Hooked To Haiku – Part I

Nowadays I am walking, talking, eating, sleeping, living, breathing haiku.  And you will be flooded with posts after posts on this mesmeric genre of unique poetry. Why? I shall disclose the reason by and by. But before that I must pay my respect to all those well- wishers of mine who showed the right direction when I was bumbling over haiku. Well, that does not mean I have mastered the art of “haiku-ing”. No, not at all…I have not because I guess haiku writing is an art which you cannot learn overnight. You have to ‘grow’ with it. More of that later…

At the outset, let me dedicate this post to Shri Amit Aggarwal of Safarnama fame who has been instrumental in exposing me to the world of Hindi haiku. Though, very technically speaking, haiku in Hindi, or any other vernacular language, for that matter, bear certain intrinsic differences from haiku written in English, in terms of expression, style, word craft etc. Notwithstanding, Hindi haiku is as engaging as its English counterpart basically because the subtler nuances of this form of writing remain the same (read form the base) whichever language one may adopt to put to word one’s epiphany moments. More so, if these haiku flow out of Dr. Sudha Gupta’s pen, the result is spell binding to say the least.

I am grateful to Amitji for generously gifting me a few of Dr. Gupta’s collection of haikus – “Lakdi Ka Sapna”, “Chulbuli Raat Ne” and a few more with the purpose to get me the “feel” of haiku in general, and Hindi haiku in particular.

Before I proceed further, let me once again confess that I am nobody to talk about, let alone evaluate, the works of a word mistress who surpassed herself with every haiku she created. Moreover, since Dr. Gupta writes in Hindi, it is more fitting to ‘speak’ about her anthologies in her mother tongue, i.e. Hindi, which I may try someday, seriously. But as of now, I just wish to ramble on ….because it is so difficult to contain oneself when one comes across precious and meaningful work of immense literary worth and not let the world know about it.  Just that and nothing else…

Yesterday night I slept over Dr. Gupta’s “Chulbuli Raat Ne”. Again, there are certain books which you cannot stop or finish reading. You keep coming back to them, gravitated by their magnetic pull, bringing you closer to the abstractions of existence with every read. That is why I have not yet shelved the book.

What is it with haiku that makes one wistful? It is that undercurrent of futility, pathos and emptiness that makes you realize how you are wasting every bit of your living moment chasing myriad things and you never know whether these are meant for you!

And that brings me to the oft-quoted shloka of Bhagwad Geeta whose relevance, I suppose, shall never depreciate with time:

“Karmanye vaadhikaaraste maa faleshu kadachana

 Maa karmafalheturbhurmaa te sangostvakarmani”

 One must devote oneself to the joy of efforts detached from the results – the journey is much more significant than the destination! And why am I reminded of this invaluable verse? It is because haiku tells me to be aware of my awareness of every moment.. to be in the now… and shrug off the fear of tomorrow and remorse of yesterday!!! Therapeutic ??? Haiku does just that…

At the same time, it makes me stand and stare and assimilate the experiences of every fraction of time….and show the world how it is and not tell…Cathartic???

Now let’s not veer into generics. Coming back to “Chulbuli Raat Ne”, the elusiveness of haiku gets underscored as one page is turned into the other…I present a few gems below:

ghoomta raha

mausam ka pahiya

phir basant

 

whirls on

 wheel of seasons

once again spring

khola jo dwar

nakamiyaan khadi thi

munh chidhaati

 door unlatched

failures galore

grimace at me

yaadon ki loi

khutiin par tange-tange

keedey kutari

blanket of memories

hanging by the hook

moth-eaten

 

aah! durdaiv!

bhumika likho tum

main pat katha

aah! disaster!

preface you script

I the screen play

 

beshumaar wey

ghaltiyaan tumhaari

maafi hamaari

 

beyond count

your follies

my forgiveness

Aah! I did it but with a trepid heart as translation or transliteration both rob the original of its beauty and I am too ‘small’ to mess with such beatific creations. Honestly, I chose those which I could ‘tweak’ idea being to outreach Dr. Gupta’s work to the non-Hindi speaking readers too. But there are numerous others which are too beautiful, too delicate, too esoteric and too prfound to meddle with… I present a few of those here as well:

kokil taan

anjaane chhu deti

dukhti rag

sab ke paas

thaila bhar kisse hain

sukh dukh ke

 

hai naseeb!

boond-bhar neend bhi

naseeb nahin

 

koi upaay?

ateet ko bulaaun?

laut aa jaaye?

 

bada bindaas

murdon se baazi lagaa

soya shahar

 

panchhi na rotey

mausam ke khilaaf

sab sahte

 

kabhi na toota

sheet-grishm-varsha ka

chakra anootha

 

gullak phod

chulbuli raat ne

bikhere sikke

 

main durba bhali

ujaad, khandahar,

kahin bhi pali

 

main to jugnu

saans bhar ujaala

phailata phirun

 

ham-safar !

mere gun na giney

khot hii dikhey

When it comes to such writings, you cannot put a full stop and say that’s it. You read, you muse over, you cannot get over it and then you come back to it once again…and then again…and then again and again…

So, see you in my next post…..

Cheerio!!