Chapter IV

Indian English Poetry

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Content

Indian English Poetry as we have seen in our recounting of

history, began in 1827 with the publication of Henry Vivian

Derozio's book of poems entitled Poems. This approximately

one hundred and seventy five years body of poetry which

started with Derozio, the fiery Eurasian who was

revolutionary not only in his iconoclastic ideas but also in his

effort to initiate a new form of literary composition, that is,

Indian English Poetry, has offered over the period a chequred

history of growth and development that continually made,

unmade and remade itself through constant experiments in

matter of themes and styles. Indian English Poetry has

undergone several phases of experimentations resulting in

varied phenomena of ceaseless poetic activities that vouch

for the inner strength of the succeeding poets. The social

reforms, the individual ecstasies, the agonies of living

personae as well as love, sex, nature, rejuvenation of

legends, metaphysical queries, longing, devotion, mystical

contemplation, spiritual illumination and urbanity are some of

the themes that have been treated and projected by Indian

English poets during both the pre-Independence and post-

Independence periods. A host of stylistic experimentation and

linguistic innovations have marked the growth of Indian

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English Poetry from its inception to the post-Independence

and post-modern periods. 1

Thus we have among others, Toru Dutt, Sarojini Naidu,

Aurobindo Ghose writing on legends, love, longing, devotion

and mystical contemplation, metaphysical queries and

spiritual illumination.

Toru Dutt, it is generally accepted, is the first major voice 1n

Indian English Poetry and her poem "Our Casuarina Tree"

found in many anthologies is often signaled out as the first

major Indian English poem. 2 "Our Casuarina Tree" is basically

a descriptive poem in which an actual tree is described in

terms of beautiful images drawn around it. It is modelled on

Keats's "Ode to Autumn". The only difference is that the

eleven line stanza has different rhyme pattern abb cddc eee.

The recurring echo established by the rhyme scheme sets the

line apart as a complete rhythmical unit comparable to

musical phrase. It further supplies the organisational pattern

of the stanzas.

The poem "Our Casuarina Tree" is an assertion of Indian

nationalism. Toru Dutt was fond of writing on Indian themes

even while she lived in England. The tree that is described in

the poem is associated with Toru's childhood in India. She

remembers the Indian tree even when she is in Italy or

1
Nila Shah and P.K. Nayar opp. cit., p. 31.
2
G.J.V. Prasad, opp. cit., p. 27.
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France. All the five stanzas of the poem are written with fine

rhythm and cadence. The stanza of the poem is based on the

logic of an image growing out of an image. Thus the first

stanza opens with a simile of a 'huge python' linked to a

'creeper'. The comparison between these two apparently

dissimilar objects is based on the shared attribute expressed

in the phrase 'winding round and round'. The poet then builds

into this simile a number of other figures of sense to convey

the sense of 'hugeness' of the tree. Hence the creeper winds

round the rugged trunk indented with deep scars. The

poetical fancy in 'upto its summit near the stars' gives an

idea of the tree's height. The vicarious reference in whose

embraces bound I No other tree could live' reveals the tree's

vitality. Fresh images are evoked by the appearance of the

word 'embrace'. This word involves the attribution of the

behaviour of a person in love, to the winding of the creeper

round the tree. Here we begin to have a poetical sense to the

'grace' of the tree and begin to see the tree in all its charm.

The images that come up in the next six lines of the stanza

further develop the idea. Thus a metaphor compares the tree

to a 'gallant giant' and the creeper to a 'scarf' thereby

stressing the ornamental value of the creeper round the tree.

The 'crimson flowers' of the creeper, as well as the 'bird and

bee' images further heighten the effect produced by the

figures. From day scenes we move to the night scenes. By

the use of the figure exaggeration the poet transcends the

limit of the ordinary world and reaches out the world of

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magic. Hence the image of a song floating in the garden,

night after night ('that seems to have no close', as if sung

from the tree in the dark ('sung darkling') creates an etherial

beauty around the tree, This exercise of the poet in building

image upon 1mage carries a unique charm that can be felt by

a sensitive reader. For instance, knowing fully that the

creeper does not climb the summit near the stars, nor the

tree can sing, the poet employs such poetic expressions

which conjures up the image and enables us to accept them

without challenge. Ultimately we become convinced with the

beauty and grandeur of the tree, which otherwise will have

remained uncomprehended without the expressions employed

by the poet.

In the second stanza the poet employs the figure the

condensed expression. The quintessence of condensed

expression is nothing but a suggested or implied companson

between the main subject described and the incidental ones

mentioned along side it. Hence, we encounter in this stanza

beautifully balancectimages which evoke a naturally agreeable

landscape replete with accurate botanical details. The central

figure, i.e., the tree is invoked and then the poet proceeds to

weave images of the winter season around it. Hence she sees

a 'gray baboon' sitting 'statue like on its bough' 'watching the

sunrise' while on its lower branch its 'puny' off-springs 'leap

about and play'. What is to be noticed here is the use of

simile in 'statue' like. By likening the posture of the baboon

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to a statue, the poet highlights the 'winter' season when

things are generally still and quiet. Again the grim 'statue'

image works against the active 'leap about and play', image,

to create a paradox or contrast. The same effect is again

achieved through the image of the hailing kokilas and the

'sleepy cows'. The simile of white lilies looking like 'snow

enmassed' 'in the shadow' cast on the 'tank' by the 'hoar

tree' is replete with condensed expression. Also to be noticed

here is the colour effect achieved. The outstanding colour is

'gray' which co- exists with the image of the winter season

when things appear gray with frost. The word 'hoar' which

means 'white or gray with age or frost', as also the beautiful

winter lilies looking like 'snow enmassed' highlight this

colour.

The transition from the second stanza to the third stanza is

achieved through the word 'magnificence'. We also notice the

change of scene, from the external world to the internal

world. Images rush out of mood. Hence the image of 'sweet

companions' are evoked from the poet. The metaphor in

'loved with loveliness' emphasises the intensity of the

relationship. The poet's fancy is at work once again. Hence

the tree in sympathy with the poet, whose eyes are blinded

by 'hot tears' in memory of the lost companions, sounds a

'dirge-like murmur'. From this simile a series of comparisons

are drawn up. Hence the 'dirge like murmur' becomes the

sound of 'sea breaking on a shingle beach' and then a

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'lament' and finally 'an eerie' speech. The peculiar effect of

these comparisons lies in the apparently unrelated way with

which images are brought together. The sudden appearance

of the word 'haply' in the concluding line of the stanza works

against the 'lament' of the previous line to create paradox or

contrast.

The apparent contrast of the last line of the third stanza is

carried over to the fourth stanza by holding 'unknown' against

'well - known' : the contrast is again retained in the images

that follow. Hence the 'breaking' sea of the previous stanza

now lay in 'sheltered bay'. Its waves did not 'break' but 'rose'

in 'wraith' and 'gently kissed' 'the classic shore' and not

'shingle - beach'. We have one of the finest examples of the

figure of exaggeration in the lines 'beneath the moon I when

the earth lay tranced in a dreamless soon.' A heightened

trance-like feeling similar to a time when the poet was so

intensely absorbed in her emotions, that she was as if sealed

off from the ordinary world, is being recalled in these lines. It

is in such 'tranced' moments that one begins to have

transcendental views. Here the tree acquires 'soul'

dimensions and is merged with that of the poet 'Mine 1nner

vision rose a form sublime', I 'Thy form, 0 Tree---'. In the

presence of the sublime vision the poet's language is not

fragmented and the images do not run after the other. The

poet's use of the stately clause is to be noticed here. The

small 't' in 'tree' becomes capital 'T' and is then addressed

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as 'Thy' and 'Thee'. Metaphorically the tree becomes man

through the bond of shared origin and fate. The stanza 1s

remarkable in the sense every word used here is indicative of

the adoration with which the tree is viewed.

This adoration is continued in the last stanza where in a

moment of extreme admiration the poet carves a prayer for

the tree

"Therefore I fain would consecrate a lay

Unto thy honour, Tree---".

Once the plane of mystical level is achieved, abstractions

follow abstractions as no concrete form exists for the tree.

The stanza hence resolves metaphorically into the language

of address (Thou, They) into the language of supplication

('May love defend thee') and the language of collocation

('Pale Fear, trembling Hope, Death, the skeleton', 'Time the

Shadow---').

"Our Casuarina Tree" is one of the miscellaneous poems from

the collection Ancient Ballads and Legends of Hindustan. As

the most representative poem of Toru Dutt it shows that, Toru

Dutt as a poet, has a remarkable maturity that deceives her

tender age. Her poems are wrought with fine artistry in

resonance with the poetic conception. The different layers of

her poems work in remarkable harmony with the poet's vision.

