Return of Jarasandha (and Ravana too)

The Mahabharata talks about Jarasandha the king of Magadha who was born in two separate halves to twin mothers and was slain by Bhima in a wrestling combat. The two halves were put together by a witch called Jara and hence his name. Bhima, in a combat which lasted 27 days, would tear him into two and by magical power, both the halves would come together. Finally, Krishna picked up a piece of straw and broke it into two and threw the halves in opposite directions and the intelligent Bhima picks up the cue and tears Jarasandha into two and throws the halves in opposite directions. The two halves thus cannot come together and Jarasandha dies. My memory of the story comes, of course, from the Amar Chitra Katha.

Jarasandha has returned.This time as a trope for splitting and division of self at multiple levels of being:emotional, personal, social, cultural, and spiritual.  He is reborn in my Marathi poem,` Jarasandhachya Blogvarche Kahi Ansh' which is the title of my second collection of Marathi poems. My first collection of Marathi poems was titled, ` Bhintishivaichya Khidkitun Dokavtana' ( click here to download my first collection) which was published by Abhidhanantar Prakashan, Mumbai in 2004. So the second collection has appeared after almost five to six years and consists of most of my poems written in the period.  The cacophonic collection is a parodic collage of ready made narrative materials in the public domain- from James Bond, Harry Potter and Peter Parker to Ravana, Jarasanda and the Bible. There is a distinct shift in the poetics from extremely subjective, surreal and  self obsessed agonies of the first collection to parodic use of public personas, narratives and motifs. Though the chief characteristic of my poetry, the visual and surreal imagery, persists. The cover of the collection is a fantastic painting titled The Colour of Genesis I by a well-known Marathi visual artist Deepak Shinde.

My poems don't set out on a predetermined journey. They usually begin with a startling image or a motif which singes my being and I explore the possibilities inherent in this seed. I don't know what tree it will turn out to be. I have written a footnote on my poems in one of my blog entries.It discusses various contexts of my poetry and creative process.


Here is a poem from my newly born Marathi collection translated into English by yours truly. It is contemporary soliloquy of Ravana


Ten Asides for Ten Heads


i)

The elixir of immortality
In the navel
Of this ten faced world
Has dried out

I place my longish demonic fingers
On the navel
And click
But I hear no beep

Its ten thousand windows
Must have crashed
I guess

ii)

You think Ravana was a single person
Or that his world had a single face
In fact, for your information
His bliss was also ten-faced
His agony was ten-faced too
He used to laugh
In ten different ways
At a single joke
He used to weep
His single grief
In ten different ways

iii)

Go and tell your one-headed Rama
To do whatever he liked in his life
But never try his hand
At poetry

Leave such things
To people like us

And drown himself
In that one-headed Sharayu

iv)

I have seen this world
Ten times more than you have
I have seen clearly
With my twenty eyes
How all things have ten sides

Pray tell me then
How can I shed light
On my ten-headed world
With your one-headed language?
How can I express
What I feel about Sita?
How can I explain
What I felt
When they humiliated my sister?

My mother tongue
Has ten grammatical numbers

How will I write poetry
In your language
Which has only two?

v)

Valmiki must have managed somehow
To write the flat one-headed story
Of Rama’s life

But kindly assign
The job of writing
My authorized biography
To Vyasa

And appoint ten Ganeshas
As his stenographer
For composing this Maha-Lanka

vi)


Your three stepped syllogism
Is useless
When it comes to understanding me

The seven-stepped logic
Of the Jainas
Is equally futile

Discover first
A ten part syllogism
First invent a language
With ten grammatical numbers for me

Bury your mono-directional
Monotonous language first

Throw away the formula
Of the Rama nama chant
And recognize me
As the true Deity of your heart

Because
With my single head
I can watch ten different channels
At a time on the TV

At a time
I can browse
At least ten different brands in the mall

I can chat at least
With ten different people
At a time

I can discuss twenty different topics
With twenty different people
With my twenty cell phones
On my twenty ears


vii)

