poem – Page 2 – Amrit Panigrahy

Caro(m)kshetra

They are family, kin and friends, how could one kill,
Void they would leave behind, who would be able to fill.

The ones that he grew up playing with, and the ones who taught,
Unable to take on them, was there a way the battle won’t be fought.

The battlefield lay in front of him, and the warriors gave battle cries,
He was unable to pick up his weapon, even after a million tries.

He was given a code to live by, and million reasons to kill,
Told they were his enemies, whose void he need not fill.

He was shaken violently, when he hesitated and refused to fight,
To see things clearly, like he would in the morning after a dark night.

He was chosen for this task because he was mighty and just,
Unlike mightier warriors filled with jealousy and blood-lust.

The ones in front of him were dead the day they joined the wrong,
With justice and morality on his side, he felt ever so strong.

Understanding his duty and worth, he started killing with rage,
Without seeing who was in front of him, or what was their age.

He killed for many days, and many of his beloved ones were taken away,
Rule of justice finally established when he stopped, and was there to stay.

This poem and the accompanying photograph are my attempt to draw an analogy between the Kurukshetra war and our day to day life, even something as uneventful as playing carom.

I try to portray one of the most important teachings of Bhagvad Gita, that attachments make us lose sense of right and wrong, just and injustice, moral and immorality. To uphold and do what is right, one must rise above every form of attachment, and look at things objectively. And when the time comes to do one’s duty, it has to be done no matter what.

In frame: The striker and the pieces on a carom board, clicked on manual mode using my Oneplus 3 phone during the carom tournament at office. This photo was edited using Google Snapseed.

VERY IMPORTANT TO NOTE: Yes, you can share this work with proper attribution. But, please seek permission before using this work (not including the photo), partially or fully. YOU CAN NOT USE THE PHOTO. Believe me, asking is better than ending up in court or facing public shaming on social media. Thanks for understanding.

Mountain Song

I was unsure and had many questions when I started,
Unable to understand whether to hold on to those who departed.

I tried and any attempt to touch my past was futile,
As from behind the veil it waved at me with a “smile”.

In a failed attempt, I fought with my past in present,
An act that I would never consider to be decent.

I cried as I saw the past slip away, to which I was so attached,
It was a healing process and I thought I was being attacked.

I decided to quit the things that I was doing,
With tears in my eyes I tried a new beginning.

There was one more thing that I had still to let go,
The sense of I, me and mine, which they call the ego.

As I looked at the winding road up the hill,
Towards a destination I hadn’t started still.

It looked like I was a long long way away from my goal,
I decided to climb nonetheless and it started taking a toll.

Shivering while climbing as cold touched my bones,
On the roads I found freshly fallen pine cones.

The pine cones reminded something that I had chosen to forget,
That even those high up also fall and eventually turn to dust.

When hungry, I found fresh apples from a road side garden,
Tastier I am sure than the one had by Eve and Adam.

When I was thirsty I drank from a mountain spring,
A respite that only pure mountain water could bring.

It was the Almighty telling me to relax and not to worry,
And that I would be provided for and I need not be sorry.

The mountains and highlands that people called divine,
When I reached there, I was sure I would be fine.

The mountains were so big, and the snow so white,
And I told myself that the teachers were always right.

Mountains told me to accept that I was puny and the outcome I can’t influence,
I am not even a speck of dust, when it comes to the whole vast universe.

The snows told me that everything here is inherently pure,
And we pollute everything looking for useless cure.

When I came down from the mountains, I was not like when I went,
Left there many things I was attached to, for which I was sent.

I was questioned for the decisions I took and things I left behind,
I told them as long as this did good to me, I really didn’t mind.

Been a year since I came back from the mountains,
And the memory still as fresh as last night’s rains.

Looking back at last year, it all makes sense now,
The answers to my why, what, when and how.

In human terms, this journey has lasted only a year long,
Ode to the mountains and my evolution, this mountain song.

The poem was penned by me, where I have tried to put in to words my evolution from what I was a year back when I went to the Himalayas.

In frame: A temple by the mountain road high in the Himalayas, on the way from Naitala to Guptakashi, in Uttarakhand, India. I found these small temples dedicated to local Gods as well as such ritualistic things, common place in the Himalayas.