The sound becomes a definite part of the sense through a

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sustained use of imagery. Her poems thus give the

impression of perfection.

Toru Dutt's volume Ancient Ballads and Legends of

Hindustan. provides the best description of India through

competent narrative and descriptive verse. The stories are

borrowed from the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the Vishnu

Purana and the Bhagvat Purana. It reveals the soul of India

to the west through the medium of English Poetry. All the

nine stories contained in the volume are moving stories.

"Savitri" shows the dedication and constancy in love that a

typical Indian woman has for her husband. "Lakshman"

depicts of the great sense of duty that he had for his elder

brother Rama. "Jogdhaya Uma" portrays that the Goddess

cared more for a simpler pedlar than a pompous priest. The

Royal Ascetic and the Hind challenges the asceticism by

showing Bharat's ardent love for a simple faith. "Dhurva"

dilineates that when the prince failed to gain the favour of his

royal father, he made up by attaining spiritual greatness.

"Buttoo" demonstrates the value of self-help and

determination that a low-caste boy learned the art of archery

without any help from Dronacharya. "Sindhu" depicts the

portrayal of an ideal son who is devoted to the services of his

weak and blind parents. "Prahlad" is the story of a devotee

who served the God by opposing his cruel father. "Sita" tells

us about her suffering during her last days. All these stories

are some of the gems of Indian literature and with all these
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themes, Ancient Ballads and Legends of Hindustan is

brilliantly steeped in ancient Indian thought and folklore.

The rejuvenation of legends and the delineation of mythical

characters is one of the many themes in Indian English

Poetry and poets past as well as present have always

remained fascinated by the character from the two great

epics the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. The Ramayana of

Valimiki and the Mahabharata of Vyasa, which have been, as

it were, the two eyes of the nation ; with their character, they

have molded the ideals of the whole nation and in their sway

over the peoples and the religious movement they gave birth

to, they outgrew their pure literary character. The Ramayana

in 24,000 couplets and the Mahabharata in a million couplets,

are both composed in the heroic measures sloka - anushtubh

and upjati. The former shows greater unity of authorship

while the latter incorporated into the framework of its main

\

story many ancient lays and edifying dialogues and

discourses on ethics and philosophy. Valimiki, like the Vedic

poets delighted in similes, and among human emotions, he

depicted not only the great love of Rama and Sita and the

poignant suffering undergone by the latter, but also portrayed

as leading motifs such emotions as friendship, brotherly love,

and above all, the love of the father for his son. In his hero,

Rama, Valmiki presented an embodiment of truth and

righteousness, who could, for the sake of these principles,

sacrifice even his dearest. The Ramayana has been called

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the first of poems, adi- kavya, and truly did Valmiki lay down

the path for the later classical poets, in formal features, in

the development of the theme, in the portryal of character

and the delineation of emotion. Vyasa depicted in his hero

Yudhishthira the same ideal of righteousness his

Mahabharata is the story of the feud and the fratricidal war of

the cousins Kauravas and Pandavas, through which Vyasa

sought to emphasise the vanity of earthly possessions and

the futility of wars on their behalf. Some of the old stories

imbedded in this great epic, e.g., of Nala and Damayanti, are

superb for their simplicity, grace and pathos ; of the many

great dialogues and discourses here, that between Lord

Krishana and Arjuna on the eve of the battle, the Bhagvat

Gita, has today been translated into every language of the

world and inspired scores of writers and thinkers.

Toru Dutt was not the only poet to be inspired by the stories

from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. As will be seen in

this study of the major themes of Indian English Poetry, many

poets were influenced by the mythical characters delineated

in these epics.

The theme of mythical characters, rejuvenation of legends,

love and nature, metaphysical queries, spiritual yearnings

and illumination and mystical contemplation finds fullest

expressron rn the poetry of Sri Aurobindo who occupies a

distinguished place in Indian English Poetry and remains

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unrivalled on account of his poetic achievement. Apart from

his interpretation of the Vedas, the Upanishads and the Gita,

the whole of his intuitive grasping of the knowledge of God

and the fervour of his desire for union with the universal

spirit is to be seen 1n his Life Divine, which offers to the

world the original thinking of a practising philosopher.

Perhaps such a genius and an original thinker naturally turns

towards poetry which is the inevitable medium which gives

vent to the inner complexities of mind. So a mystic such as

Aurobindo needs poetry inevitably. He is a born poet and

genius, for invariably they both go together. As Aurobindo

puts it himself in one of his letters: 'A born poet is usually a

genius, poetry with any power or beauty in it implies genius'. 3

As a poet Aurobindo developed his own theory of poetry and

considered all 'future poetry' to be more and approximate to

the Vedic mantra, minimizing, if not wholly eliminating, the

meddling middlemen- the intellect, the senses, even the

imagination-and effecting in one swift unfailing step the

miracle of communication from the poet to reader. As

Aurobindo has remarked in The Future Poetry

---the true creator (of poetry), the true hearer is

the soul- A divine ananda --- is that which the soul

of the poet feels and which, when he can conquer

the human difficulties of his task, he succeeds in

3
Letters of Sri Aurobindo (III Series), p. 300.
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pouring also into all those who are prepared to

receive it. 4

A study of his poetry shows how he always tried to strive for

this poetry of divine ananda and tried especially in the poems

of his last period to conquer 'the human difficulties of the

task' and create a body of mantric poetry that came as a

proper culmination of his long, sustained and inspiring career

as a poet.

Sri Aurobindo's first book of verse Songs to Myrtilla (1895)

was written mostly between eighteen and twenty, a few, like

"A Rose of Women" and "To the Cuckoo" even earlier. Two

groups of poems stand out : the political poems were about

Ireland and her tragic hero, Parnell. Among tributes may be

mentioned the one on Goethe. But in "Envoi" the young poet

bids adieu to the foreign fields, the Hellenic Muses and

announces his return home :

Pale poems, weak poems ---

In Sicilian olive groves no more

Or seldom must my footprints now be seen,

Nor tread Athenian lanes, nor yet explore

Parnassus or thy voiceful shores, 0 Hippocrene.

Me from here lotus throne Sarswati

Has called to regions of eternal snow

And Ganges pacing to the southern sea,

4
Aurobindo quoted in K.R. Srinivas Iyengar, opp. cit., p. 166.
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Ganges upon whose shores the flowers of Eden

blow. ("Envoi")

The poet seems unaccountably severe with himself. In any

case, 'the flowers of Eden' betrays the classicist. But in true

essence the regions of eternal snow appear in the poems that

follow and the poet takes up the oldest theme known to

mankind - love, deathless love.

These narrative poems, of heroic and romantic love, are

based on the mythological characters. The Urvasie theme has

always been an old favourite of the Indian poets. In the

hands of Aurobindo it 1s passion more than penance that 1s a

felt quality, the passion for love and the passion for beauty.

The king, Pururvas, who prays to the silent Himalayas : 'Give

her back to me, 0 mountain, g1ve her back' later finds the

object of his adoration, abandoned on the cold hillside a lily

mishandled :

Perfect she lay amid her tresses

Like a mishandled lily luminous,

As she had fallen. From the lucid robe

One shoulder gleamed and golden breast left bare,

Divinely lifting, one gold arm was flung

A warm rich splendour exquisitely outlined

Against the dazzling whiteness, and her face

Was as a fallen moon among the snows.

(Urvasie:A Poem)
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The meeting of the lovers provides one of the most glowing

passages in the poem and we shall like to cite it here, in full :

She a leaf

Before a gust among the nearing trees

Cowered. But, all a sea of mighty joy

Rushing and swallowing up the golden sand,

With a great cry and glad Pururavus

Seized her and caught her to his bosom thrilled,

Clinging and shuddering. All her wonderful hair

Loosened and the wind seized and bore it streaming

Over the shoulder of Pururavus

And on his cheeks a softness. She overborne,

Panting with inarticulate murmurs lay,

Like a slim tree half seen through driving hail,

Her naked arms clasping his neck, her cheek

And golden throat averted, and wide trouble

In her large eyes bewildered with their bliss.

With her sweet limbs all his, feeling her breasts

Tumultuous up against his beating heart,

He kissed the glorious mouth of heaven's desire.

So clung they two as shipwrecked in a surge.

Then strong Pururavus, with golden eyes,

Mastering hers, cried tremulus: '0 beloved,

0 miser of thy rich and happy voice,

One word, one word to tell me that thou lovest'.

And Urvasie, all broken on his bosom,

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Her godhead in his passion lost, moaned out,

From her imprisoned breasts, 'my lord ! My love !'

