and his sewing themolten gold of shoes

catapulted stories fora new tale to begin.Shrubs and trees had

mazes of history onwhich Meera walk'd for

a space. The shreds conjugatedinto a lively shape thatchurned and filtered the

dross, the rigid and thedead. The guru satunder the greenwood tree,a germinal choice for a

dialogue to be. Guru is

sprawling consciousness-a

big tree among the clownishlack-lusture theme of ideas.

Meera begg�d for relief,rescue and resolve that had

tabernacled knotty dots uponparivrajaka paths. As the

71


time costume folded intothe sagacity of conscience,Shiva tenements of Meera�s

being got ready for habitationalzone that the guru was tocreate. Meera�s shrinkingspirits zeroed in into a

Buddha-vacuity of consonantal

sunyu. She broke the logarithmof her rhythmic walk when

grocery items shook her

being and her footwear gotout of sheen. Guru�s smile

broke zonal disharmony ofMeera�s cocktail existence; .

her begging bowl of requestfor the footwear to be

sewn got the guru proclaimthat he would sew her too.

Dazzl�d by strokes of

beauty and crucifixionsof wonder, Meera got her

guru even though she stilllook'd for one. The gurugave her a lyre of

thought which could becomea song at penumbral willof guru�s conscience. Guru-mantras crucity deadlyfrescoes of the bodyand re�live the songeternal again. Meera�srebirth into song madeKrishna incarnate Himself

as rhythm that auctioned{rigidity to the windy

�an.

die.

Meera

corridors. The rhythm�scoih�onal capsule broughtBuddha�s change of wheelwhere Meera became the

cogs and Krishna the movingEmperor of scaling seam.

73

Buddha

The deadening yawn ofovercrowded forest juggled .

�

in the whiggery of theircostume when a certain kingincarnated five deviations

of his being under a nomadic

kingdom empyrean. The sons

tip-toed, wrestled and sportedtogether in the light andshadow of looming trees tilltheir upbeat texture galvanised

�

into the maturity of their "

skin and the king hadto lay bare the terrible

map of futurity in thecrucified jungles of

insecurity. One sonwith feathers of goldrested with the king whilethe quadrangular zone wasasked to travel to Kapilaforests in search of

homes that could substitute

palatial domes.

Buddha

Of these four in the

directives to truth

upgrading life to a climaxical

myth, Shuddodhan was onewho marginalised his perceptivemanifold and centered it on

the princesses of Koli kingdomthat unfurled its sacred flagsacross the pious banksof river Rohini and its

suburbs. The king wentbarren amid leafy designsof encroaching forestsfor a good season that wouldhave made Time older thanits age. It was thenthat Maya dreamt four mythicalsubsidiaries to the seminal

tale whose meanings oneneeded wisemen to decide.

Crimson ideas compiled into

complicated bouquets thatflew like meteors in the

unknown heights of the

sky. Shddodhan summoned

soothsayers whose wisdomcould hermeneutise the

interpretation of dreams.The legendary assemblage had

kinship ambience when the

king bore the syntacticalwhole into the narrative

of history. The wisest ofthem all got up and blessedthe king with a renowned

renunciatory victmy.

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76

Amazed at the distancesthat separate figural timefrom flowering eternity and

anguish�d by the deep fallow

lineage of ancesz within,Shuddodhan didn�t want to be

the burden of a storywhich Buddha was to create.

The wisemen foretold the

seed-syllables of a beingwho would either be a Kingof kings or a mendicant supremewithin the galaxial fold of

golden beams. The interpretivemiscellany had a lot more

airy nothings than substantialzones to be happy about.The king became a twin-edgedweapon that ultimately seem'dto gallop him in his ownsermon. The yawning chokeof king�s rainbow being upstageddramaturgical arts in vain;the son could hardly enjoy the

materiality of a king andwould not live in chain.

Choreography is a limitedbonanza of seasons as human

life itself is. Shuddodhan�s

cocktail care of Siddharth

had no deviation themes

and the family got worriedover Buddha�s will being.Siddarth�s cow-journeys to

encircling forests had milkand gold all the way Maids

that cooked songs for himin an embroidery of lacesdivine went sporting for awhile asking Siddarth to situnder the shady shrine. Timestretched its winged horsewestwared and the tree-shadowsbecame pilgrims to the templesbeyond. The bunyan tree Siddarthbeamed under did not mudgeits shadows or dither into a

plethora of sound. Divinitystructures are interwoven

within the tertiary fold offlowers that bloom but fade

away. Buddhas may come and gobut Buddhism had come to stay.Parental burdens often growinto cactus trees that becomeacacia over inbreathings and

outbreathings of life. The corridorsof prophecy had metal gatesopening both ways into eternityand the sensory kingdomsof paradise. Shuddodhan didn�twant his heart-beat crucible

to donate his bodily chariotto the winds and directionsall over. Princes as kingsshould appropriate and stillask for more. Buddha thoughtit vain and went beyond theriver-beds and the distance of

the sea-shore.