FIRE

Ember and ash, that is left of everything you knew,
Burning faster with anger, as the winds blew.

It burned up the tears, and the joy and the sorrows,
All emotions, even the deepest ones hidden in burrows.

The ego, and the grudges and the red book that held them,
It ate up all, including your pride and the little game.

It killed what is left of you, good and evil, and otherwise,
It is the genesis, and it seeds the phoenixes to rise.

And when everyone thought it was all but over,
A new life germinated, tearing up the ashened cover.

It left everything that was left behind, burning,
Beginning of the end, and a whole new beginning.

A new you, in new surroundings with new desire,
It kills, but facilitates new beginnings, the Fire.

The poem was penned by me, and looks at the end of things from the perspective of beginning of new things.

In frame: The holy fire during a ritual. I shot this frame using my 35mm Canon FTb QL manual film SLR on an Ilford HP5 Plus 400. This is the first frame from Project 35.

I was there…. Waiting for you!

I waited there, under our pine tree,
And I went there for many more days,
Hoping you would come one day.

It was futile, I was told,
And that you would never be back.
But, I wanted to give it a try.

I wanted to give it a try,
Just so when my time comes,
I won’t feel that I did not wait enough.

And when I realized many springs later,
That you would never come,
I left there the scarf you had given me.

The scarf, my only piece of memory of you,
For it had your scent, as fresh as dew,
It was the only thing that I had of you.

As I wanted to let you know,
Just in case you showed up..
….That…

I was there…. Waiting for you!

————————————————

DISCLAIMER: Penned by yours truly, this poem is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental.

In frame: A ritualistic scarf tied to a pine tree in the Himalayas, on the way from Naitala to Guptakashi, in Uttarakhand, India. I found small temples dedicated to local Gods as well as such ritualistic things, common place in the Himalayas.

VERY IMPORTANT TO NOTE: Yes, you can share this work with proper attribution. But, please seek permission before using this work (not including the photo), partially or fully. YOU CAN NOT USE THE PHOTO. Believe me, asking is better than ending up in court or facing public shaming on social media. Thanks for understanding.

Why travel?

//राही बन//

आराम और सुविधाओं से भरी बेरंग ज़िन्दगी जिएगा कब तक?
निकल बाहर और राही बन, रास्ते को बना अपना घर,
भाग उस मंज़िल की तरफ, जिसका पता ना मुझे है, ना तुझे
जा.. जी अपनी जिंदगी, क्यूँ की उम्र बाकी है बहुत कम..
ऐसी बेरंग ज़िन्दगी जिएगा कब तक?

One for the road — An empty stretch of road between Ujjain and Mandav, in Madhya Pradesh, India after almost 25-30 kms of non-existent roads.

I will admit! For me, travel had always something very tempting about it. My father, who is an avid traveller himself, sowed the seeds of love for travel. And when I was a kid, my mother (who is a History major) would tell me bed time stories about Xuanzang, Faxian, Ibn Battuta and Captain James Cook, and I would lie on the bed imagining myself as an explorer/traveller. Though I have not come too far from those bed-time-stories days, I think it has been good start, although late.

I have been able to cover only a small fraction of this magnificent land. For a starter, I have been breathless on Khardung La in the Himalayas, and have been dwarfed by the majestic mountains in Kedarnath, and have almost frozen in the waters of Gangotri, and have been mesmerised by the Ganga Aarti in Rishikesh. I have criss-crossed central India hopping from heritage sites to religious places, and have been wowed by Kailash temple in Ellora and paintings of Padmapani and Vajrapani in Ajanta, and have been transcended into another dimension while watching Bhashmaarti in Ujjain. I have been lazy in a Goan monsoon, and also have been awed by the magnificence of Hampi. I have crawled up and down in the coffee estates in the Western Ghats, and have also seen the calmness of the sea in Rameshwaram, and have been on the Vivekananda rock to see the three seas meet.

Wait! That’s not all. I have driven my beat Maruti 800 to places. I have ridden my Pulsar 200NS for thousands of kilometres. I have taken my Scorpio on multiple multi-thousand kilometre road trips, and have been on the roads for days together.