Welcome, folks to my palace

Look at my well furnished bathroom
But I hope you won’t be so stupid
As to ask me why
There are ten mirrors here
Or ten tooth brushes
Or mouth fresheners of ten different flavours
Or ten tongue cleaners here

My soul is dual-core
Multi-tasking is my very nature

viii)

My mother had just two breasts
Women unfortunately just have two
That’s the reason why
I need either
At least ten women at a time
Or a single complete woman
With ten hands and ten breasts

However, I feel Lord Shambhunath
Has benevolently obliged womankind
By not creating such women

Had he made such a woman
We would have committed
Atrocities on her ten times over

Indeed
Even if men have a single organ
Their hunger is of ten different kinds
Their thirst has ten faces

Conversant as I am
With these things
In my old age
I am planning to write
For the ten-headed men
A different Kamsutra with ten sutras

Book your copy today
And get a prepublication discount
On my autographed copy

Ten conditions, of course
Apply.


ix)


You must have realized by now
That this glossy resplendent world
Is my empire

My close circuit cameras
Watch over all ten directions

I have detailed information
About what you do
Or do not do
In the mall

This world is my circular prison
All of you are my unknowing prisoners
My innumerable cameras
Keep a close watch
Over your every move
Over infinitesimal vibration of your thought
If you do anything out of the way
Mind you
You will have to face me

x)

However,
Only I know my true tragedy

Your one-headed Rama
Could never fathom my secret
His puritan Brahmastra
Could never find its way to my navel
As he never knew
Where it was

My heart has sprouted ten heads too
I sit and cry
In the ten-headed darkness

This Sharayu of yours
Is made of my ten types of tears
I have cried
Till my heart has turned schizophrenic

You alone can find my navel
And free me of my ten souls
Or else in the end
I will have to commit
Postmodern Harakiri myself

( Translated from Marathi by the Poet)


If you are interested in the collection, please feel free to write to me at sachinketkar at gmail dot com.

मराठी असणे म्हणजे नेमके काय असणे ह्या गुंतागुंतीच्या विषयावर संध्याकाळी केलेले काही विसखळीत विचार- सचिन केतकर

मराठी असंणे म्हणजे
मराठीत असणे


मराठी असणे म्हणजे शेतावर मराठी बुजगावणे लावणे
मराठी असणे म्हणजे बुजगावण्यांचीच शेती करणे
मराठी असणे म्हणजे मराठीत आत्मह्त्या करणे


मराठी असणे म्हणजे सातशे वर्ष जुन्या 
अनार्य गर्भाशयातून खडकाळ दरीत जन्मणे  


मराठी असणे म्हणजे मराठीत जगणे मराठीत हगणे 
मराठीत मुतणे 
मराठीत पिणे मराठी अश्रु काढणे
मराठीत रोगी होणे मराठीत भोगी होणे 
मराठीत उपभोगी होणे मराठीत योगी होणे
मराठीत उपयोगी होणे मराठीत खेळणे मराठीत चोळणे
मराठीत खुळे होणे
मराठीत लुळे होणे
मराठीत चरणे मराठीत हरणे 
मराठीत ऊठणे मराठीत मुठळ्या मारणे
मराठीत धरणे मराठीत करणे मराठीत मरणे
मराठीत धावणे मराठीत लावणे मराठीत चावणे
मराठीत हसणे मराठीत बसणे मराठीत डसणे
मराठी वेश करणे 
शुद्ध मराठी द्वेष करणे 
मराठीत माया लावणे 
मराठीत काया लावणे
मराठीत जीभेच्या भवानीला धार काढणे
मराठीत ऊडणे मराठीत बुडणे 
मराठीत पडणे मराठीत लंगडणे


मराठी असणे म्हणजे खांद्यावर शुद्ध मराठी ओझे वाहणे
मराठी असणे म्हणजे शुद्ध मराठी सुळ्यावर लटकणे
मराठी असणे म्हणजे शास्वत काळापासून
कपाळावर मराठी जखम घेउन हिंडणे