Shuddodhan built walls of

gold within the palatialmansions that become a bending

77


sickle to the imperial theme.Seasonal interstices marvel

courtyards where lullabydances encapsule tinsel

sensory songs as voluptuousmeteors in the sky. Siddarth�sfirst pilgrimage to the wiseman�s school drew him apartfrom five hundred children�s

scorecard. Dev Vrata the

uncle and Nanda the stepbrother to the Buddha of futuremade fun of Siddarth�s lascivious

upbringing but Buddha silencedthem all in horse-riding and

manly sports in one outing.Buddha�s limbs grew as atree�stem reaching devdar

heights. The peripheral zone ofhis body became a seasonal

equinox that sang mediterranean

songs. In order Buddha

may not escape into the

planetary music of spheres,Shuddodhan tied continentalbonds of Buddha�s nuptial ovewith Yashodhara�the lady witha heart of gold but a silverfish dying of scarce watersaround. Buddha enjoy� d chessboardpatterns of princely life

looking at dancing peacocksof glory that ever write amirthful story. Buddha shouldnot butter breads of endlesssorrows was the theme and

Buddha

Siddarth enjoy�d it for awhile before collecting thesteam.

The sun hid that day behindtamarind and acacia trees�

leaves without shadows and

light without darkeninggrips of killing silence.Channa huddl�d beateous bountyof white horses five togetherin a composite stride to chariotBuddha to the streets of

Kapilvastu-a city of sakyas-the enterprising, the bravesauve beyond sobriety junglesof ill-health and pelf andwealth. City� s scenic beautybred euphorias of heavenlyimagination with smells ofsounds and senses sweet

oozing from directional glory.Strokeful dust of destinycannot be withheld into a

cage by the binoculars orthe mental frame that putthe rest to shame. Buddhasaw an old man tattered into

the fragile coatings of a dayleaning on the stick toget across the bay. Buddha�s

query to Channa thecharioteer brought a millionsmile from etherial heavens

but: it got into a tearof woe in Shuddodhan�s eyes.Channa�s answer only

-

V

79

80

fuelled the fiery zonewithin for why shouldTime decay even deathwithout itself gettingsabotaged? The movementforward is a movement back

indeed only if one knowssecrets of narrative emboldenedinto mud�icons of yore. Thenext sight of a dead body-frame galloped deep intoBuddha's agony of ideasand it served no pupose to

say that death shall overtakeus all. A similar scene

of a sickly man broughtno cheers to the imeprialtheme and Buddha got intomeditational zone where

the lyre is a bamboo-reedof honey skies.

Buddha�s journey backinto the golden subsidiary ofShuddodhan�s earthly palacewas a retraction back to the

original theme. Rivers donot become Ganga all of a

sudden; it is a million of

years of meditative poisethat makes the flowingwater into a nectoral cream.

Palaiial dances pinchedas Yashodhara and her son

linked; an �in�between' Buddhabecame a yawning impossibilitycontaining disease and its

Buddha

treatment. The wood�fireof thought cook'd crocodile

�

inerlias of nought and Buddhabecame a cypher unto nothing.It was a Macbeth day of destinywhen one murder� d Duncan

and the other got out ofthe immobility of palace insearch of two kinds of truths-

possessive and renunciatory-the clinging sort and the

purposelessly purposive boot.

Channa took the khantaka horsein the deadening frescoesof evanescent night even asBuddha became heavier thanbolstered screws of Time; he

glanc�d at Yashodhara andRahul his son and bore the

vow of breaking this chainelse he a victim of time

would ever remain. Shuddodhan�s

dream of christening Buddhaas the ruling deity of

kingdoms across seven continentsmisbred into a tortoise shellwhose extensions and contractions

were predictably froggy.Buddha rode the horse and

Channa drove but the gatesto the kingdom were lock�dtill a nihilistic nightgave birth to a sizzling dawn.The devil Mara bumped Buddhaat the western gate with

myriad lantern lullabies that

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82

would better serve a dinner

at a five star hotel; Maracould not delude Buddha

whose candle-laugh broughtthe horse to the eastern gate.Destiny appear� d as a wingedangel checkmating keepersinto silences sleepy serene;Channa drove the horse awayas the lightening wouldthe clouds away. Rabbit

leaps of khantaka drew millionsof acres of land into a

mustard seed that locusts

cannot eat nor elephants feed.