This is love poetry as its best. Passages of such glowing

pass1on and sweep, of grand conceptions, stately

expressions and noble sallies of imagination are nowhere to

be found in the entire corpus of Indian English Poetry, except

in Sri Aurobindo. Urvasie and the companion poem Love and

Death, describing the story of 'Ruru and Priyumbada' are in

the tradition of great love poetry. Both Urvasie and Love and

Death, point to the author's enduring concern which he has

phrased, elsewhere, a little differently as 'Earth and Love and

Doom'. Between these early exercises and the 'inner epic' of

his maturity Aurobindo has come a long way from romance to

reality.

His next book of verse, Poems (1905) deals with a different

world. We are faced with the problem of belief, and

soliloquies and debates abound. The mood and manner of

these writings explain why in certain minds Sri Aurobindo 1s

equated with the philosopher as poet. In the next poem Baji

Prabhou (1910) we are 1n a different world. Intellectual

debates and idealized solutions left behind, the locale of Baji

Prabhou is not the Himalayas or the moonlight or the tortured

mind of modern Hamlet but the scorching Deccan plateaus, a

background of battle. Here Aurobindo chooses an epical

episode from Maratha history, Baji Prabhou's defence of

gorge against the superior and overwhelming Moghul army.

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There can be little doubt that the choice of the theme was

expressive of the poet's intense nationalism.

One may wonder how, in Ahna and Other Poems (1915) the

same poet was writing, at about the same time, the

invocation to the 'Mother of Dreams', a poem part aesthetic,

part symbolic, link between the world of dreams and of the

visionary. The key poem in this volume is no doubt "Ahna".

The Argument tells us: 'Ahna, the God of Dawn, descends in

the world where amid the strife and trouble of mortality, the

Hunters of Joy, the Seekers after knowledge, the Climbers in

the quest of Power are toiling up the slopes or waiting in the

valleys. As she stands on the mountains of the East, voices

of the Hunters of Joy are the first to greet her". 5 The

Argument prepares us for the pattern in which the familiar

features of reason's rubrics of the mysteries of life are

repeated. These are the voices of negation according to

which 'Vain in the passion to divine manhood --- None can

exceed himself. Shun the light of the ideal and chimera ---

Curb heart's impatience, bind the desires down, pause from

self - vexing.' But the passion to divine manhood is an

evolving theme in Aurobindonean imagination and when,

years later out of 'the great mass of poems written during the

twenties and thirties', a few short poems like Six Poems

(1934), Poems (1941) and Poems Past and Present (1946)

were published, the change and impact were unmistakable. If

5
K.R. Srinivas Iyengar, opp. cit., p. 162.
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there had been any doubt about the quality and direction of

the Aurobindonean muse, his role and rank as a poet, these

poems dispel them effectively. There is for instance,

'Nirvana' the poetry of what he has elsewhere called 'open

realization'. There is the poem "Thought-the Paraclete" which

attempts to project in terms of poetry of the flight of thought,

as it takes off from the normal intellectual plane, and sweeps

across the illumined, intuitive and overmental regions, finally

disappearing bound for the ultimate. The central idea of the

poem which is the transformation in the self brought about as

a result of the ascent of the Consciousness to the superlative

level, is suggested by the imagery and the music, rather than

closely argued out in terms of logical reason. We are

expected to proceed from light to light, from one luminous

revelation to another, and anon to the next, and so on, till we

arrive at and are lost in the rich calm of the wonderful last

line 'Self was lost, lone, limitless, nude, immune.' Of the four

separate 'movements' in the poem, the first describes limited

human Thought invading the realms of the Invisible and being

'self lost in the vasts of God'. The second movement follows

Thought's progress from Mind to Higher Mind, from Higher

Mind to Illumined Mind, from Illumined Mind to Intuition, and

from Intuition to Overmind. The third movement describes

Thought racing beyond Overmind. And disappearing in the

region of the Supermind. The last line marks the concluding

movement the realization of the infinite Self is now

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complete, the ego is dead, the self is bare of all the sheaths

of Ignorance- it is 'lone, limitless, nude, immune.' 6

"The Bird of Fire" and "Rose of God" are other remarkable

poems. As poetry of prayer and VIs 1on, of poetry as a

variation of the sacred name, "Rose of God" has few equals.

The poem defines the term and end of Aurobindonean poetry

as well as of his Yoga : it is the 'outbreak of the Godhead in

man'. In his adventure of consciousness poetry is Sri

Aurobindo's chosen strategy. If, as Middleton Murry once

said, we require from the highest poetry that it should not

merely thrill us but also still us what better proof can we

point to than these poems.

Poems Past and Present (1946) is a record mostly of spiritual

experiences and a further proof of the kind of writing he had

hinted at in The Future Poetry. "Bride of Fire" reminds us of

the earlier "Rose of God". A poem of holy love, the first two

lines of the opening stanza comprise a prayer or an act, while

the third and fourth set forth the conditions of the

embodiment.

Bride of the fire, clasp me now close,

Bride of the fire !

have shade the bloom of the earthly rose,

have slain desire ("Bride of Fire")

6
Ibid. p. 168.
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A posthumous publication of forty - eight poems, mostly

sonnets, Last Poems (1953) was among the last to be written

by Sri Aurobindo. In 1957 came More Poems, it contained

some early works, a few fragments as well as political poems

and sonnet. Rarely has the sonnet been put to such wide use

as in Sri Aurobindo, as a vehicle of ontological discourse

inspired by 'some greater voice and mightier vision'. Most of

the poems in the collection, the Last Poems (1952) are

autobiographical and mystic 1n nature. They show

Aurobindo's personal strivings to reach God and again the

harmonious and poised feeling of being with God. The poems

are all remarkable for their lyrical intensity, creative force

and the urgency of feelings. The first poem in this collection

bears the title "The Divine Hearing" Here the advaitic concept

of the universal spirit being one is expressed in a deeply

personal way. The poet feels the Universal Being flowing

within him. It is not the knowledge of advaitic philosophy that

he is trying to reveal here, but it is the felt experience which

is clear in the title itself, that he is trying to recreate 1n

words. It is the Divine Hearing, he hears the Divine tone 1n

every voice of this world, the first line, though it looks like a

statement, has a tinge of serenity, calmness and vastness

about it : 'All sounds, all voices have become thy voice'. He

supports this view in the remaining part of the poem. He

stretches the 'All' into the innumerable things of the world.

The one voice is reflected in the music, in the thunder and in

the cry of the birds, in life's babble, both its sorrows and its
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joys. The world itself is a wonder and all the creations in it

breathe wonder - tones because they are all the features of

the one Eternal Spirit : 'All now are wonder - tones and

themes of Thee'. The prosaic word 'theme' has attained a

higher and an elevated meaning here, as Sri Aurobindo says :

'A phrase, a word or line may be quite simple and ordinary

and yet taken with another phrase, line or word become the

perfect thing.' 7 In the last couplet Aurobindo concentrates on

the same thought with a sureness of touch :

A secret harmony steals through the blind heart

And all grows beautiful because Thou art.

The secret harmony exists in every being whether it is aware

of it or not and that is the sole cause for the beauty of the

world. The poet reveals the personal experience of what we

might dogmatically call the advaitic principle. It fulfills our

experience of a mystic poem. What we expect such poetry to

give us is not a system of thought but the glow and the force

of thought, not philosophy; what mystic poetry should give us

again is not a laborious transcription of such supernormal

experience, but rather, a re-enacting-a repetition-of the

experience in which we may ourselves be totally and

inescapably engaged. Philosophical poetry, like mystical

poetry rs difficult to achieve, but not impossible. The poem

seems to illustrate the idea that, 'if he has the passion, then

7
Letters of Sri Aurobindo, opp. cit., p. 25
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even a philosophical statement of it he can surcharge with

this sense of power, force, light and beauty'. 8

We find, Sri Aurobindo, the mystic after having striven to be

with God, achieves his goal and the soul's vision of such a

union is revealed to us in the poem, "The Divine Hearing".

