I Won't Let You Go (14 page)

The carriage stands at the door. It is midday.

The autumn sun is gradually gathering strength.

The noon wind blows the dust on the deserted

village path. Beneath a cool peepul

an ancient, weary beggar-woman sleeps

on a tattered cloth. All is hushed and still

and shines brilliantly – like a sun-lit night.

Only in my home there’s neither siesta nor rest.

Ashwin’s gone. The Puja vacation’s ended.

I’ve to return to the far-off place where I work.

Servants, busybodies, shout and fuss

with ropes and strings, tying packages sprawled

in this room and that, all over the house.

The lady of the house, her heart heavy as a stone,

her eyes moist, nevertheless has no time

to shed tears, no, not a minute: she has

too much to organise, rushes about,

extremely busy, and though there already is

too much baggage, she reckons it’s not enough.

‘Look,’ I say, ‘what on earth shall I do with these –

so many stewpots, jugs, bowls, casseroles,

bedclothes, bottles, boxes? Let me take

a few and leave the rest behind.’

                                 Nobody pays

the slightest attention to what I say. ‘You might

suddenly feel the need for this or that

and where then would you find it far from home?

Golden moong beans, long-grain rice, betel leaves,

areca-nuts; in that bowl, covered, a few blocks

of date-palm molasses; firm ripe coconuts;

two containers of fine mustard oil;

dried mango, mango-cakes; milk – two seers –

and in these jars and bottles your medicines.

Some sweet goodies I’ve left inside this bowl.

For goodness’s sake, do eat them, don’t forget them.’

I realise it would be useless to argue with her.

There it is, my luggage, piled high as a mountain.

I look at the clock, then look back at the face

of my beloved, and gently say, ‘Bye then.’

Quickly she turns her face away, head bent,

and pulls the end of her sari over her eyes

to hide her tears, for tears are inauspicious.

By the front door sits my daughter, four years old,

low in spirits, who, on any other day,

would have had her bath well completed by now,

and with two mouthfuls of lunch would have succumbed

to drowsiness in her eyelids, but who, today,

neglected by her mother, has neither bathed

nor lunched yet. Like a shadow she has

kept close to me all morning, observing

the fuss of the packing, silent, wide-eyed.

Weary now, and sunk in some thought of hers,

she sits by the front door quietly, without a word.

‘Goodbye then, poppet,’ when I say,

she simply replies, sad-eyed, her face grave:

‘I won’t let you go.’ That is all.

She sits where she is, makes not the slightest attempt

to either hold my arm or close the door,

but only with her heart’s right, given by love,

proclaims her stand: ‘I won’t let you go.’

Yet in the end the time comes when, alas,

she has to let me go.

                      Foolish girl, my

daughter, who gave you the strength

to make such a statement, so bold, so self-assured –

‘I won’t let you go’? Whom will you,

in this universe, with two little hands

hold back, proud girl, and against whom fight,

with that tiny weary body of yours by the door,

that stock of love in your heart your only arms?

Nervously, shyly, urged by our pain within,

we can but express our innermost desire,

just say, ‘I do not wish

to let you go.’ But who can

say such a thing as ‘I won’t let you go’!

Hearing such a proud assertion of love

from your little mouth, the world, with a mischievous smile,

dragged me from you, and you, quite defeated,

sat by the door like a picture, tears in your eyes.

All I could do was mop my own eyes and leave.

On either side of the road as I move on

fields of autumn, bent by the weight of their crops,

bask in the sun; trees, indifferent to others,

stand on either side, staring all day

at their own shadows. Full, autumnal,

Ganga flows rapidly. In the blue heavens

white cloudlets lie like delicate new-born calves,

fully satisfied with their mother’s milk

and blissfully asleep. I sigh,

looking at the earth, stretching to the horizon,

weary of the passing epochs, bare in the brilliant sun.

In what a profound sadness are sky and earth

immersed! The further I go,

the more I hear the same piteous note:

‘I won’t let you go!’ From the earth’s edge

to the outermost limits of the blue heavens rings

this perennial cry, without beginning, without end:

‘I won’t let you go! I won’t let you go!’ That’s what

they all say – ‘I won’t let you go!’ Mother earth,

holding the littlest grass-stalk to her breast,

says with all her power: ‘I won’t let you go!’

And in a lamp about to go out, someone seems

to pull the dying flame from darkness’s grasp,

saying a hundred times, ‘Ah, I won’t let you go!’

From heaven to earth in this infinite universe

this is the oldest statement, the deepest cry –

‘I won’t let you go!’ And yet, alas,

we have to let go of everything, and they go.