Ahaa… Wait! That’s not all, either. I have been stuck on the highway with a cyclone approaching. And as I spent my night in the car and the eye of the cylcone came really close, the howling gale almost blew the car away. And at least on two occasions I have been stranded on the road, surrounded by flood waters, and water levels slowly rising all around me. In such situations the natural choice boils down to either survival (an animal instinct) or humanity (that differentiates us from animals). In the small village I was stuck in on one occasion during the floods, there were at least two hundred more people stranded. And all of us were fed well by the villagers, without being charged a single penny. Without any idea how long the floods will last, wasn’t it brave of those villagers?

Had I been confined, I will not be having these wonderful experiences to share, correct? The travel experiences have shaped me into the kind of human I am at present.

Why I travel, explained in 3 P’s:

Places: Only words and pictures will not do justice to the places I have been to and the stories behind them. The befitting tribute to those places can only be paid by visiting and experiencing them first hand. How on earth can someone tell how it feels to be starved of oxygen at five and a half kilometres above mean sea level? Or, how it feels when water at sub-zero temperatures hits the calvaria? Or, how it feels being stranded in the eye of a cyclone and the gales are about to blow away your car?

People: The great explorers of the past were not dumb to have travelled the world and learn nothing. Humans learn best from experiences of other human beings. And what better way to meet new people other than travel? I have never seen more honest people than the Laddakhis. Being fed by villagers during the floods and for free was the best gesture any human to have ever showed me. I have had instances of total strangers coming and talking to me when I was on a ride to Odisha on my Pulsar 200NS and in the course of the conversation, telling me about places of interest nearby, or about the road that lay ahead. And, people are not always pleasant. I have also been conned many times during my travels. I call them “learning experiences”.

Passion: I am the happiest when I am on the roads, away from my desk, away from my flat. Only someone with love for travelling will understand this. Good news is, there is no way you will not fall in love with it after you start travelling. I mean, I wasn’t born with this love either. And those selfies at beautiful places are a bonus!

Few points of wisdom:

Something always goes wrong when one travels. It is the risks that make travelling even more enticing. Here are a few things that I keep in mind when I am travelling:

Time: When travelling, I always keep time in hand, and utilize it to the fullest extent. I divide my travelling days and set realistic targets for the same. Seeing places is a serious business, you see!

Lights (while self-driving): I have done a fair bit of driving/riding under the lights and have come to a conclusion that it is not worth it. It is a proven fact that human reflexes while driving are much less effective under artificial light. Then there is always the risk of unsocial elements, ghosts and unsocial-elements-dressed-as-ghosts at night. I hate ghosts and hence I try my best to avoid night driving. Pun intended!

Money: Not all places have ATMs. And post demonetisation, not all the ATMs dispense cash. I carry just enough to survive and overcome an eventuality and much less than an amount that will tempt someone to kill me. As a rule of thumb, I would start my day with Rs 5000, and replenish it back to that level at start of each day.

Maps and research: I carry a road atlas as a back up to the map on my phone. Most of the times, I do my route and stoppage planning beforehand. The most fun part of travel preparation is setting up an itinerary. I call it research!

When in doubt, I lie: If it is a self-driven road-trip, when asking for directions I always ask directions to the next big town on my route, and not to my destination. When the stranger I am speaking to does not seem right, or is too inquisitive, or both, I just cook up a story. Believe me, it is not a sin to lie when it comes down to safety. And I have a thing against serial killers!

Have fun: When something goes wrong, and something always goes wrong, I don’t get bogged down by the incident and look at the brighter side, instead. Remember, if you have no control on the outcome of a crisis, have a good time while having the crisis.

I also admit that I am yet to see the world, and have experienced just a fraction of what so many other people might have. Although late, I am glad to have started travelling. And travel I will!

Finally, let me repeat the wise words from John A. Shedd for you – “A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.”

So, what are you waiting for? Pack your bags, and get out of the house. Go Now!

Credits: Poem at the top penned by your’s truly!

Note: Please get in touch if you have difficulty in reading Hindi, and would prefer an English translation of the poem instead.

In frame: A stretch of good road between Ujjain and Mandav. We stopped here to straighten our backs after 25-30kms on non-existent roads. Yes, that happens in a Scorpio too!