Mountain Nights by Rati Saxena
1
Last night
there was a dream
And
In the dream -You
You
You
And
Only you
Where was I?
2
Before your arrival
A few names were known to me
Mountain, river, stream and dewpond
You made me a friend
To
Snow thunder encampment in the mountain
Typhoons in rivers
Tiny waves in the pond
And to the song of
The dancing stream
And my self
but
I wanted to be a friend of yours!.
3++++
Last night
The earth worms forgot their way
And came into the holes of snakes
When snakes could not find their place
They went to the sea to make billows
No, no
nothing happened to fishes
they remained in the sea
lost in themselves
forgot completely to swim.
nobody called to the bubbling earth
neither the sky or nor the earth
yesterday
the earth was on the tree
the whole night
5
last night
the sky was so close
that I could cover myself
and pass the night
the mountain was sitting near to me
with a burning cigar on his lips
the sea was at my feet
gently caressing my feet
but I was not there,
roaming in the jungle, caves
with wild animals
to reduce my itch
by their sharp teeth
6
they say that
their nights are like mountains
but mine was like
sluggish water
even though
I was sleeping
and waking with it
the whole night
Explication by Dr Ramesh Chandra Mukhopadhyaya
The title of the poem is curious. It is Mountain Night.Could a night be like a
mountain that is vast and
insurmountable? Or else could a night be littered with mountains in a dream?
The addressee of the poem is a mountain. The poet recollects
her dream. It was in the dream that a mountain engrossed the poet. The poet
addresses the mountain of her dream and says
Last night
there was a dream
And
In the dream -You
You
You
And
Only you
Where was I?
The lay out of the poem reminds one of Cummings. The word you has been emphasized through
repetition that reminds one of Dante A fytte of the poem is twice built with
one word- you.With the poet the you of the mountain was all in all.The notion of I was totally absent in the poets
mind.It is said that Guru Nanak was once running a shop in his adolescence. And
his head was full of yours. That is whoever came to his shop to buy
something would hear from Nanakji that
the article did not belong to Nanakji but to the customer only. Once one can
love the other like that, forgetful of ones self one attains bliss so says the
Upanishads. In the light of Freud the mountain could stand for phallus. And if
one could forget oneself to give
pleasure to the other even in physical relation one could perhaps attain the
same bliss of forgetting ones self and merging into the other.Edward Said has
made us aware of the other.If we try to dominate the other we enter into
strife.If we forget the self and are dominated by the other we attain bliss.
The poet engrossed with the other all of a sudden enquired of her own self and did not find its separate
identity and cried –Where was I? In fact during perfect bliss although the ego
vanishes some awareness of the self still lingers in the consciousness. This
baffles description
The poet tells the Mountain that before the mountain arrived
she knew certain things such as mountain
river stream and dewpod only in name. But now that the mountain is her friend
it is through the mountain that the poet has a first hand experience not
only of the dewponds or the ponds atop the hill but also the rivers and the
streams that flow down the mountain
and charge the environ ment with
vitality and thrill.Yes the mountain introduced the poet with snow thunder
encampment in mountains typhoons in
rivers small waves in the pond and the song of the dancing stream.They
became the poets friends.What is snow ?
We are aware of the conscious mind. But there could be minds below the
conscious mind . It is the snow of forgetfulness that keeps in unknown unknowable
store the experiences of earlier births if any. It is the snow that melts in
the sun to invoke new births. Thunder accompanied the giving of Law of
Sinai.Being introduced to thunder the poet experiences fresh revelations.
Encampments in mountains might mean hard
to reach mental spiritual and emotional state. It is the dwelling place of holy
beings and God.The existence is in a flux. The human body is in a flux. The
blood vessels the nerves are rivers.And the poet experiences typhoons in them.
The typhoon over there could be small waves in ponds. Then there is the tranquility
as heard in the song of the dancing stream.Thus there has been a transition
from snow to dancing stream through different stages. The dancing stream fertilizes
the soil.