"Krishna" is another such poem in which the poet reveals his

union with Lord Kirshna. The opening of the poem suggests

the relief that the poet experiences at the feet of God : 'I who

have felt the hungry heart of earth I Aspiring beyond heaven

to Krishna's feet'. It is a moment of feeling of oneness with

God for the poet ; this feeling of oneness, the moment of his

union with God is given to us in the lines :

Nearer and nearer now the music draws,

Life shudders with a strange felicity

All nature is wide enamoured pause

Hoping her lord to touch, to clasp, to be. ("Krishna")

Perhaps this 1s one of the greatest expressions of

Aurobindo's mystic experiences. The whole idea is conceived

as a beloved's meeting of his Lover, one of the ways in which

the mystic seeks his God. This subtle movement of his soul's

experience is caught in a few words. These lines prove Sri

Aurobindo's statement : 'There is no incompatibility between

spirituality and creative activity--- they can be united', as it

is the inner chord of the soul that experiences and expresses

8
Ibid., p. 128.
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the feelings and not the mere thinking mind --- Neither the

intelligence, the imagination, nor the ears are the true

recipients of the poetic delight, even as they are not its true

creators, they are only its channels and instruments; the true

creator, the true hearer is the soul. Again in the last couplet

of the poem, the poet expresses his satisfaction which

presents the peace in his soul : 'For this one moment lived

the ages past I The world now throbs fulfilled in me at last'.

There is another poem from an earlier period of his creative

activity, "Revelation", which suggests the sudden leaping up

of the consciousness of Divinity in the poem. The mystic

vision ends with the couplet : 'Someone of the heavenly rout I

From behind the veil ran out'. The mystic vision is compared

to a thought disappearing before the mind 1s able to catch it :

'as a thought I Escapes the mind ere it is caught'. The

thought that comes to the mind of the poet is elusive and

teasing and cannot be grasped easily.

Another poem which commands our attention is "Shiva". The

theme of the poem again is the union of the Being with the

spirit. But the conception of union is here different from the

one expressed in the poem "Krishna". This mystic experience

is conceived as the consummation of the union of the

Devotee and the Deity, viewed through the conjugal love of

Shiva and Parvathi. The beginning of the poem again and

 154

again brings an atmosphere of serenity and peaceful

surroundings where Shiva sits alone meditating

Once the white summit of eternity

A single soul of bare infinities,

Guarded he keeps by a fire - screen of peace

His mystic loneliness of nude ecstasy. ("Shiva")

There 1s both the power and the pure environment around

Shiva. The pictorial presentation of Shiva's feature poses the

perfect picture of Lord Shiva as conceived in Indian

mythology. The words 'white', 'eternity', 'bare', 'Peace',

'loneliness' and 'nude' evoke the image of Shiva before us,

and these words command a 'smiling sureness of touch and

inner breath of perfect perfection born, not made in the words

themselves'. But after a pause, in his mood of immense

delight, Shiva stretches his sight over the depths and sees

the Mighty Mother waiting to be received :

But , touched by an immense delight to be,

He looks across unending depths and sees

Musing amidst the inconscient silences

The Mighty Mother's dumb felicity. ("Shiva")

The 'Mighty Mother' responds to the sight of Lord Shiva and

rises with felicity to unite with him. The inner throbs of the

heart of its Mother while reaching the spirit is seen 1n the

following lines :
 155

Half now awake she rises to his glance ;

Then, moved to circling by her heart-beats will,

The rhythmic worlds describe that passionate-dance.

The result of this Eternal Dance of Shiva with Parvathi is the

rhythmic world created by it. From the passion dance evolves

this 'rhythmic world'. The last three lines describe the final

union :

Life springs in her and Mind is born ; her face

She lifts to Him who is Herself, until

The spirit leaps into the spirit's embrace.

The Divine awakening comes and there is a mystic approach

and a final reaching of the Goal. The poem satisfies the

expectations of a reader who seeks in the poet's experience,

'his vision of its beauty, its power, his thrilled reception of it,

his joy in it that he tries to convey by an utmost perfection in

word and rhythm'. 9

These short poems of lyrical intensity and mystic themes

belongs to the last phase of Aurobindo's poetic career. The

notes of mysticism, however, rings through Aurobindo's

poetry right from the beginning and culminates in Savitri, the

celebrated epic. The mystical poems of Sri Aurobindo have

been divined into four groupings 10 : poems written in 1895 -

1908; in 1908-1930; in 1930-1950; and, Savitri. The

9
Letters of Sri Aurobindo (III Series) p. 128.
10
Makrand Paranjpe, opp. cit., p. 79.
 156

relevant poems in the first section, 1895 - 1908 are short

poems which illustrate the first blossoming of Sri Aurobindo's

mysticism. Those in the seconds section, 1908 - 1930, are

mainly short poems, sonnets, and those in the third section,

1930 - 1950, are poems in new metres. Savitri, because of

its length and dimensions is best considered as a unit 1n

itself.

Sri Aurobindo had a classical bent of mind. In his delineation

of characters and in his capacity to form grand conceptions,

deep thoughts, stately expressions and noble sallies of

imagination he remains unrivalled in the entire corpus of

Indian English Poetry. In poems after poems these traits of

his poetry are revealed to us. In "Ilion" he revives his own

typical brand of Homeric epic. Not only it impresses us by its

bulk and the sheer audacity of its conception, but also by the

lavish amplitude of its execution. The description of Dawn

with which the poem opens is among the finest things in Sri

Aurobindo, surpassed only by the evocation of 'The symbol

Dawn' in Savitri, the debate of the Trojan statesmen -

recalling the debate of the fallen angels in Book II of

Paradise Lost is elaborated at almost extravagant length. But

his greater achievement was in Savitri. The legendary story,

the symbolic overtones, the hint of Savitri's Journey into the

continents of Night, Twilight and Day, the Savitri - Yama

dialectic, and above all the character of the heroine who is a

radiant column of sheer light and saviour strength had always

 157

attracted Sri Aurobindo. This is how he brings out the

magnificent and grand delineation of his heroine :

A wide self- giving was her native act

A magnanimity as of sea or sky

Enveloped with all its greatness all that came

And gave a sense as of a greatened world :

Her kindly care was a sweet temperate sun,

Her high passion a blue heaven's equipoise---

A deep of compassion, a hushed sanctuary,

Her inward help unbarred a gate in heaven;

The whole world could take refuge in her single heart,

(Savitri, p.19)

This stupendous ambrosial truth about Savitri's power of love

-'The world could take refuge in her heart'-must have

endlessly fascinated Sri Aurobindo.

Indian literature is not lacking in images of holy wedded love.

Sita, Draupadi, Sakuntala, Damayanti- these among others-

have inspired poets to immortal song. But none of these

heroines quite measures up consistently to the fierce purity,

purpose, preparedness and puissance of Savitri. None of the

heroines was really as free to choose and be chosen as

Savitri. And their wedded lives ran by no means a smooth

course. Rama sent Sita away to the forest ; Draupadi was

almost gambled away ; Sakuntala was too easily won and too

causally rejected ; Damayanti was cruelly abandoned in the

 158

forest by her husband. They were all mastered, at one time or

another, by circumstances; only Savitri is mistress of

circumstance all the time. She does not falter, she does not

fumble, she does not weep ; and ever she indignantly rejects

the very idea of failure. Her light ultimately eats up the

darkness of the dark God. 11

The two opposed each other face to face,

His being like a huge fort of darkness towered;

Around it her life grew, an ocean's seige ---

Light like a burning tongue licked up his thoughts,

Light was luminous torture in his heart,

Light coursed, a splendid agony, through its nerves;

His darkness muttered perishing in her blaze.

(Savitri, p.748.)

And so death is dead, though only to revive as a god of light.

And Satyavan is redeemed indeed, and the earth is assured

of a series of new times charged with the glory of heaven

This earth shall stir with impulses sublime,

Humanity awake to deepest self,

Nature the Hidden godhead recognize

The spirit shall take up the human play,

The earthly life become the life divine. (Savitri,p. 796)

Savitri as a poem has many passages of such sustained

height of inspiration, exceptional intensity and stately

11
K.R. Srinivas Iyengar, Dawn 1Q Greater Dawn (Simla: Indian Institute of Advance Study, 1975),
p. 33.
 159

expressions. Thus, when the whole poem moves on such

heights of revelation, inspiration, and illumination and never

comes down to a lower plane, it becomes difficult for us to

make a choice of passages with special poetical merit. But

there are single lines, double lines, triple lines, four lines

throughout the poem that have a power of poetic beauty and

excellence that enthrall our mind and reach an Upanishadic

height. Notice, for example, the single lines. Carrying

concentrated expression of the poetic vision, they sink into

our mind and go on echoing with wealth of suggestions :

Death's grip can break our bodies, not our souls. (p. 490)

My love shall outlast the world. (p. 490)

Fate's law may change; but not my spirit's will. (p. 490)

My strength is not the titan's, it is God's. (p. 493)

Our lives are caught in an ambiguous net. (p. 507)

Man must overcome or miss his higher fate. (p. 507)

Alone she is equal to her mighty task. (p. 512)

The whole world could take refuge in her single heart. (p. 19)

Open God's door, enter into his trance. (p. 541)

Only by suffering can I scale. (p. 574)

There is a purpose in each stumble and fall. (p. 738)

