A Poetic Implosion

The attack on women in a Mangalore pub by the ultra rightwing Rama Sene a little before the elections, people thought,would generate an angry response in the ballot box. But that has not been the case. If one goes purely by electoral results in Karnataka, there has been no resonance or reflection of the issue that shamed India. Forget rural areas, the urban and semi-urban areas too appear oblivious to the issue. This may provoke a whole set of questions, but it is important for us to remember that electoral results are always a complex aggregate of public opinion. However, the point I want to make here is that elections may not always be the best instrument to measure the impact of such an attack. One need not expect it to be an oil slick on the still waters of society, but should patiently check for the slow yet substantial simmer below the stratum. To prove my point, I want to record two strong poetic reactions to the ghastly incident from two women Kannada poets, belonging to different generations. 

The first poem I'll discuss is titled 'Devi' and is written by Pratibha Nandakumar, arguably one of the finest woman poets writing in the Kannada language today. What Prathiba does is peg her poetic idea around theLalitha Sahasranama, a classical text that is routinely recited by women in upper caste Hindu households. Any traditionally bred person would tell you that this classical text, which literally means a thousand incantations for goddess Sri Lalitha Devi, is found in the Brahmanda Purana as an exchange between Hyagriva, an avatar of Vishnu and sage Agastya. It celebrates the different forms and facets of the goddess and establishes her as the 'divine feminine' and 'mother supreme'. It is said to be the principle text of Shakti worshippers, that is people who conceive the goddess as the ultimate godhead and as Durga and Kali. If Shiva is said to be the static element, Shakti or Devi is said to be the dynamic force that makes the cosmos possible. In short, theLalitha Sahasranama accords absolute primacy to the feminine force and without a single repetition offers a thousand names to describe the goddess. Like all chants it is also set to a strict poetic metre. Traditional women believe that by chanting these thousand names on Fridays they would ward off evil and secure a long life. If you are looking for a cultural parallel to theSahasranama then it is somewhat comparable to the Litany of the Blessed VirginMary,' but I'll resist from such narrow and easy comparisons. 

Prathiba takes this text out of its religious space, halts the mindless pace of the rote chant and draws attention to the meaning or its suggestion behind the various names ascribed to the Devi or the goddess in the text. In this process of breaking up the text, paraphrasing and altering its accepted rhythm she morphs a sacred canonical text into a literary one. This subversive activity takes place in the first six paragraphs of the poem where she reiterates that if the venerated male trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Maheswara are matter Devi is the energy that breathes life into them. If Shiva is knowledge then she is the critical faculty that guides him. Referring to the Devi's familial manifestation and sexual energies she says there is no doubt that she operates on her own terms -"Tannicheyante pati, bhoga, sukha, kama hondidavalu." 

In para seven she shifts gear to directly address the pub-attackers: 

"She can drink, she can dance, she can be lost in her games and drift into herpleasures
But you can't catch her in pubs
You can't throw her to the ground and get her to surrender
In those dull lights you can't see her with your dim vision
She will come back with her thousand tongues sucking blood
You will become the ritual gulp ['aposhana'] in her cupped palm
She is the primordial goddess of vermilion and saffron
The colours you carry may thin out in water but not hers
What do you impotent ones
Who slyly enter lanes and hide behind pillars to scorn her
Know about her birth and lineage... 
Go, come back after you have learnt your first letters, after you know your short and longvowels
Your aspirated and unaspirated phonemes...
Who knows she may then accept you
If there is love in your heart
If you understand that she is no mere doll
That she is a mother when she sings and a Devi when she blesses you
She is a consort when she cherishes you and a Kali when provoked." 

It is needless to say here that my translation is only a prosaic approximation of the original.

These lines carry the anger of the poet no doubt, but there is also pity from which stems the urge to educate the men who little understand women and culture. Interestingly, the education is imparted by drawing the attention of these men to the content of a text that has an unquestionable place in the Hindu religious and ritualistic hierarchy. I spoke to Pratibha for a few minutes after I heard her read this poem at a women poets' meet. She spoke with disarming clarity: 

"I wrote this because I felt these men who were attacking women by saying that 'our culture does not permit such behaviour' do not really know how our culture perceives women. So I picked the most sacred Hindu text and plucked out the most radical ideas contained in it. The Hindu fundamentalists say that we have developed amnesia about our culture, in reality it is they who have developed amnesia. They really don't know what our scriptures speak. There is a major lapse in our understanding of our traditions."

Inspired by the poem I visited a rather ordinary translation of the LalitaSahasranama on the Internet and found these exquisitely charming lines which are spruced up a bit. There is an unfettered description of the goddess from head to toe. The poetic quality of the lines overshadowed its religious context for me. Instead of evoking devotion they led to joy. Perhaps that's the cleverness of an atheist at play, whatever: 

"...She who immerses the universe in her splash of red that has the hue of the sun at dawn. She who has a beautiful forehead like the half moon. She who has beautiful eyelids which are like the cupid's home. She who has a nose that is like the freshly bloomed Champaka flower. She who wears the son and the moon as her ear studs. She whose lips are like newly formed coral. She who has a smile like a river in which the cupid plays. She who offered her breasts which are like a pot of precious stones to Kameshwara and obtained his love. She who has three stripes on her belly which seem to protect her tiny waist from her heavy breasts. She who enjoys making love to her lord. She who is prayed by Lord Brahma, Vishnu, Mahendra and other gods. She who is forever clean. She who carries no blemishes. She who is supremely angry. She who is the axe that fells the tree of death. She who cannot be won..." 

This is just a sample and there is lots more. I can't read Sanskrit and hence can't catch the nuance of the original but there is sufficient hint of the treasure in the translation. 

Prathibha's effort to strike at the fundamentalist streak surrounding us by picking an arrow that the ultraRight carry in their own quiver may sound like artful stratagem for a person who can't access her full Kannada poem, but in reality the tone of the poem is sincere. It is autobiographical of all women who face Talibanised men.

The second poem that I intend to mention here is that of Bharati Devi. It factors in the pub attacks, but goes beyond the incident to lament the continued saffronisation of Karnataka's coastal districts. Bharati is a much younger poetess with just one collection of poems and not a veteran like Pratibha. Her home is in the coastal region unlike Prathibha who hails from the plains of the South. This offers her greater proximity to the events and theepicentre and also unconsciously laces her poem with a tinge of nostalgia. The poem, titled 'She has no permission to laugh and no tears to cry' makes River Netravati its central metaphor. Netravati is Mangalore's chief source of water. The poem is crude in its expression and structurally weak but the concern and emotion is emphatic. Interestingly, Bharati read out this poem at the same women poets' conference where Prathibha read out her 'Devi.'

Bharathi's poem begins with these lines: 

"Netravati's laughter that lashed against the rocks
Is finally gone, fully shattered
She has shed her tears continuously and has gone dry
On the unassuming nakedness of her rocks is now spread a saffron drape." 

This personification of Netravati continues through a couple of paras and the poem ends by saying the river now awaits a monsoon that would wash away all the stains on her body. This poem read at the poets conference was recorded for telecast on Doordarshan, but it was finally censored. Pratibha's poem perhaps escaped the censors because they could not penetrate its deceptive familiarity.

Incidentally, both Bharathi and Prathibha belong to the Brahmin community with a fairly conservative upbringing and therefore in essence these two poems indicate a certain implosion to me.