मराठी असंणे म्हणजे
मराठीत असणे


म्हणजेच मराठीत नसणे


मराठी असणे म्हणजे अमृताशी पैजा जिंकणाऱ्या 
आयसीयूत व्हेंटीलेटवर टिकलेल्या भाषेत


दुख:स्वप्न पाहणे


(१२ जानेवारी २०१०)

मी भाषेला बोलताना ऎकतो: सचिन केतकरची एक कविता

मी भाषेला बोलताना ऎकतो

सचिन केतकर

भाषा बोलतीय
मी ऎकतोय


सगळ्यांच्या पलीकडून ती बोलतीय
शेकडो वर्षांपासून
संततधार
अखंड
अव्याहात
भाषा बोलतीय मी ऎकतोय
लोकं तोंड फ़क्त हलवतायत
लोकाना वाटतय ते स्वत: बोलतायत
पण भाषाच बोलतीय
भाषेच्या उगमा पलिकडून


मी ऎकतोय
कित्येक नद्यांना पूर आले अन गेले
नद्यांनी कित्येकदा वाटा बदलल्या
भाषा थांबतच नाहीये
तिच्या सादेतूनच उभं होतं जग
हे घर हे झाड ही माणसं
भाषा बोलतीये


पण ती माझ्याशी बोलतीय का?
भाषा कोणाशीही बोलत नाहीये
म्हणून ती सगळ्यांशीच बोलतीये
पण भाषा स्वत:शीच बोलतीये फ़क्त
भाषेला बोलताना मी ऎकत नाहीये
मला बोलताना भाषा ऎकतीये


कारण अनादी काळा पासून
फ़क्त भाषाच बोलतीये
आणि भाषाच ऎकतीये


१४ ओक्टोबर २००९ सकळ्चे १२:१५

The Challenge called Dilip Chitre

This morning I received the sad news from Hemant that Dilip Dada is no more. With passing away of Dilip Chitre (1938-2009), an era of  Marathi poetry and literature comes to an end. He was one of the greatest poets in Marathi and one of the best Indian poets. He was a fantastic translator, critic and fiction writer. He was always a brave rebel, an immensely creative personality and uncompromising critical intelligence. He kickstarted the `Little Magazine Movement' in Maharashtra with his little magazine`Shabda' in the mid fifties. He remained a great influence and inspiration for hundreds of younger poets like me. He did so many blurbs for young unknown poets like me in Marathi. He was always `dada' an elder brother, and never a father figure. He never imposed himself or his ideas on people. His greatness lay in his attitude in treating everyone as equal. It was this spirit that permeates and pervades his work as an artist.

My encounters with Dilip Chitre have always been exciting and provocative. It was always an illuminating experience to listen to his long speeches full of very original insights. I met him for the first time during  Abhidhanantar's decennial celebration where he read his poetry. I consulted him for his advice on publication of my first Marathi collection. He recommended the name of  Hemant Divate.  I met Chitre again in May 2003 and had a long session on Marathi historiography with him. His critical inputs while making of the Live Update Anthology were precious. He liked my selection of poems and was critical about many things.

One day in 2004,  he called me up and had a long telephonic conversation with me.I remember his remarks about his possible death during that conversation. I said we need people like you to be with us. He said, and very typically, that we need Shakespeare and Tukaram too but then it is not in our hands. He liked my translations and poetry, he said and I should not harbour self doubts. He said, with his tongue very much in his cheek, that we, Maharashtrians in general and particularly me should remember Shivaji and shed feelings of  inferiority. He remarked that my strength was that I worked with four languages: Marathi, English, Hindi and Gujarati. He also said that Ashwini's poems are better than mine. In one of my later visits, he gave me a profound insight regarding poetry and modernity: modernity and creativity lies in the spaces between words of your phrase. It is in this turn of phrase, he said, that contemporary creativity lies.