Thus it has been since time without beginning.

In creation’s torrent, carrier of deluging seas,

they all rush past with fierce velocity,

eyes burning, eager arms outstretched,

moaning, calling – ‘Won’t, won’t let you go!’ –

filling the shores of the cosmos with their clamour.

‘Won’t, won’t let you go,’ declares the rear wave

to the front wave, but none listens

or responds.

             From all directions today

that sad heart-rending wail reaches my ears,

ringing without pause, and in my daughter’s voice:

a cry of the cosmos quite as importunate

as a child’s. Since time began

all it gets it loses. Yet its grasp

of things hasn’t slackened, and in the pride

of undiminished love, like my daughter of four,

ceaselessly it sends out this cry: ‘I won’t let you go!’

Face wan, tears streaming,

its pride is shattered each hour, every minute.

Yet such is love, it never concedes defeat

and in a choked voice rebelliously repeats:

‘I won’t let you go!’ Each time it loses,

each time it blurts, ‘How can what I

love be ever alienated from me?

Is there anything in this whole universe

as full of yearning, as superlative,

as mighty, as boundless as my desire?’

So saying, it arrogantly proclaims:

‘I won’t let you go’, only to see at once

its cherished treasure blown away by a breath

like trivial dry dust, whereupon

eyes overflowing, like a tree uprooted,

it collapses on the ground, pride crushed, head bent.

Yet this remains love’s plea:

‘I won’t let the Creator break His promise to me.

A great pledge, sealed and signed, to me was given,

a charter of rights in perpetuity.’

Thus, though thin and frail, and face to face

with almighty death, it says, swollen with pride,

‘Death, you don’t exist!’ What cheek!

Death sits, smiling. And that eternal love,

so death-tormented, for ever in a flutter

with restless anxiety, has quite overpowered

this infinite universe, like the dampness of tears

suffusing sad eyes. A weary hope against hope

has drawn a mist of dejection over the whole

universe. Yes, I think I see

two hapless imploring arms lie quietly,

encircling the world, in a vain attempt

to bind it in its embrace, like a still reflection

lying in a flowing stream – some illusion

of a cloud charged with raindrops and tears.

Wherefore today I can hear

so much yearning in the rustling of the trees,

as the noonday’s hot wind, idly unmindful, plays

meaningless games with dry leaves, and as the day wanes,

lengthening the shadows under the peepul trees.

The cosmos is a field where the infinite’s flute

plays a pastoral lament. And she sits and listens,

earth, her hair down, and it fills her with longing,

there, in the far cornfields, by Ganga’s borders,

a golden cloth-end, sunlight-yellow, drawn

over her breast. Her eyes are still,

fixed on the far blue sky, and she says nothing.

Yes, I’ve seen her pale face,

no different from the face of my daughter of four,

so quiet, so hurt, and nearly lost in the door-edge.

Earth, take me back,

your lap-child back to your lap

in the shelter of your sari’s voluminous end.

Mother made of earth, may I

live diffused in your soil; spread

myself in every direction like spring’s joy;

burst this breast-cage, shatter this stone-closed

narrow wall, this blind dismal jail

of self; swing, hum, shake,

flop, radiate, disperse,

shudder, be startled by

sudden lights and thrills,

flow through the whole globe –

edge to edge, north to south,

east to west; burgeon

with secret sap in moss, lichen, grass,

branch, bark, leaf; touch

with rippling fingers cornfields bent with the weight

of golden ears; privily fill

new blossoms with colour, aroma, nectar;

fill too, with blue, waters of vast seas,

and dance to ceaseless waves on quiet beaches;

hurrah language from wave to wave everywhere;

lay myself like a white scarf on mountain-tops,

in lofty regions of solitude, lands of hushed

unsullied snow.

                  The desire that unawares to me

has long been welling in me like a secret spring,

now, having brimmed the heart, wants to get out

in a flow that will be free, generous, bold,

uncontrolled – in order to bedew you.

How shall I crack this heart, how unfetter

that anguished wish, send it in a million streams

to all lands and directions!

Therefore, simply sitting at home,

I’m always greedily devouring travelogues,

tales of those whom curiosity has driven

to roam in strange places. And with them

I girdle you in my imagination’s meshes.

                Far lands difficult of access,

endless savannahs with neither trees nor tracks,

theatres of dire thirst, where the glare

from burning sand-heaps pierces eyes like needles,

beds of dust to the horizon upon which

earth, flushed with fever, lies and pants,

breath inflamed, throat parched, body on fire,

ruthless, taciturn, all alone.

