Poetry: A dialogue with Rabindranath Tagore

By

Sunil Sharma

THE VOICE of wayside pansies,

that do not attract the careless glance

murmurs in these desultory line

(Tagore—Verses: Fireflies—2)

I hear your song

Whispering the voice of pansies

Softly in those lines, lest breeze takes it away

To some far-away spot left fragrant by another bunch.

In my Mumbai home, on a lazy Sunday afternoon,

I hear and see the wayside flowers in the text

In mind’s eye, sorely missing their presence in the wasteland.

Now I know where to find the strange music

And a song to hum on the long commutes

In robotic crowds, tired rails and trains,

Things wafted on the invisible wind—-

That will make me reborn as a human.

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THE SUN breaks out from the clouds on the day when I must go.

And the sky gazes upon the earth like God’s wonder.

My heart is sad, for it knows not from where comes its call…

(Tagore, Crossing, 1)

I feel your presence in this sun-lit poem

Catching a moment of transition.

Crossing was never easy!

Going to a land unseen, demanding.

The familiar is receding behind rapidly

And the new one is beckoning

Out of the mists swirling on a shore distant.

Tears and fragrance

Both I feel the duality of leaving and arriving

In that same instant,

The simultaneity of the pain and joy of

Exiting the old/entering realms unseen.

———————————————————————————————

I SEEK AND SEEK on my harp strings the notes that can blend with thine.

Simple is the awakening of the morning and the flow of water,

simple are the dewdrops on leaves, colours in clouds, the moonlight on sand-banks of the river and showers of rain in the midnight.

(Tagore, Poems, 46)

You seek the wind, the lights of the sky

Your strings are new but they capture

The beauty of the passing scene.

O Master, your poems breathe nature

I inhale its fragrance and feel uplifted!

You explore the connection between Prakriti and Purusha.

Our own lines—so sterile

Music—soulless sound.

Art—without a heart, bloodless.

Re-reading you I discover lost threads

And the inherent mysticism.

I hear the eternal music of the stars

The flowers and the rush of the wind.

I feel restored/ integrated  by this vision!

The healing touch, reviving rusted innards

Fevered mind, chasing profits and new sensations.

Soothing words that glide over a stunned soul…like a mother’s gentle hands

Over a bent head, crying near the sick bed, praying for a quick miracle.

The haunting lyricism that reminds one of the Great Ganges

And its hypnotic effect on mind.

The landscape revealed is so enriching!

Stark, our inner impoverishment.

I hear the universe speaking in/through you.

And art becomes a pilgrimage, not mechanical reading.

Sunil Sharma

Mumbai-based, Sunil Sharma is a widely-published writer. He has already published  14 books: four collections of poetry, two of short fiction, one novel, one a critical study of the novel and co-edited six anthologies on prose, poetry and criticism. He is a recipient of the UK-based Destiny Poets’ inaugural Poet of the Year award—2012. Recently his poems were published in the UN project: Happiness: The Delight-Tree.