I also had the honour of working with him on New Quest and it was again a very interesting phase. We had our differences and he probably saw me as an obstinate animal  with inferiority complex, but he was always sympathetic and warm and treated me at par with himself. He loved Amogh and thought may be Amogh would be able to show way to his poor wayward father.

When the fatal cancer was detected some time back, Chitre fought back bravely and we thought for the moment that he would survive it as he has survived some of the most difficult times. We knew he was a fierce fighter. He was forever young in spirit. The way he took to the latest technology is simply amazing. When people of his age, felt that cellphone was a gadget from a different planet, used only by aliens, he networked energetically on the social networking sites like Orkut and Facebook. He had 1118 friends on Facebook at the age of 71, which would give a 17 year old net newbie all sorts of complexes.

The most difficult period for me, was when he lost his son and I did not know what to say and how to speak to him. It was one of the most shocking things for us and I felt me and Ashwini were too young to `console' someone like Chitre's who were not only very elder to us but also were people we looked up to.His wife, Viju tai is, for me an equally admirable woman; very warm and loving and very supportive.She stood by Dilip in most difficult of times and he always treated her as his equal.  I pray to god to give her strength to bear this great loss.

He once compared death with sharpshooter who claimed his close friend Arun Kolatkar, his son and people close to him in quick succession. The Sharpshooter has claimed Chitre too. His poetry in English and Marathi since its very beginning, reflect an obsessive preoccupation with images death and self-mutilation, making it dark and disturbing. The Sharp Shooter has put an end to this agony at last.

I think Dilip dada's one of the most important contribution to Marathi poetry and even the Indian poetry is his remarkable invention of `indigenous modernity' , which is simultaneously cosmopolitan and rooted, profoundly democratic and uncompromisingly artistic, deeply influenced by greatest international poetry and singularly situated in the democratic and pluralistic indigenous tradition of bhasha poetry. He saw that what unites powerful poetry of the post-Eliotian American poetry like the Beat Generation and Confessional poets with the extremely different , but equally powerful tradition of the Bhakti poetry as exemplified in Tukaram, was a certain existential -spiritual self-awareness, which is neither completely western nor completely peculiar to Marathi. What he says about ` Sahitya ani Atmabhaan', or ` Literature and Self Awareness' in the book by the same name in Marathi is perhaps best guide to his practice. His critical outlook, likewise, embodied these values.He could perceive the seamless interconnection between the deeply progressive and pluralist dimension of his tradition with the universal human dimension of the international and western modernity. Hence his poetry will be something of an outsider to people brought up only on the westernized aesthetics or only on the native ones.

Like Tukaram and probably Ginsberg , he made no distinction between living and writing. When we enter his poetry, we have to pick up the challenge of facing the man, his life and his agonies. We who cant even face our own darkness will find it difficult to face the looming personality of the man himself staring at you from his words. His poetry, hence, will never be populist or popular as it offers no false respite and reassurances. His poetry is not peppered with humour to people who want to have a bit of fun. His poetry is dark, serious and unbearable and in order to read Chitre, you have to read him on his own terms and not according to your demands. He is not a `demand-supply' man. It is this challenging non-conformity which makes his poetry not becoming people's favourite.

Chitre was never a conformist in life. He never gave into the Brahminical middle class mindset that pervaded Marathi poetry and certain right-winged attitudes to Indian culture. His earliest short story, ` Kesaal KaleBhore Pillu' ( A Dark Hairy Pup) dealing with clandestine sexual relation between a servant and his mistress,  enraged the well-known Marathi writer Atre so much that he publicly declared his desire to flog Chitre. When  the American scholar James Laine acknowledged him in his controversial book on Shivaji, the Government decided much to Chitre's anger to offer him `police protection'. He vocally protested against the vandalization of the Bhandarkar Institute, communal riots in Gujarat and all forms of  bigotry everywhere. His vision of culture admitted no such narrow and intolerant actions.