I lay my hands upon thy heart of love. (p. 785)

This earthly life become life divine. (p. 798)

And the two lines :

In the enormous emptiness of thy mind

thou shalt see the Eternal's body in the world. (p. 541)
 lOU

Nature's most careless lolling is a pose

Preparing some forward step, some deep result. (p. 738)

A Lover leaning from his cloister's door

Gathers the whole world into his single breast. (p. 71 0)

Life was his drama and the vast a stage,

The Universe was his body, God its soul. (p. 631)

The word I have spoken can never be erased

It is written in the record book of God. (p. 490)

My love is not a craving of the flesh

It came to me from God, to God returns. (p. 688)

Earth is the heroic spirit's battlefield,

The forge where the Arch - mason shapes his works. (p. 770)

And the three lines :

They were tied in the single circling of their days

Together by loves unseen atmosphere,

Inseparable like the earth and sky. (p. 606)

Life now became a sure approach to God,

Existence a divine experiment

And cosmos the soul's opportunity. (p. 50)

 161

And the four lines :

Intolerant of the poverty of Time

Her passion catching at the fugitive hours

Willed the expense of centuries in one day

0 f prod i g a I I o v e and the s u rf of ecstasy --- ( p. 53 4)

In a simple purity of emptiness

Her mind knelt down before the unknowable

All was abolished save her naked self

And the prostrate yearning of her surrendered heart---(p. 592)

Her high nude soul,

Stripped of the girdle of mortality,

Against fixed destiny and the grooves of law

Stood up in its sheer will a primal force--- (p. 656)

If one wishes, one can add a long list of beautiful and

illustrative examples to those listed above. It is not our

intention to do so here, as those noted above are 1n

themselves sufficient enough to show the grandeur of thought

and expression achieved by Sri Aurobindo. Indeed what

Johnson said of Milton is absolutely true of Sri Aurobindo :

'Which other mind soared so high and sustained its flight for

so long' (Life of Milton). V.K. Gokak has rightly written : 'Like

Dante and Milton he produced in Savitri, an epic of universal

significance. Like Goethe, he picked up an ancient story and

developed it as a legend summing up the past, a symbol

projecting the future and a philosophy based on his own

 162

experience. He fulfilled the promise of the subjective ep1c

and introspective lyricism which had opened so b ri IIi a ntly

with Wordsworth, Shelley and Keats.' 12 P. Lal who once

condemned Savitri as 'greasy, weak-spined and purple

adjectived' later modified his stand and accepted Aurobindo

13
as the Milton of Indian English Poetry.

Love has always inspired the best and the majority of the

world's literary works. Sarojini Naidu is no exception ; her

love poems outnumber all others. Almost every one poem 1n

three among the poems of Sarojini Naidu is a love poem of

one kind or other. 14 The longing of lovers for each other is

expressed with truly oriental splendour in "A Rajput Love

Song". "A Persian Love Song", which comes immediately

after, exhibits the serener mood of lovers who are conscious

of their oneness through love. The lover does not know why,

when his beloved is glad, or sad, or at rest, or pain, he feels

exactly what she feels ; but he has an inkling of the possible

explanation. But the ecstasy of loving and being loved can be

so overpowering as to be almost unbearable as is evident in

"Ecstasy":

Cover mine eyes, 0 my love !

Mine eyes that are weary of bliss

As of light that is poignant and strong;

12
V.K. Gokak, Sri Aurobindo: Poet and Seer (New Delhi Abhinav, 1973), p. 16.
13
Sri K.R. Srinivas Inyengar, opp. cit., p. 653.
14
P.E. Dustoor, Sarojini Naidu (Mysore: Rao and Raghvan, 196), p. 30
 163

0 silence my lips with a kiss,

My lips that are weary of song

Shelter my soul, 0 my love !

My soul is bent low with the pain

And the burden of love like the grace

Of a flower that is smitten with rain.

0 shelter my soul from thy face !

Another aspect of love is revealed elsewhere. Thus, in "The

Poet's Love Song", the poet, far away from her lover, is rapt

in dreams all day ; but not so at night : 'But in the desolate

hour of midnight--- my soul hungers for thy voice'. In "Alone"

the sense of loneliness is constant ' neither the 'accustomed

alleys of delight' nor the 'orchards of the night' bring any

relief the maiden breasts the 'tides of life's familiar

streams'. In "The Garden Vigil" the woman, separated from

her lover, finds comfort in apostrophizing the morning star. In

other poems something more than the pathos of separation is

expressed. In "A Love Song from the North" the forsaken one

cannot bear to hear the papeeha's call for similar joyous

sights and sounds, for they only recall dreams of delights

that are gone. In "Caprice" and in "Destiny" we are shown

how maiden's hearts are broken by those unworthy of their

love. In "Longing" the heart, thus broken, still hopes for the

return of the way- ward lover. Amid the gleaming pageant of

life that crowds round the sadness of the maiden's days and

nights, she still harbours a hope to 'reach the comfort of your

 164

breast.' "The Festival of Memory" shows that the memory of a

love however transient is a dear memory.

But all these are scattered poems. There is a constellation of

love poems at the end of her last volume, and the twenty-

four poems that form the group are significantly given the

collective title, "The Temple". The deep mystic fervour that

inspired them is stressed with the subtitle 'A Pilgrimage of

Love'. The pilgrimage towards the Temple is carefully worked

out in three stages of eight poems each. The pilgrimage

begins with 'The Gate of Delight' and the poems of this stage

are calculated to demonstrate that in Love's bondage is true

freedom, and true bliss in the sacrifices it demands. In the

opening poem, 'The Offering', the woman, unable to bring

beauty or greatness to Love's shrine, can yet bring a

devotion that asks for no recompense. Similarly, the devotee

of 'The Feast' is content to smear her head and eyelids with

the 'entranced and flowering dust' that Love has honoured

with his tread, happy to bear Love's foot-prints on her breast,

and eager to have as a priceless boon 'All the sorrows of

your years I All the secret of your tears.' In 'Ecstasy' the

woman cares not at all for the glories that spring brings. In

'Lute-Song' the beloved tells her that he needs no mirror, no

lute, no silks. Her eyes, her voice, her heart will serve

instead. 'If you call me I will come', says the maiden in the

next poem. In the sins of love the poet asks for forgiveness

for the sins of looking on the face of her lover, touching his
 165

flesh, assailing him with her silence or her song. 'The Desire

of Love' is a short, simple song, but intense and packed with

passion. The last of the eight poems in this section is 'The

Vision of Love'. The woman has lost all knowledge except of

her beloved. To her enraptured sight he is the sovereign and

sweet reality, the splendour of the morning star, the might

and the magic of the sea, the subtle fragrance of the spring,

the fruit of all Time's harvesting ; he is the sacred fount from

which her spirit draws all sustenance ; he is the temple of her

woe and bliss.

But issuing through the Gate of Delight, the pilgrim of Love

must tread, the path of tears- tears of humiliation. True love,

long-suffering and self-denying, must overcome pride,

whether in the loved one's spirit or 1n the lover's own.

Accordingly, in the eight poems that mark 'The Path of Tears'

the faithful lover bewails the other's pride and disdain and

cruelty. In the opening poem, 'The Sorrow of Love', the

woman complains that her beloved has turned his face away,

perhaps because he is afraid that his strength and pride will

suffer if he continues to give himself to her. In 'The Silence

of Love', she is determined that, though she has given her

lover the whole joy of her flesh and the treasure of her soul,

she will demand no answering gift from him. 'The Menace of

Love' opens with the ruthless, pride of the loved one and

closes with the lover's dilemma : '--- if I shall save or slay

you I As you lie spent and broken at my feet'! But even

 166

humiliation at the loved one's hand is sweet and is hugged as

a rich reward. Witness, for example, 'Love's Guerdon' which

closes with :

You plucked my heart and broke it, 0 my Love,

And bleeding flung it down ! ...

Sweeter to die thus trodden of your feet,

Than reign apart upon an ivory seat

Crowned in a lovely rapture of renown.

In desperation at her plight the lover, in 'If You Were Dead',

1s prepared to welcome the loved one's death. The broken -

hearted maiden, in 'Supplication', would pardon all the

wrongs done to her. Even the withering of all her hopes and

the utter deadness of her life would seem nothing to her if

only she could find relief in tears. This is all she asks from

the loved one. The loved one, drenched with life drops of the

heart he has killed is the Slayer, in the poem of that name.