Behind the ignited suburbsof Koli kingdom came Channawith the horse. Buddha ask�d

for a pause in rhythm on the

sandy beaches of the goldenNaoma river. History tooka turn as Buddha got downthe saddle bare-footed

aplomb searching for Smithy� s

staggering source of meanderingcourse. Buddha asked Channa

to go and tell what has happen�d;Buddha will never return but

once in the folio caves of

city-suburbs if ever he

got beyond ambivalences thatchisel a king's kingdom anda pauper�s climate of tears.Buddha exchanged princely robesof muslin and silk with a

beggei�s cloths sde in

Scripture on Stone

Buddha

mud and dust. This was the

augury of changes within theinterior decor that shall

climax into dharm�cakra-parivartanaconquering our being alwaysand ever more.

As the diurnal dark

enveloped crimson gay ofthe palace into rudimentaryforms of negativity, Buddhamarched ahead into the

pathless wood unaware ofthe ways he was christening.The questing hero madeinroads into Samath jungles-all on foot for now

his mind was Channa and his

body the chariot. Buddhatorched his filamental self's

sacramental tissues and his

body became a grain ofrice�raw and uncook�d. Guruhe had none for sequentail termsand Vedic ritualistic attire

he could only abhore. Out intothe mazes meandering and zig�zag,Buddha nursed his psychic glowas an earthen lamp yetnot catching fire. He metfive brethren saints whohad neither a guru nor the

privilege of a tathagatapath. Consumed as Buddhadid a single grain ofsoulful rice each day, thefive made Buddha their guru;

83

84 �

Scripture on StoneBuddha did not have the lustof owning an Ashram premisesas Mann, Vishwamitra, Chanakyaand Vashishtha had beforedone. So he began eating asthe torched body became a hazymaze still losing the pathof light ever more. The five

thought Buddha an anchorite in

disgrace for he catapultednormativity�s delicious zone

disregarding conclusions alreadyforegone.

The hero in quest became azero in the world as destinychocalated his path theensanguined woods in the forestsof Bodhgaya. His padmasana posturetranSfigured him to regionswhere temporality like a crowcan only helplessly look atwithout harming the swan thatone becomes. Buddha�s perceptivetextuality bore the themewith a difference. All texts

are embodied as God Himself is

when He incarnates the primordialityof His being. Vedas are partof the internal rhythm that cannotassume a beginning or an end.A samadhist Buddha imbibedsecretive lore beyond the sevenregions of the language everspoken. He made the bodythe hearth and the yajnaand the mind the ablation

Buddha

ritualistic repertoire is

ingrained within the processesof thought; purificatory ritesemanate from the interiors

of psychic ethnicity thatsublimate the body to the pointof transcendence. The villagegirl's rice-milk divinity calledkheer made Buddha got on to hisfeet and come to Samath againto deliver the propriety of soundthat would heal many a commonwound.

Buddha�s toxicology of thefirst sermon made Samath

the onto-genesis of a substi-

tutionary text which was as

primary as the Vedas themselves;textual deviance is no bricolagebut a dividend on the first Word

ever spoken. Buddha�s Godwas empyrean emptiness and notthe wilderness it is imagined tobe. The great cypher is the

Upanishadic circle of completionwhere substraction and addition

still conjugate into thelineamental destiny of the

golden beams of the circle.

Yogic kaivalya assumed nirvanatextural body of emancipationand samsara performed no betterthan a zig saw puzzle of themind which is and is not inthe endless folios of a

naughty nought.

85

86

The twelve-fold nidanas

activate blood-corpuscles thatincarnate into sambhog kaya,dharm kaya notions of being; theyare inmlities of existence

that can always grow intothe vajr kaya proportions ofthe emboldening self. The

pratitya�samutpada textualitydoes not begin or end in fodder

games one might play. It isa genetic aberration engagingin a game of hide and seek withthe chy. Dukkha sediments usall in embodied saturnalia;nirvana 'm samsara and samsara

nirvana is not a makeshift

arrangement but beyond time's

statuary insignia.