They don't make people like him these days. Dilip Chitre is no more physically with us and to say that he will be with us in form of his ` akshar deha'- `the body of letters', would be a cliche. However, Dilip Dada will live  not in the books but in the words and in the language of later poets. His presence will be felt even more acutely now. He was a challenge when he was alive, he now becomes an unsurmountable challenge. I will always miss his deep voice, typical Puneri cap,his cigar, his pungent sarcasm, and razor sharp critical vision. I will miss his warmth and love. As Harold Bloom points out that the poet becomes all the more alive once he dies. Once he dies it is impossible to kill him. Now they wont be able to kill him. Now nothing can kill him.

Four Generations of Chitres: Dilip's father PA Chitre, a noted Marathi editor, Aashay Chitre, Dilip's son with his son Yogul and Dilip Chitre.

Diving into the Dessicate Mainstream

I spent last two evenings with the `main stream' Marathi literature, thanks to the annual literary programme of the Baroda Marathi Vangmai Parishad. On Friday, we were offered what the organizers felt was ` Marathi Love Poetry'. Well, the Maharashtrians dont really have a reputation as lovers. I cant think of Marathi counterparts to Sohni Mahival, Heer Ranjha, Dhola Maru , Devdas Paro or Romeo and Juliet and other romantic pin ups. Bajirao Mastani is not exactly a love story. Mastani was Bajirao's kept rather than a lover. Keeps and mistresses are common; love is rather rare in Maharashtra (as anywhere else probably). Predictably, most of the traditional love poetry in Marathi is mildly sentimental erotica consisting of the hackneyed nature imagery and lyricism. The famous love poetry in Marathi is made famous due to brilliant musical compositions and heavenly voices of the singers rather than the geniuses of the poets. There is neither imagination, nor passion in most of the `love poetry' that is sold across the counter here. Don’t expect to find Octavio Paz or Pablo Neruda or Lorca or Donne. Don’t even expect to find Kabir or Meera. Marathi manus is basically quarrelsome and bickering and brawling is what comes natural to him. Egoism and love are rather incompatible bedfellows. Women poets who write love poetry. Please don’t even mention them. Sentimentality minus lust takes away even the least interesting thing in love poetry. Why did I go there? Simply out of curiosity, because I find the term `Marathi love poetry’ something of an oxymoron.

Interestingly young Marathi people were absent. Not because they find traditional Marathi poetry boring, as some of us would like to believe, but simply because they are not interested in poetry, literature, or things like that. Marathi youngsters in Baroda are irresponsible because they have left something like poetry in the hands of old. Maharashtrians in Baroda are Marathi merely because of historical reasons now. Many Marathi youth in Baroda prefer not to use Marathi out of shame, and in case they do, well they do have reasons for being ashamed. Marathi in Baroda is a dialect of Gujarati rather than being a dialect of Marathi.

The programme on Saturday, yesterday that is, was Ms Mangala Khadilkar's logorreal cultural gossip about the so-called greats. The pretty woman talked non-stop for two hours without a break. She is a famous media person who is reputed as an anchor and reporter. She shamelessly (well, she was paid for it and that is what the audience wanted) dropped all the famous names she had encountered and talked about how an anchor is peripheral to fame and how a good anchor should not mistake the closeness to the celebrities as a real intimacy and that sort of things. I was interested because her Marathi was good and the chances of hearing good Marathi are rather rare in Baroda.

Today, we have the noted actor Sharad Ponkshe who played Nathuram Godse in ` Mee Nathuram Godse Boltoi’. That will be interesting because, it is Nathuram, rather than Gandhi , who is hot in Gujarat. He is the sinner whom people identify with rather easily. Gandhi is a saint and saints are not meant to be identified with. I look at Gandhi’s attempt to identify with the ` common man’ and `the lowest among the low’ rather suspiciously. I think it was a strategy on the part of the Mahatma to promote himself circuitously as a saint. The` common man’, if such an animal really exists, would be more interested in Nathuram today I suppose.