But this kind of conceit is carried even further in the last

poem of this section 'The Secret'. And then to the Sanctuary,

the shrine at which the lover must be prepared to worship

with the utmost devotion, even to the point of a Joyous

surrender of life itself. Accordingly, in the first of the eight

poems in 'The Sanctuary', entitled 'The Fear of Love', the

maiden, for fear of any harm coming to her beloved, would

build a shrine for him against covetous Time and Fate. A

similar passionate devotion inspires 'The Illusion of Love'. In

'The Worship of Love', she asks to be crushed by her lover

 167

like a lemon leaf or basil bloom and to be burnt like a sandal

grain. Then follow 'Love Triumphant', 'Love Omnipotent', and

'Love Transcendent'. In the first the woman would shield her

beloved from the world's horror or hate even if his hands

were stained with blood - guiltiness, she would endure any

suffering to succour him and hush his anguish in her breast.

In the second, she similarly expressed her readiness to

undertake the most arduous or impossible task for her

beloved's sake. The third, 'Love Transcendent', visualizes

the Day of Judgement, when her beloved, 'Saint with the

sinless eyes,' will be crowned amid the peace anointed and

she herself will be hurled from Heaven's high battlement. But

her fall, then, will be brightened by the memory of his radiant

face, and she will sing a paean to thrill the dead with his

deathless name. In 'Invocation 'the woman in love calls upon

the Star of her Trust to shine upon her straggling spirit and

raise it ; she is confident that his warmth and grief and stern

agonizing silence can chasten her spirit. And finally there is

'Devotion', direct and brief : 'Love, I am yours to lie in your

breast like a flower,/ Or burn like a weed for your Sake in the

flame of hell.'

There is much in Sarojini Naidu's love poetry which is

extravagant, needlessly wordy, or merely pretty. 15 But it does

reveal a sensitive and passionate spirit. Apart from the aches

of ecstasies of love, Indian myth and legend, Indian beliefs

15
Ibid., p. 40.
 168

and attitudes find a reflection in Sarojini Naidu's poetry-

poem after poem reveals its basic inspiration and theme or in

its incidental imagery and allusions, the native Indian mind

and outlook of the poem. Thus we have "Suttee" ; "Leili" ;

"Damyanti to Nala in the Hour of Exile" ; 'To a Buddha seated

on a Lotus' ; "Vasant Panchami", 'The Festival of Servants' ;

"Song of Radha", "The Milkmaid"; "Hymn to India", "Lord of

Rain" ; "The Temple" ;"Lakshmi", "The Lotus Born"; "The

Flute Player of Brindaban" ; "Kali the Mother"-the tiles of

which clearly carry the Indian identity.

The simple joys and hopes and fears and lives of the common

folk in town and country ; the irresistible fascination which

nature, especially at springtime, exercises over her, the ever

present challenge of suffering and loss to the human spirit of

Death to Life, these are some of the recurrent themes to

which Sarojini Naidu returns again and again in her poetry.

They are, of course, not mutually exclusive, and they often

overlap, but in song and sonnet, in poems that are narrative

in style and in those that are openly and plainly lyrical she

returns-if not exclusively, then predominantly to one or the

other of these favourite themes. 16

"Indian Weavers", "Street Cries", "In The Bazars of

Hyderabad" and "Bangle Sellers" are a class in themselves

within the larger class of folk poem. These poems focus

16
Ibid., p. 23.
 169

poetic attention on common men and women at their common

daily tasks and at the same time relate their activities and

vocations to the vicissitudes and changing phases of human

life. The appeal of Nature, and particularly of spring, inspired

a number of Sarojini Naidu's poems. Pretty as well as

sincere; they are all expressions of her genu1ne excitement

over the sights and sounds and scents of the earth,

especially in spring. A group of four poems - In "Praise of

Gulmohur Blossoms", "Nasturtiums", "Golden Cassia", and

"Champak Blossoms" are dedicated to individual

manifestations of Nature's beauty Then, there are over a

dozen poems in which Sarojini Naidu is concerned wholly

with the theme of the challenge of suffering and pain and

death to life. Thus, we have the sonnet "Love and Death"

which expresses the utter despair voiced by the poet, while in

another poem, "To the God of Pain", she sees herself as an

unwilling priestess in the temple of the god. Exhausted and

completely spent, she craves only for the release from his

service. In another, "Past and Future", faced with the future-

the past having retreated like a hermit to his cell - she stands

expectant but not knowing what to expect. In varying degree

these poems reveal a sprit crushed and awed by fate. A

realization of the helplessness of herself and her kind before

the wind of change, which blows across the ways of men and

blows away one sorrow only to bring another enters into the

profoundly moving poem "To A Buddha Seated on a Lotus".

What mystic rapture, what peace, unknown to the world of

 170

men, she asks, is the secret of Lord Buddha, seated on his

Lotus throne? She recalls by way of contrast the sufferings

and strife, 'the strenuous lessons of defeat', the hope

deferred, the futile strivings of the spirit, the unsatisfied

hunger of the soul, which are our common destiny. Puzzled,

she turns to the Buddha :

The end elusive and afar,

Steel lures as with its beckoning flight,

And all our mortal moments are

A session of the infinite,

How shall we reach the great unknown

Nirvana of thy Lotus - thronef

A different mood emerges in the three poems, "Forest",

"Transience", and "At Twilight". Thus, 1n the first of these

poems, she goes into the forest to burn the dear dreams that

are dead, 'Nay, do not grieve tho' life be full of sadness' is

the very opening line of "Transience". The recoil from despair

and the initial despair are both stronger in "At Twilight".

Weary, the poet seeks kind Death at twilight. "The Poet to

Death", "Death and Life", "Life", "The Soul's Prayer",

"Invincible", "A Challenge to Fate" and finally, "In Salutation

to the Eternal Peace" are poems dealing with the theme of

suffering, pain, life and death.

Sarojini Naidu's poetry IS a pure success at evoking the

experience of beauty, in the reader. The sense of beauty

 171

experience is not of particular things but is the sense of

beauty in all things as discussed in the various themes of her

poetry.

Thus, Sarojini Naidu undeniably belongs to the romantic

school, and it is the romantic in her that in its most

passionate mood brings about a heightening of the

consciousness. There is in her poetry a genuine search for

beauty and a realization that the beautiful has an

independent value. It thus reinforces the view that art is self-

sufficient and that the harmonizing value of poetry is present

in the beauty of art itself.

Sarojini Naidu did not seek to grapple with life's intricate

problems as a philosopher does. There were only situations

for her that made her nerves 'tingle' and stirred her into

creation. Life's endless variety excited her, its colour dazzled

her, its beauty intoxicated her. Thus some of her poems, as

we have already seen, quiver with the passion of love, some

are effusions of the rapture of spring, some transport us into

the world of inner ecstasy, while some others to the agonies

of suffering and pain, life and death.

Thus Sarojini Naidu's poetry reveals that she was endowed

with an extraordinary sense for describing objects with

accurate details. The style of her poems has the capacity to

communicate the poet's experience as the felt experience of

the reader. While her poetry does not make any pretence to
 172

grand conceptions, deep thoughts and stately expressions,

all essential ingredients of the sublime, they certainly give us

genuine poetry throbbing with life.

Independence in India did not bring a change only in the

socio - economic and political fields but in the field of

literature as well. New movements in literature are the new

uses of language. The new mind requires the new voice, and

the new voice is discovered by the writer's genius for

intimately registering the idiom of his own world. 17

Poets like Nissim Ezekiel, P. Lal, Shiv K. Kumar, A.K.

Ramanujan, R. Parthasarathy, Jayant Mahapatra, Arun

Kolatkar, K.N. Daruwalla, Kamla Das, Dom Moraes, Gieve

Patel, Adil Jussawala, Pritish Nandy, A.K. Mehrotra and many

others speak in a new voice. Although they retain some of the

themes consciously or otherwise, of the earlier poets, their

idiom, style, syntax, speak of their freedom 1n handling

themes. 18 This is best illustrated in their attitude to and their

treatment of the theme of love, one of the three permanent

themes - the other two being life and death - of poetry, and

for that matter of literature. It has always occupied a central

place in the realms of Indian English Poetry. We have already

seen how it has been delineated in the poetry of Toru Dutt,

Sri Aurobindo and Sarojini Naidu.

17
B.K. Das, Modern Indian English Poetry (Bariely: Prakash Book Depot, 1982), p. 4.
18
Ibid. p. 5.
 173

The theme of love as delineated in the hands of the new

poets takes a different shape with definite overtones of

physical and corporeal. Naturally, instead of devotion there is

lust. Thus we have Nissim Ezekiel, one of the pioneers of

'new' poetry in English writing freely, frankly and openly on

sex. This is traceable from the very first poem "A Time to

change" where the poet talks of the 'Debtors to the whore of

love', 'the flesh defiled by dreams of flesh'. Neither a

romantic dreamer nor a Platonic, he holds an altogether

different stance in his approach to sex and women resulting

in highly sensual descriptions of the human organs and love

making in bed. 19

The poet is 'painfully and poignantly aware of the flesh, its

insistent urges, its stark ecstasies, its disturbing filiations

with the m i n d ' . 20 T h us , many of the poems i n c I u de d i n A T i me

to Change express the poets constant desire to affirm to all

engrossing and reciprocal love of woman. The second

anthology, Sixty Poems, carries the impulse even further.