Many a time sitting at home by my window,

looking out, I’ve imagined scenes far away:

say, a blue lake, hushed, secluded,

clear as crystal, circled by sierras,

cloudlets clinging to the peaks like suckling infants;

snow-lines, visible above the mountains’ blue,

block our sight, like row upon row

of immobile barricades mushroomed through heaven,

sentries posted at yoga-immersed

matted-hair Shiva’s hermitage.

In my mind I’ve roamed

on far-off polar beaches where earth’s vowed

eternal virginity in chill attire,

bereft of jewels, desires, company;

where at long night’s end, day returns,

but without sound or music; and night comes,

with none to sleep, stays steadfastly awake

in the endless sky, like a mother whose sleep’s been murdered,

whose bed is empty, whose child is dead.

The more I study the names of new countries

and their varied accounts, the more my mind

rushes forward, wanting to touch all; say, by a sea,

between small blue hills there lies a hamlet where

fishing-nets lie on the beach, drying in the sun,

a boat hovers on the waters, a sail stirs,

a fisherman fishes, and through a steep ravine

a narrow stream winds its way, twists and turns.

How I wish I could

embrace with my arms, press to my heart that nest

of human habitation, cosily ensconced

in the lap of hills and resonant with the waves!

Whatever exists anywhere I wish to make mine,

melt myself into a river’s current,

to village after village on either bank

offer myself as water to quench men’s thirst,

sing my murmuring song both day and night;

become a chain of lofty mountains stretching

from the sea where the sun rises to the sea where it sets,

rim to rim, a cincture to the earth,

noble in my mystery, which none may fathom,

and on my hard stone lap, where the chill wind sharply blows,

secretly cradle, rear to manhood new

unknown nations. Deep is my desire

in country after country to identify

myself with all men; to be born

as an Arab child in the desert, fearless and free,

raised on camel’s milk; to explore

cold stone mansions, Buddhist monasteries

on Tibet’s plateau; to drink grape-wine

as a Persian in a rose-garden; to ride

horses as an intrepid Tartar; to be polite

and vigorous as a Japanese; to toil

with dedication as in the ancient Chinese land;

to experience existence in all homes.

Oh, to be a naked barbarian, sturdy, robust, fierce,

neither to duties nor to prohibitions geared,

bound by nothing – neither customs, nor scruples, nor doubts,

nor a sense of mine and thine, nor the fever of thought;

one whose life-flow always rushes unchecked,

colliding with what’s in front, bearing clouts

without a whimper, never looking back –

stung by conscience or in vain remorse –

nor regarding the future with false hopes,

but on the wave-peaks of the here and the now

dancing and moving on in thrilled delight!

Yes, that life’s unruly, but I still love it,

and how often have I wished I could submit

to that vitality’s storm, hurtling like a light-weight

boat in full sail!

                 The forest’s ferocious tiger

easily bears his own enormous heft

by his immense strength. His body, vivid and bright

like thunder within which fire lurks, beneath

forests which are like clouds, with a mighty roar

as deep as thunder springs suddenly upon his prey

with lightning’s speed. Effortless is that greatness,

violence-keen that joy, that proud triumph:

even such things I wish to savour once!

I would, if I could, drink again and again

the manifold wines of joy that overflow

all the goblets that this cosmos holds.

Beautiful earth, as I have looked upon you,

how often has my spirit leapt into song

with huge happiness! How I have craved

to get a firm grip on your ocean-girdled waist

and keep it pressed to my breast;

to spread myself in every direction, as pervasive

and boundless as the morning sun; to dance

all day long upon forests, upon mountains,

on the undulations of trembling leaves; to kiss

every flower that buds; to embrace

all the tender densely growing greenswards;

to oscillate as on a swing of delight

on every wave; and quietly at night

with hushed footsteps to come as cosmic sleep,

stroking the eyes of all your birds and beasts

with my own fingers, entering every bed,

nest, home, cave, den that there is, spreading myself

like a gigantic sari-end upon

all that exists, cloaking it

with the gentlest darkness!

                 My earth, you are

so many years old; with me mixed in your clay,

unwearied in the limitless firmament,

you have orbited the sun; and for nights and days

spanning millennia within me your grass has grown,

flowers in clusters have opened,

so many trees have shed their leaves, buds, fruits,

odoriferous pollen! Hence in the present time,

maybe one day, sitting alone with a drifting mind

on Padma’s bank, gazing with charmed eyes,

with all my limbs and awareness I can sense

how grass-seeds sprout with shivers within your soil,

how, inside you, streams of vital fluids

circulate night and day, how flower-buds

appear with blind ecstatic delight,

shielded by lovely calyces, how in the morning sun

grass-blades, climbers, trees, shrubs rejoice,

with a concealed thrill and almost foolish elation,

like infants wearied by suckling at mothers’ breasts,

fully satisfied, smiling at pleasant dreams.

