It needs enormous discipline to keep the flow of thoughts under control. Selection of arguments and evidences require judgment. Organization of an idea can test one’s patience. Ultimately, sentences that remain unwritten, expressions that have been discarded and preconceived notions that made way for unexpected insights accentuate the impact of mature text. [break]
A successful piece of writing should enable a reader to think. Since nobody can compell a person to believe things against one’s will, hence propaganda materials aim to convince the reader that conclusions of a piece identify with the reader rather than the writer or its sponsors. Once a prose reaches the reader, it becomes the reader’s own to either modify the meaning, accept the message or reject the material in its entirety. Like a mason, the writer builds a house, which then becomes the possession of its occupants with all its deficiencies. Exceptional buildings do retain the signature of its architect, but few remember the builder who actually struggled to put together brick and cement to erect the edifice. It is for the owner to transform a house into a home and it is the responsibility of the reader to give meaning and purpose to a piece of prose.
Poetry, however, emanates from someplace else and follows a different trajectory of influence. A good poem has to appeal simultaneously to the heart and the mind. The two seldom act in tandem. Heart is too fickle to comprehend the lasting beauty of everyday words. The mind is conditioned to contemplate over every issue in terms of cause and effect. Poetry rarely informs, it does not entertain and the claim that poems enlighten need to be taken with a tablespoon of salt—dictators are known to have been connoisseurs of literature with special affinity for verses.
Romantic poet Percy B Shelly thought that when the heart ached, songs were born: “We look before and after/ And pine for what is not / Our sincerest laughter / With some pain is fraught; / Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.” A Hindi poet further concurs, “The first poet must have been a forlorn soul, songs must have been born out of longings.” The idea that pain is the fountainhead of poetry is so established that celebratory verses are sometimes considered inferior. Happy songs can be festive, triumphant and satirical, but if they pretend to be philosophical, they begin to appear like parodies.
Pain is not only primal but the pinnacle of all human emotions. The moment a poet emotes, tears begin to flow. Liquid secreted by glands from the eye, at the height of happiness is as salty as tears of sadness. The highest form of joy is pain; the feeling is often so powerful that it can educe a heart attack. “Happiness is transient”, said the Enlightened One, “and only suffering is permanent”. He asked his followers to accept the supremacy of the Enlightened (Buddha), pursue the Righteous Path (Dharma), and be a part of the Organization (Sangha) to find release from the miseries of life. He should have suggested his acolytes to read or listen to poetry too. But that command was unnecessary. Buddha’s teachings, like most other religious sermons in the world, are poetic anyways. Poetic works dominate the most popular and enduring works of literature in any language.
Last week, Buddhisagar released a book of his poems. That is hardly news: it seems every budding poet wants the shortcut to immortality through publication of verses. What sets Buddhisagar’s creations apart; however, are his innovating metaphors, startling imagery and a hint of piercing pain inherent in all forms of emotions. Spring comes to pay back loans and sticks green leaves on the trees. Winter returns to collect and takes back the foliage. Dreams buy new pairs of shoes to climb mountains of aspirations. Death becomes a toddler leading an old man towards eternity. Suffering is immense, but optimism survives. Life would lose its meaning had it not been for the indestructibility of hope.
Even though anguish is the lot of everyone born in this world, each suffers differently. “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way,” observed Leo Tolstoy. It holds true for individuals as well. The range of pain is indeed wide. Among Nepali poets, Gopal Prasad Rimal writhes in angst. Bhupi Sherchan agonises over absurdities of life. For Madhav Prasad Ghimire, the torment is of separation as he laments cruelties of fate in different forms. The central theme of Buddhisagar’s pain is what he calls Aithan—the feeling of twisting in acute pain. Like many other terms of complex emotions in every language, the word Aithan is almost untranslatable.
Even at its simplest form, Aithan can mean anything from intense, piercing pain, or a combination of grief, loss and separation to the wretchedness of regretful twinges of guilt and the hopelessness of drowning alone in the river of sorrows. How does one describe Aithan in words? Writer Khagendra Sangraula remembered the facial expression of renowned actor Haribansh Acharya.
The grief of one of the most celebrated comedians of our times cannot be explained as he endures it all with Aithan. Meera Acharya, Haribanshji’s love, and his wife for several years was a wonderful person but after her untimely demise, all that remains are her memories.. For Haribanshaji, Meera’s departure to eternity has created a hole in the emptiness, which can neither be seen nor felt but has to be endured on a daily basis. Where is poetry in this ? One may ask. Madhav Ghimire has answered that question poetically in one of the greatest works of Nepali literature—Gauri.
Just as successful prose makes readers think, perhaps the quality of poetry should be judged by its ability to enable the reader to tolerate life. That is what an Urdu poet opines when he observes, poems must contain the liquid from liver to be effective. This flight of imagination of a poet is more meaningful than learned analyses of thousands of critics of poetry. Indeed, liver is the chemist that makes life endurable.
Liver secretes bile, a bitter digestive fluid that transforms the food we eat into energy, converts poisonous substances into water-soluble salts and helps dump the waste out of our system. Without bile, there would be no poetry worth the name. However, unlike the fluid that helps us survive, poetic drops of liquid in life need not be bitter from beginning until the end. There is a wide range of in-betweens. Like bile, poetry enables us to bear and thrive. As long as there is life, there will be poetry in some form or another.
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