Let us light our ownearthen lamps darkened ever since

memory lanes lost their way;Buddha is notaname buta

frame one gets into after

consuming binaries within thenerve-centres of being;chiselling transubstantiates

cogitating bones and lifts them

up into an empyrean. Linguisticpromiscuity could not breedexterior children of shame; it

led to interior spaces unfadmmable

bleeding to get eternity outof disgrace.� Buddha got back

kingdom's to his precincts tofulfil his rainbow promise

Buddha

to Yashodhara and the would-be

king. Straight went the messageof Buddha's arrival and the

lady came running out ofthe citadel Yashodhara's waitfor Buddha exceeded all known

limits of human patience. EvenBharaba's yearing yawn forRam had a few acres of

land in be tilled and won

over but Yashodhara�s sacrificialzone found no surface to

appeal- nor continent to land;enlightenment is always be setwith pigmy pink thatencroaches familial scene;Buddha�s quest was Yashodharaand Fahul�s opphanage too;will the history tell it endanswer a question or two?

Beggers don�t beg fromthe beggers as Yashodharadid. 'What have you got£0: Rahul� asked she andBuddha extended the spacesof his empty bowl to proclaim�what else could there be

but an empty me and an

empty he�. Sunya became thewatch dog and a flying deershowcased in timbers ofskin disease. Let us all

get up to the Budda-Wordfor a banal community� 3self-release.

Kabir

Dogs bark'd and junkcorridors shrunk in the

dip of the scorpion nightwhen the star on the wavewas born on the tumultuouswaters of the pool that

. still appeared stagnantand uncogitated in essence.Such were the circuitous

�wires Kabii�s body waswove in for not even dustystrokes of winds couldunearth or usher the storyhe was in the totem and

taboo of his being.Born like a blizzard andlost like a meteor in the

unlimiling chasms of the sky,Kabir rose from the ashes .of the Rig Vedic times stringedto perfection in the bowof ideas that shoot acrosssurfaces undying, hard anduneven in their intentional

gimmickery of scene and sense.� Crying in the willowed wilderness

Kabir _

of birth-pangs, Kabir outgrewthe rubbish of his localewhen the nuptial details ofhis figural limbs were nurtured

by Neema and Neeru�theimmaterial cognates of a wheelthat creates diasporic centreswithin the apple-caves ofman�s being.The circle can expand into

nothing but into its own

corollary structure of

empyrean self as did Kabir.

Concentricity must have a

systems of growth or searchfor it in the centre. All

centres are guru�projectionsthat effect ignition inthe mud-corpus of subsidiarydetails that only consumes

'

without litting the dove�fireswithin. Neema sang the songof clay while Neeru made aVedic hymn shrouded in,rustic times beyond eternity.Kabir�s journey to the

pilgrimage of Gurudom ledhim to the sacred sanctityof five rivers who confluencedat the ivory shrine of panchgangaghat that bred lessons

beyond langue and parole.Kabir�s ethnic preambleevolved into rituals of

primitivism in the junglesof Seer - the footprint zone

89

90

of gum Ramanand who carried

legacies of kindling lampsunto strawberries. The gurunegated bridging of distanceseven as Kabir essay�d toclose them off. The endless

closure made Kabir a pumpkinof sorts who would have

swelled to� nothing withoutguru�s footage in bodilyempyrean. It was onthe stairs to shanties

divine that Kabir laid

himself in the chocolate hoursof celestial dawn. Guru�sroutine bath into the Gangesand his way back became historyas Kabir was trodden underfootin layered traditions of

Destiny�s sophistry. The

earthly swan flew into thecocktail golds of limitless

sky for nothing could bettera disciple�s cry than the

grace of guru�s marigolddye.Out from the crimson zone .of the valley or tears, Kabiravalanched into the self-made

acacia trees that pricked atthe filamental being of arotten society still ruggedand unyielding to move.Castefolios galloped into� Prismatic angles of tortoiseVision as Kabir's foray

Scripture on Stone

Kabir

of indelible shots becameverbal icons hard to savour

for Hindus and Muslims. Neither

an atheist nor agnostic Kabiroutsmarted frolicking religionsof self-interest paraphernaliathat had made India a junkdreaming still of a junction.The lotus-touch of guru�spadukas created timeless

plots where there was none.Guru is the name of a coconut

'mlding-a sea of milk withinbut an unperforable shellwithout. Ramanand�s gesturalcompass dug deep intoKabir�s celibate heart as he

sculpted icons that could notbe mortgaged into the

mortuary bonds of templeidols. Kabir tore into

pieces the idylic rainbowof slavish idols that becamea victim and grievanceof rituals of desire

shooting into folk-talesall quagmire !

