A Vietnamese Poem A Casual Thought about Grass Explicated by Ramesh Mukhopadhyaya

Poet Truong Nam Huong

Translator into English Thieu Khanh

Explicated by Ramesh Chandra Mukhopadhyaya

A casual thought about grass

People say loving each  and kiss each

other on grass

People bid farewell and show each other the

Crevasse

The grass  listens and stays naturally green

People dig grass up

And cultivate it again

With all pessimism and

All their hope then

Grass stands thempains

And stays naturally green

History has seen declined and

Prosperous dynasties

Buried under grass

many kings as well as crazies

Fair and lovely grass stays naturally green

Above all sufferings;

Above all great cheer

Grass is green like a delight and soft like a

tear

Self- convinced of no account, grass stays naturally green

The poem opens with an idyllic environment. There the people recline on grass and speak of love. They kiss each other on grass. This is an imagery that catches the eye. People bid farewell to each other and show each other the gaps between the grasses or else the fissures on the soil. The earth is indeed the bed or the sofa where they could make love to each other but this is not all. The poet feels that the grass listens to our dialogues of love and stays naturally green.  The legitimation is perhaps significant , The grass might stand for Nature itself. If we men had loved each other really , if there were no fight among nations, nature would remain unperturbed and green because nature loves to hear men who love each other. But this is a world where men fight their fellowmen and a country attacks another country goaded by greed. So nature is losing its green. Every man stands alone as it were shunned by his neighbours in a defoliated forest. It was cultivation or agriculture that started polluting nature. The poet observes that the people dig grass up and c ultivate it again. People dig grass to produce agricultural crops or to retrieve mineral wealth or else people destroys grass to go ahead with urbanization. That is how the civilization wounds and injures Nature. But the poet observes that the grass or Nature may pass through a dejected mental state. Maybe nature might look forward to a resurrection as well. Yet sometimes people cultivate the grass and nature again. But there is a difference between the woodland and the park of Ebenezer Howard. In the woods, nature remains untrammeled. In the parks, the Nature we encounter is scissored Nature. Be that as it may, Nature or grass stands the pains and stays naturally green. The poet observes that history has seen rise and fall of dynasties and empires. The mightiest monarchs could not hold on more than a day. However much great they were, they had to embrace the earth as their graves . That was their  be all and end all. The sceptre and crown must tumble with scythe and spade and find rest below the grasses. Man seeks to control Nature and reign over Nature. But it is a pity he is himself a part of Nature and despite his empty vaunts dust he is and to dust he returns. Crazies are now on the saddle. Globalization is the fad of  the day. They are out to destroy Nature but the poet prophesies that they must also bite the grass when the inevitable hour comes. Nature however has no word against man. Fair and loving grass stays naturally green. The grass is the type of ideal man. The grass is above all sufferings and all great cheer .That is the grass is the ideal man who takes joys and sorrows weal and woe with equanimity of mind. The poet says that the grass is green like a delight and soft like  a tear. This is an imagery which is time and again. Green here stands for delight and tear here stands for softness. With the poet, softness alone endures, love alone endures. Jesus , God the Son prophesied that the world will be ruled by the meek and the humble in times to come. Despite the untold sufferings, why should the grass remain ever delighted? Why should Nature remain ever delighted? Well, neither the grass nor the Nature as a whole has any object in view. In other words, unlike men they do not have any desire. That is why they are neither overtaken by sorrow because of the unfulfillment of any desire. They are not overwhelmed by joys because of attainment of desires. It is they who remain ever in delight. Here is a legitimation . Happiness does not consist of victories or attainment in the contingent. True delight is found through the joy of living only. Those who live just for the sake of living stay naturally green. On another level, the grass could stand for the common run of men. Let kings and emperors come and go., Let empires appear and disappear, but the common run of men will go on forever. But if they  had learned the art of living from Nature, from the soft grass, from the humble grass,  they could remain ever in love and peace. The grass lives simply impelled by the delight in living. Does not the grass stand for the artist who professes art for art sake? One wonders whether the present poem contradicts this theory or not. Because the poem in our final judgment is didactic. This is a paradox. Paradox is indeed the stuff with which good pieces of literature are composed.   The poem is like a dewdrop  deposited at dawn dazzling like diamond which reflects the way of the world and which illuminates the way out from the mesh of worldly joys and sorrows.