This is a wonderful imagery dwelling on the communion of the
self with nonself..Physical sensations
as a result of the communion with the nonself have been delineated in terms of
objective symbols such as mountains and typhoons .And they lay bare the whole
gamut of Nature with its terrible beauty that evokes holy dread. The body
itself is Nature or Prakriti. So through physical sensations one might
experiemce the whole gamut of Nature.Seen from another angle it is the
different aspects of Nature that work together to create human body,In
Durgasaptasati of Markandeya Purana it is Death that creates the hair it is the
Ocean or Varuna who forges the thighs of the goddess Durga and it is the Moon
that creates her breasts and so on. Practically through this communion with the
other one becomes aware of her greater self the Prakriti. One understands how
ones body is the world. The body is not what it seems to be made of flesh and
bones only. But the poet is not satisfied with the realization of her greater
self. She wants to be the friend of nonself or the friend of the Beyond.An
infinite as it were aware of its
finitude wants to befriend another infinite perhaps larger and greater
And what happens in the realm of the unconscious mind of the
poet? Therein lives the earthworms and the snakes. The earth worm cannot tolerate
the sun .It always hides from the sun in the tunnels inside the earth forged by itself.It upturns the soil of the
earth and makes the earth fertile. It has no bones no eyes. But it can perceive
the world by feeling vibrations. The earthworm popping up from the unconscious
sneaks into the holes of the snakes.The
holes of the snakes also belong to the plane of the unconscious where
they hibernate throughout the winter. The sensations and feelings that are the
earthworm as if take refuge in hibernation. The snakes now finding their
shelters usurped go to the seas and forge billows where they can retire. The
deep in us or the billows now call out to the deep in God
The poet in course of her narration of her experience of the
communion with the nonself switches to a
fairy tale.The earthworms enter into the holes of the snake. The snake enters
the sea. Now the poet takes the role of the listener and asks What happens to
the fish? Well if the entrails of the earth are symbolic of the unconscious the
waters are symbolic of the subconscious. The snake hiding in the earth is
wisdom. When wisdom alights on the subconscious the fishes forget to swim and
are lost in themselves as it were engrossed with creativity. They do not fidget
any more being in close neighbourhood of snakes or wisdom.
Charged with the billows of wisdom the poet in a vision sees the earth nesting on a tree
throughout the night. What night is to
the common run of men is the hour when the poets undertake voyages in the world
within alight with the light of wisdom. This is the tree along the trunk of which the shamans go up to the
heaven and go down to the netherland. It is the tree that connects the three
worlds of the conscious subconscious and unconscious. When information moves to
and fro among the three world we can attain the wholeness of our personality.
In the next phase of the poets meditation the poet finds
herself very close to the skies and she covers herself with that only. In human
terms to be covered with the sky implies to be decked with no cover. But nay
the sky stands for the nihil that covers the world and lurks inside the world.
Near her the mountain is aburning like a cigar. Will the poet climb the
mountain and vanish like Moses . No the poet now engrossed with the nihil of
the existence is not drawn to the contingent. She adventures in the jungles and probes into the caves amidst wild animals.
She now encounters her wild desires lurking in the subconscious and unconscious
four square. This she does impelled by her itch.Often the wounds created by the
beasts in an encounter with them could tranquillise such itches.An imagery that
might allude to physical communion with the other where mind is absent.
The beasts claim that the all embracing night is like mountain. As
it were the mountain is all in all with them. So the desires are all taking
refuge in the mountain or in the phallus.But the poet tells them that although she is with the mountain all the
time she knows that it is stagnant water.What could be the mountain then? Well
it is the world of the contingent with which we are
always engaged in intercourse. But the poet tells the Desires that the big
bazaars and shopping malls and the physical comforts are but shallow water.
This is the world view of a shaman who visits the three worlds in dreams
Thi is a poem that depicts a spiritual voyage
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