"Situation" is much like "An Affair" where the immediate

moment of love occupies the participants. In "Lines", there is

a tacit approval of the act of love. Love in its bare form, in

and outside marriage has occupied the poet in many of his

early poems. Thus "Marriage Poem" is reminiscent of "To a

Certain Lady". The poet is actually aware of the fibers of

19
Anisur Rahman, Form and Value i!! the Poetry ofNissim Ezekiel (New Delhi: Abhinav
Publications, 1981 ), p. 13.
°
2
K.R.S. Iyengar, opp. cit., p. 657.
 174

flesh and desire. As a poet of the body, he has a penchant

for representing the physical features of a woman in a

number of ways. As already noted, these representations are

highly sensuous. One may like to cite the poem entitled

"Descriptions" as one such instance:

I will begin but how should I begin ?

With hair, your hair,

remembered hair,

touched, smelt, lying silent there

upon your head, beneath your arms

and then between your thighs a wonder

of hair --- ("Descriptions")

One wonders what is there so 'poetic' about 'the image of

hair, a single element in the woman's total composition',

which has been rendered, in the eyes of a critic, 'with a touch

of wonder, excitement and novelty.' 21

One feels, on the other hand, that such sensuous

descriptions of the human organs particularly in the last two

lines border on the verge of obscenity and shows the weird

and grotesque imagination of the poet bereft of any noble

sallies of imagination and deep thoughts.

The theme of body and its sensuous descriptions is further

explored in 'The Female Image' where the various female

21
Anisur Rahman, opp. cit., p. 17.
 175

adjuncts tend to occupy the poet both in the mind and out

side the home. The musings on the female body 'Shall her

belly know the lust of man ? I 'And shall he be contended ?'

is obsessive. The poet's mind is full of the erotic images of

the woman's body as he returns home: 'And on my lips a

hurricane of Helen's kisses'.

In all anthologies of Nissim Ezekiel up to the latest Poems

1983-1988 the nature of this experience of the poet is not

radically different. Thus the poet's mind seems to be

occupied with 'breasts and buttocks', 22 'breasts and thighs' 23 ,

' t h i g h s a s tree - t r u n k s ' 24 , ' Ii p s a n d t h i g h s ' 25 , ' s m a II b re a s t s

f u II b r e a s t s ' 26 . I n ' P a s s i o n P o e m s ' , H y m n l..D.. D a r k n e s s ( 1 9 7 6 )

the poet refers to Sanskrit poets and mythology and holds

them as his model for his own sexual frenzy and unabated

erotic zeal. Notice how even in old age he uses Radha and

Krishna myth as a mask for his own sexuality

Radha says she longs for Krishna

As the soul longs for union with God.

Krishna likes the idea.

("Ten Poems in the Greek Anthology Mode")

22
Nissim Ezekiel, Collected Poems (Delhi : Oxford University Press, 1989) p. 249.
23
Ibid. p. 16.
24
Ibid. p. 249.
25
Ibid. p. 25.
26
Ibid. p. 250.
 176

The Radha - Krishna myth has also been used by Kamla Das

to hide her own sensuality and sexuality. With frankness and

openness unusual in the Indian context Kamla Das expresses

her need for love and goes a step forward by using words and

lines such as 'my pubis', 'lesbian', 'figid', 'hetero', 'poor lust',

'flamboyant love', 'endless female hungers', 'menstrual

blood', 'the musk of seat between the breasts' 'the jerky way

he urinates' and 'you dribbled spittle into my mouth'. Das is

credited with, as noted in the previous chapter, bringing the

confessional poetry of the likes of Sylvia Plath and Anne

Sexton which was later followed and practised by a number of

women poets who were influenced by Kamla Das.

Kamla Das's outpourings pertain to a particular reg1on which

readily becomes a talking point in a cocktail circuit :

They did this to her, the men who knew her, the man

She loved, who loved her not enough, being selfish

And a coward, the husband who neither loved nor

Used her, but was a ruthless watcher, and the band

Of cynics she turned to, clinging to their chests where

New hair sprouted like great - winged moths, burrowing her

Face into their smells and their young lusts to forget ---

("The Sunshine Cat" )

Several of her poems are puerile adolescent fragments as for

example the following :

 177

Love

Until I found you,

I wrote verse, drew pictures

And, went out friends

For walks ---

Now that I love you,

Curled like an old mongrel

My life lie, content,

In you---

("The Old Playhouse and Other Poems", p. 23)

'The whole frame of the poem', said Donne 'is beating out of

a piece of gold', and added, 'but the last clause is like the

impression of the stamp and it is that which makes it current'.

Kamla Das, being a poet of emotion, may inaugurate her

poems well, but she is unaware of the craft of consummate

culmination. For example, the title poem "The Descendants",

b~in ,s effectively enough :

(.

We have spent our youth in gentle sinning

Exchanging some insubstantial love ---

The narrative, construed as a guiltless reflection of the

couple's infidelities to each other, does not conclude

logically. The end, in fact, is a non- sequitur

--- no, we are not going to be

Ever redeemed, or made new ("The Descendents")

 178

Her outpourings in poem after poem unnerves the reader.

She rationalises her escapades with other men by blaming

her husband :

You let me toss my youth like coins

--- you let your wife seek ecstasy in other's arms.

("A Man is a Season")

The unabashed celebration of the physical and corporeal,

startling, daring and revealing to the utmost is one of the

dominating themes of India English Poetry. Thus we have

Shiv K. Kumar talking of 'the vaginal creaks', the 'thrusts'

'and the consummation' in Cobwebs i.D_ The Sun (p. 48. 1974),

the juxtaposition of the 'open - thighed' and 'closed - fists' in

"Kovalam Beach" and his exploration of desire, this time

juxtaposing desire with age in Woolgathering (1998). Then,

there is Jayant Mahapatra exploring the intricacies of human

relationships, especially those of lovers. Love offers a sort of

relief from the uncertainties of life and this has been probed

rigorously in poems like "Lost" and "The Logic". But for

Mahapatra also sexual attraction for some woman or women

often remains the disguised subject. What is to be noted is

that there is always a lifting of inhibitions in the expressions

of sexuality and desire bereft of noble love and noble

conceptions.

We find a marked change in the attitude to and description of

the scenes of nature also. Thus the poets no longer sing of

 179

the glories of nature, its radiant beauty, brightness,

magnificence and splendour as celebrated in the earlier

poetry. Instead, they now fathom its darkness. A very

different kind of treatment IS given to river in A.K.

Ramanujan's "A River". Instead of a traditional song of praise

for the full river, Ramanujan gives us what he sees as the

villager's real experience. The river is beautiful in the

summer, but when it floods, it causes suffering that is not at

27
all poetic. Poems on rivers abound in Indian English Poetry.

So much so that Indian English poets are said to be 'river

poets'. 28

Daruwalla's Crossing of Rivers is almost entirely devoted to

river poems, and some of his earlier poems, too, like, "The

Ghagra in Spate" (Under Orion) are about rivers. Then, there

are Mehrotra's "Songs of the Ganga", and Mahapatra's poems

like "On the Bank of the Ganges" (A Rain of Rites), "Way of

the River", "Song of the River" (Waiting), "Evening

Landscape by the River", "Dead River" and "Again, One Day,

Walking by the River" (Life Signs). Parthasarathy, like.

Ramanujan, has also written on the river Vaikai. One can get

interesting insights into the works of all these poets simply by

com paring their attitude to rivers which to rm s an i m porta nt

part of the theme of nature in Indian English Poetry. Indian

landscape gets described in the modern Indian English

27
B.K. Das. opp. cit., p. 6.
28
Vilas Sarang opp. cit., p. 13.
 180

Poetry. In Dauwalla's poetry, the landscape of Northern

Indian hills and plains is evoked in many poems notably. "The

Ghaghra in Spate". Shiv K. Kumar's "Indian women", "An

Indian Mango Vendor", "Kovalam Beach", "Transcendental

Meditation", and "A Hindu to his Cow" are some poems which

describe the Indian landscape. Kumar not only makes subtle

use of mythology (Subterfuges, p. 15) but he has to his credit

some fine portraiture of Indian women :

In this triple baked continent

Women don't etch angry eyebrows

On mud walls.