Likewise some day when post-rains sunrays

fall on fields of ripened golden crops,

rows of coconut palms quiver in the breeze,

shimmer in the sun, there rises within me such

an immense yearning, as if in remembrance

of bygone days when my sentience was dispersed

everywhere – in land, water, leaves,

the sky’s azure. And the entire world

seems to send me a hundred inarticulate calls,

like the familiar hubbub of manifold

gladsome games played by my perennial

companions, a happy commingled murmur

issuing from a vast, varied nursery.

Take me back

once more to that refuge, remove that hurt

of separation that throbs from time to time

within my mind, when in the evening’s rays

I look at a big meadow, as cows return

from far pastures, kicking dust from field-paths,

smoke curls from tree-encircled hamlets

up to the evening sky, far off the moon

appears slowly, slowly like a weary farer,

and on the deserted sandbank by the river

I feel so lonely, such an alien,

like an exile, and with arms outstretched

I rush out to receive the entire outer world

within myself: sky, earth, river-nestled

heaps of sleeping calm white moonlight. But I can’t

touch anything and just stare at an emptiness

in utter despondence. Take me back

to the centre of that wholeness, whence continually

life germinates in a hundred thousand ways,

sends out shoots and buds, whence songs burst

in a million melodies, dances emanate

in countless gestures, where the mind flows

in torrents of ideas and emotions, where every hole

belongs to a flute that plays, and where you stand,

black mythic cow of plenty, being milked

from a thousand angles by plants, birds, beasts,

numberless thirsty creatures, the juice of joy

raining in so many ways and all the directions

echoing to that murmuring music. I wish

to taste that various, universal bliss

in one moment, all elements together,

united with all. And will not your groves

be even greener, mingled with my gladness?

Will not a few new trembling rays invade

the morning sunshine? Surely my ecstasy

will dye both earth and sky with the heart’s pigments,

gazing at which, within a poet’s mind

poems shall rise, lovers’ eyes shall fill

with emotion’s intoxication, and from bird-beaks

sudden songs shall spring. O earth,

all your limbs are dyed with the happiness

of so many thousands!

Floods of creatures have again and again

enveloped you with their lives, gone and returned,

mixing their hearts’ affection with your humus,

writing so many scripts, spreading in so many directions

such yearning eager embraces! With them I shall

mingle all my love with diligent care,

dye your sari’s end with vivid colours.

Yes, I shall

deck you with my all. And will not

some enchanted ear on a river-bank

hear my song in the water’s murmur? Will not

some earth-dweller rise from sleep, perceive

my song in the dawn-light? A hundred years hence

will not my spirit quiver in this lovely forest’s

layers of leaves? In home after home

hundreds of men and women will for long

play their games of domesticity, and will not

something of myself remain in their loves?

Tell me, will I not

descend as laughter on their faces or as lush

youth on all their limbs? Will I not be

their sudden pleasure on a spring day or a young

keen bud of love sprouting in a nook

of their minds? Could you, motherland,

abandon me altogether? Could the tough

earthen cord that has endured for ages

suddenly be severed? Might I have to leave

the soft lap that has cradled me a million years?

Rather, from all sides won’t they pull me to them:

all these trees, shrubs, mountains, rivers, glens,

this deep blue sky that belongs to eternity,

this generous breeze that wafts such vitality,

light that wakes, the knitted social lives

within which all creatures live enmeshed?

Yes, I’ll circle you; I shall dwell among

your own kinsfolk; as birds, beasts, worms,

trees, shrubs, creepers you’ll call me again and again,

draw me to your warm throbbing bosom;

age after age, life after life you’ll press

your breasts to my mouth, assuage the million

hungers of my lives with the dripping ambrosial milk

of a million delights, emptying yourself

and making me drink with your deepest tenderness.

Then shall I, a young man, earth’s grown up son,

travel the world, traverse continents,

venture far, far among constellations

along inaccessible tracks. But as yet

I’ve not had enough; thirst for your nectar-milk

still clings to my mouth; your face

still brings lovely dreams before my eyes;

nothing of you have I finished yet;

all is mysterious, and my steady gaze

hasn’t yet plumbed the depth of its own amazement.

Like a child I still cling to your bosom,

my eyes on your face. Mother, hold me, please,

within the firmest embrace of your arms.

Make me your own, one who belongs to your breast:

that secret source from where the fountain rises –

of your vast vitality and varied delights –

do take me there. Don’t keep me away.