What is really fascinating about the `popular literature’ and culture is its allergy for intelligence. You can’t be intelligent in your work and be popular in India. If you are really intelligent, like Shah Rukh Khan or Amitabh Bacchan, you have to intelligently keep intelligence out of your work.

War Veterens and the Epehebes

Dilip Chitre, the grand old man of Indian Poetry, is bringing out a big fat collection of poems in English on Friday. The collection is awesome and superbly brought out by Poetrywala. After Arun Kolatkar's mind blowing Kala Ghoda Poems and Sarpa Satra, Chitre's 'As Is, Where Is' is a landmark work in Indian Poetry in English. Chitre has brought out three collections of his 'collected works' running into more than seven hundred pages, he has also translated hundreds of pages from Marathi and has translated some seminal poets from all over the world into Marathi. I wonder if our generation will ever be able to reach this quantity and quality. It not only requires total dedication to art, but also immense passion and fire in the soul. This fire and passion and this dedication is missing in our generation. We also lack wide ranging scholarship that these people possess. Most of my contemporaries are myopic and their understanding of literature is very crude and gross. Their scholarship is zero. These War Veterans and their works are Himalayan obstacles and it will be an Herculean ordeal for our poetic strength to cross these ranges. I am going to Mumbai, the day after tomorrow for the book release function and hoping to meet my dear friends. Do I have enough RDX in my soul to better and on a bigger scale then these people? Time alone will tell. The small bulk of poetry I have written is a product of extremely intense, dark and passionate moments of my life. It is, I believe, like those moments which produced it. What is the place of my poetry in Marathi literary tradition? What is its place in the International arena of poetry? I wish I knew. Till then, dig dig deeper into my soul, my grave digger, and talk to the skull of Yorick you find......

Victory of Hope over Experience

Hemant asked me to scribble something like a blog for the forthcoming issue ofAbhidhanantar and I was wondering what to write. Actually, my poetry has come in for adverse criticism from various quarters and usual complaints are that I have no moral consciousness(ah-hem) ,I am actually a `romantic poet' and that my modernity is superficial, and that I have no social consciousness.That I resemble a `Pandit Poet' of the Pandit era of Marathi poetry. And I am irritated.

I feel that I should not have entered Marathi poetry scenario at all. I am taken aback at the crudity and superficiality of the conception of poetry today in Marathi. Poetry,according to many of those who supposedly take poetry seriously, ought to reflect social problems realistically and directly or ought to be a documentary criticism of society. For those who do not take poetry seriously it is hardly anything more than cliched and sentimental phrasing that they learnt at school. In short, the understanding of poetry in Marathi is shallow and crude. Do you hope to be appreciated Mr. Ketkar? Do you expect a sensible critique of your works? Forget it and write good poems and hope that some time in the far away future after your death, someone sensible and intelligent will come across your works and respond to it in more mature way.

Dr. Johnson described marriage as a victory of hope over experience. Writing poetry in Marathi is no different. You hope for a sensible and intelligent reader, even if you havent come across any.

Metaphysical Poetry at the turn of 21st century.

Teaching Metaphysical poets to MA part one students these days. It made me think on how a mode of writing which was considerd marginal and freakish for hundreds of years, suddenly became an object of admiration and a model in the twentieth century.

My own poetry resembles metaphysical mode in many ways. I have written on the things like spam and corrupt floppy and cyber porn and even `alu vadi' ( paatra in Gujarati) an Indian recipe. These guys used all the learning and scholarship to do violence to the language of poetry and even then their expression of love, devotion, death remains remarkably precise. What is remarkable is that their imagery sounds far fetched and their poetic logic seem to carry things too far, even after extreme avant garde movements like Surrrealism and Dadaism. I think thats what makes them so very interesting.

The Metaphysical mode is the avant-garde of the seventeenth century because it aims to include and absorb everything thats considered `unpoetic' into the language of poetry and inflict great violence on it to express its meaning. Perhaps this is the reason why Sachin is so terribly interested in them even today at the turn of the twentifirst century and understand why Eliot was so excited about them almost a hundred years back.