Overburdening golds of

tutelage are fissiparousfusilage and Kabir knewit till the end ~echoes ofhis egregious being. Hedivided normativity intothe zonal paradigms thatbecome a pendulum in thefresco existences of life.

92

A disciple yet a rebel- a

choreographer dumped withinthe shadowy trees cris-

crossing eternity at

junctural aporias that

convey neither sensenor fulcrums of meaning.Kabir�s anguish'd cogitational empirebred miscellanies of journalisticdetail that jeopardised systematicepistemes into the courtyardrubbish besides tea-canteens

Kashi was an inebriated store

of religious entelechy that a.could only concubine withritualistic attire of

unsalvaged flesh that needed

many more prostitutionaloutings to lay claim to a

signifier dovetailing essence.A sadhaka of sabda-brahma yeta cypher in the scriptologicalburdens of the sacrilegioustext, Kabir tore the languageinto a non-generative grammaticalzone; he became the phoneinstead resting in the

hieroglyphics of conscience.The voice over-rode polysemicdesigns that cook half-bakedtruth into sleeve-less storiesthat gallop into pantaloon depthswhose inside-out corners

only lead into the nighthoary.

Scripture on Stone

Kabir

Edging logistical sublimityKabir became a morphologicalmonarch incarnating canticlesof eternity within the groomingvoice of arcadias of phone; theWord and Braluna interlocuted

silence into a folk-tale of

spindle and wheel that spun '

sabda-Brahma cognates evenwithin the perfidies of aDeistic Machine. Kabir

was the wheel and Loyi the spindle;the forestry of nerves, arteriesand a flowering of cells was all

Loyi�s good artisanship thatKabir furrowed into a conch-

shell design of self. Even thougha crackling bolt and an

analytic agent excavatingsabda�bmhma to the brink of

sea-shores, Kabir�s ensanguin�dassembly of prayers gotinto Jayadeva�s mould and Namdevatoo. Kabir�s self-abnegationand cobweb critique of

make him hate what he loved;hateful contraries chiselinto cuckoo songs when aKabir marshals are musicof his bone into the Loyiragas of conscience.

Kabir spun the web whileLoyi pigmented the beingWith warp and woof. TheSpindle sculpted continental

94

shores that set the limits

of liberating death. AsKabir spun the wheel he

wept into mental cavernsforlorn. Disciples look�d

dismay� d, entangl�d intocantakerous waves, did notunderstand the lettingoff of the shore for Kabirhad gotten across effectingdharm-cakra-parivartana indioramic totality andrenunciation of karma. Kabir

spun for bread and butteronce which he now did for Ram;religion is not a ritualistic

body of tears nor a filmsy attireof canopied utopia; it is the

self-transforming act of singulardevotion that gets us out of

scribbling phobia.Kabii�s simplistic felicitationsextended to the limits of

eternity. The earth blush'dfor Kabir was its own

fertility of crop as well asits own barren banalitybeyond doubt. An insigniaof Truth, a metaphormKabirrefused to become a simileeven of the heights and

depths of Himalayas andthe sea. Kabir�s rainbow

strings tightened to thefire that could only be Sun'sa rice-wheat-barley flavourwas his own as well as the

Kabir

pungency of a biting bitchand the trident attackson society�s blockhead pointsmasquerading as victory ships.The tamarind-onion combinemade Kabir a scare-crow with

live blood-vessels that subsum'dsocial bouquets of stinkingdirt into the golden chimeof lightening cuckoo�s chirp.Kabir had no magic plow forhe furrow�d deep into age-oldstrawberries of conscience;the stickle and the bend washis own�a critique ofrestaurant cultures bythe junk of a manwith a fungus-clad heardthat canopied the lean

body writhing in a fakir�s

gown. Love goes withrebellion outdated of

late. Foucauldian prison-houses would have put Kabirbehind the gate. But phonetravels from one eternityin another unlike script whichsediments time; Kabir did notwrite but got written under

legacies that shrine history;Sikandar Lodi�s attritional joltsthat magnetised in Kashi.

Kabir opened the flightsof dove within as the eaglesof masked religion fled astray;he invited death many-a-timewhich lingered and ran away.

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Kabir�s residual nuances led

the swan to &y into thedrum-beat rhythms of Western

Pop though he still hid the-

lyre of Saraswati within thelotus folios of his heart.The poet-singer of comic-bales wove tragic stories ofunfathomable depth within thesecrecies of the blood. Kashi

held him as a sugarcane seedlingthough some thought he cooked

piracies into the cauldron ofdeath. Hindus and Muslims

loved and hated him alike

in the chivahy of theirhellish dreams and those of paradise.Kabir advocated unitarianism not

of the chruch but of the self; he

died in Magahar to deludethe idea of Kashi�s liberational

elf. What Hindus thoughttheir own, Muslims did not

disown. Their claims to

the mortal glow did not

go beyond lotus-leaves thatKabil�s rudimentary nuptial limbshad become. Monumental mosquesand temples could not house Kabir�stonal body of tears. The earthsmiled as did the sea and the

ether. The potter shall makethe pitcher again for usnever to wither?

Scripture on Stone

Ganga

Ganga was a Vedic hymneven before textured into

a metered being. Her celestial

origins bred endless blisslived as she in the mountains

deep and heavenly orchardsfree. A pearl-necklace to

sagacities of ether and a

seed-syllable of thought,she remained sedimented as

the whisper of a song thatcould break to the winds

on any morning chant.

A jelly-fish of heavenlybreeze cucumbering intocoriander seeds of memoryGanga was freedom�s essenceand the folding folios ofan infinite story. She travell�dfar and wide into corners

beyond paradise. The fourteenblmvanas she habitated intolocalities of conscience,the flowering zone that ceaselesslypirated bliss all along.

98

T n�pathaga she was for cascadinginto the dreams of

heavenly eternity and frequenciesof time that mutilated

into the burden of the

earth and the truncated

vision of lokas below.

It folded into sageSagai�s utopian dream ofself-consumation that filteredinto sixty-thousand plotsof a narrative story. Undeten�dand willing to prolongtertiary shreds of narrative,

Sagar volcanoed into a yajnato beget stories fromanother of his female

consort whose singular issuewas a tale well-told yetlost to the freakish agesof ungroomed imagination.It was not the horse of

mortality who roomed across

perfidies of Time but Sagai�syajna horse who should leapill-between heaven and earth

to celebrate empyrean descent. �

Even before the issue was

launched, Kapil Muni gothold of the horse and tied

him down in greasy patal-lokawherefrom one hardly returns.Amazed and angry, Saga: seem�druined; in mine exercise ofmore crudity and little sensehe sent his sixty thousandsons to locate the horse for

'

Scripture on Stone

Ganga

his yajna to begin after across-over.

the cobwebbed galaxy ofmillions of pathways to

eternity got into shape as

sixty thousand rollicking sonsof sage Sagar frolicked intosuburban locales of their tingedimagination. The woody pathsand stony heights hid the horsein realms beyond mortalityareas of conscience. The

search got into a wolf�sbane when classical ragaswere unsung to the tunesthat waited for them so long.Heaven and earth�drew blank

for in Pluto�s underworld

or proserpine�s the sageKapil resided at the navelcentres of our being while

Sagal�s sons mutilated thewonder within garbagingKapil for not releasing thehorse.

The horse was the bodilybeing of Sagar and his sonswhile Kapil the garbh-graha oftheir sinuous mortality. Biscuitsof anger, hate and jealousyawakened Kapil into likeemotions which brought to ashesthe notoriety of sons� clashes.

Sagar felt poured out ofcontent fallen as he was underneaththe pressures that only consume

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and kill. He could not send

the lone son from the second

wife as he incarnated depravityat its ugliest satanic selfhood.

Sagar sent his son�s soninstead Anshuman by name who

implored and entreated infallible

Kapil who then granted himtwo boons. By one he releasedthe horse and by the otherhe helped Ganga to flow onearth for the salvation ofthe sons painstakingly lost by.This got Sagar into theact again and he performedthe yajna of his life. All yajnas

. have bodily oblations, consume as

they do our own selves, releasingthem too in the same breath

that reaches eternity in therealms unknown. Ganga lived

_ in vacuums in regions beyondreason and language; forestborn of Menka and Himalayasshe had sisterly epitomesof relational variety withUma, Shiva�s divine consortUma and Ganga in vernacular themes.Uma and Ganga play�d with

density of clouds and the magnetictombs of mountain-tops thatchiselled with glacial snow

ready to consume inertias intofulcrum spaces of life.

Sagar�s dream of salvationalmudras for his dead sons

Scripture on Stone

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