Patiently they sit

Like empty pitchers

On the mouth of the village well

(Subterfuges, p. 37)

The search for 'Self' is a major concern for Indian poets in

English. Given the peculiar genesis of Indian English Poetry,

it is no wonder that the poet's 'other world'-the 'real'

English-speaking world-holds a special attention for him.

The poet, reared upon the English Language, longs to be at

the centre of English language culture; but he also has his

involvement with India, and is thus, torn between two worlds.

Poets may settle down in England or America or Germany or

for that matter, in any other country, or may decide to remain

in India, but their alliance continues to be mixed.

 181

Modern Indian English poets may be divided into three

groups : those who have lived for some years particularly

during their formative years in the West, and thereafter

returned to India; those who have decided to make their

home in the West; and those who have never lived abroad for

any substantial period. To first group belong Ezekiel, Moraes

Jussawala, Parthasarathy and Vikram Seth. G.S. Sharat

Chandra and Ramanujan as also Sujata Bhatt belong to the

second group, Sharat Chandra and Ramanujan both having

settled in America, Sujata Bhatt in Germany, though it is

notable that Ramannujan has maintained strong ties with

Indian culture and ancient literature. (Parthasarathy has, 1n

recent years, settled himself in America, and may end up 1n

the second group). It is also notable that even Moraes, the

most 'English' of Indian English poets, who seemed very

much at home in the British literary world, chose to return to

India. At the present time, there may be some younger poets

like H.O. Nazareth living in England, but, significantly, none

of the I e ad i n g I n d ian Eng I ish poets I i v e s i n Eng Ian d . 29

The appeal of 'Self' and 'Exile' appears to have been

particularly strong with poets who began writing in the fifties

or early sixties. The consequent 'self questioning' and 'inner-

tension' can be observed 1n the poems of Ezekiel,

Ramanujan, Parthasarathy and Jussawala. A number of

leading poets who began to publish during the seventies,

29
Vilas Sarang, opp. cit., p. 12.
 182

e.g., Mahapatra, Daruwalla, Kolatkar and Mehrotra-belong to

the third group described above, and never seem to have felt

much need for living in exile. They seem to regard India as

their natural home, and felt no need to make self- conscious

resolutions or declarations such as Ezekiel's oft-quoted one :

I have made my commitments now

This is one; to stay where I am,

As others choose to give themselves

In some remote and backward place.

My backward place is where I am.

("Background, Casually")

R. Parhasarathy visualizing the direction of Indian English

Poetry in future, talks of 'Indian reality' as the major pre -

occupation of our poets. Thus, the realities of life and being

are stressed with definite accents. This is more pronounced

in the poems related to the city-life and almost all major poet

discuss it 1n their poetry. Most of this poetry is about the

mundane, the quotidian and the monotony of the routine

urban life. Poets frequently perceive the city as a site where

the self I other barrier is explored. The self meets other

selves in relationships that are antagonistic, supportive,

threatening or simply indifferent. There is maladjustment,

fear, cruelty that uniformly mark the poetry of the city. It's the

site of chance, sexual encounters, and undemanding,

loveless relationships. It is indifferent to its inhabitants and

 183

their emotional attachments, and offers neither comfort, nor

shelter.

Mysticism has not found much favour with modern poets and

apart from A.K. Mehrotra, Nissim Ezekiel and A.K.

Ramanujan as their later poetry shows there are few poets

interested in the mystic mode. Similarly Indian myth which

was amply displayed in the poetry of Toru Dutt, Aurobindo

and Sarojini Naidu, seems to be lacking in the poetry of the

modern poets. The attempted rejuvenation of legendary

characters by P. Lal and the attempts to mythicize Radha -

Krishna legend by Nissim Ezekiel and Kamla Das have not

been very successful. Some of the modern poets have even

failed to realize the powerful impact of myth. One may like to

cite, for instance, the views of Adil Jussawala on Shri

Aurobindo's Savitri : 'To my mind --- Savitri is a poem on the

relation of the spirit to a matter, unwinding like an

interminable Sari through twelve books and about 2400 lines

1s one vast onion of a poem. The layers gradually fall away to

rev e a I n o t h i n g . ' 30

Jussawala questions a tradition which, in his v1ew 1s nothing

but 'a vagueness of thought, an absolute faith in the mystical,

and a blind reliance in the heart'. Thus he fails to see the

symbolic reliance of the mythological Savitri to the Indian

womanhood. Savitri, Sita, Draupadi, Damyanti and Sakuntala,

30
Adil Jussawala, 'The New Poetry,' Readings in Commonwealth Literature (ed.). Williom Walsh
(New Delhi : Oxford University Press, 1973), p. 16.
 184

remain among others some of the supreme epitomes of holy

wedded love in the Indian tradition and some of the greatest

examples of noble conceptions of noble minds.

As the corpus of Indian English Poetry is quite enormous, the

discussion of its themes can be extended to any dimension,

but the above discussion of some of the major themes will

surely suffice our purpose to show what actually consists of

the content of Indian English Poetry. From this discussion of

the 'content' we now move on to make a brief statement on

the 'form' of Indian English Poetry.

Form

Form is a natural correlate to content. It leads us directly to a

consideration of the language of composition, in terms of its

images, diction etc. of which the world of poetry is made.

They constitute the essential elements of poetry, unravel the

poet's area of associations and demonstrate his ability to

reach to his reader by making an impression I effect felt. This

impression I effect can either be in the form of reason I

knowledge or pleasure.

Before we begin this study of the formal features as stated

above of Indian English Poetry, we shall like to make some

statement on the nature of imagery and diction. Imagery is a

topic which belongs both to psychology and literary study. In

psychology it means a mental reproduction a memory of

 185

sensational or perceptual experience which may be auditory

or may be wholly psychological. 31 In literary study, it refers to

pictures produced by language, whose words and statements

may refer either to experiences which could produce physical

perceptions were the readers actually to have those

experience, or to the sense - impressions themselves. In

other words, it is used, in literary study, to refer variously to

the meaning of a statement involving images, to the images

themselves, or to the combination of 1mages and meaning.

Thus Longinus says, 1mage 1s used of any mental

conception, from whatever source it presents itself which

gives rise to speech--- (On the Sublime, 15.2) or Spugreon

says, I use the term image here as the only available word to

cover every kind of simile, as well as every kind of what 1s

c a II e d co m p r e s sed s i m i I e - ' m eta p h o r' 32 or c .D . L e w i s ref e r s

to it as a picture made out of words' for 'exploring reality'. 33

These various definitions can be reduced essentially to three

(i) 'mental imagery'; (ii) 'imagery as figures of speech', and

(iii) 'imagery and image patterns as the embodiment of

symbolic vision'.

Our first definition emphasizes the relation of the statement

on the page to the sensation it produces in the mind. Interest

31
John Middleton Marray, 'Metaphor', Twentieth Century Poe![y: Critical Essays and Documents,
(ed.). G. Martin and P.M. Furbank (Walton Hall, Milton Keynes: The open University Press
1975), p. 7-17.
32
C.F.E. Spurgeon, Shakespear's Imagery and What!! Tells~ (Cambridge : At the University
Press 1935), p. 35.
33
C.D. Lewis, The poetic Image (London : Penguin Books 1958 ) p. 58.
 186

in this field was apparently first aroused by the early

experiments in the psychology of perception of Sir Frances

Galton, in 1880 who sought to discover that people differ in

their image making habits and capacities.

Our second definition concentrates on the nature of the

relationship between a subject and analogue, that 1s, on

metaphor. Although it is the analogue which 1s, strictly

speaking, the image, the term is often used to refer to the

entire subject analogue relationship.

Our third definition is concerned precisely with the function of

image patterns whether literal or figurative or both, as

symbols by virtue of psychological association. The problems

here are to ascertain how the poet's choice of imagery

reveals not merely the sensory capacities of his mind but

also his interests, tastes, temperament values, and v1s1on; to

determine the function of recurring images in the poem 1n

which they occur as tone-setters, structural devices and

symbols : and to examine the relations between the poet's

over-all image patterns and those of myths and rituals.

While discussing the patterns of imagery - whether literal,

figurative or both-we are faced with the essential question of

how does this pattern of imagery in a work reveals things

about the author and or his poem the basic assumption is

that repetition and recurrences are in themselves significant.

 187

If we assume for the moment that repetitions are indeed

significant, the nature of the significance must be examined.

What exactly, will counting image clusters tell the critic?

There are at least five distinguishable answers :

( 1) Texts of d o u b t f u I a u t h o r s h i p c a n be a u t h e n t i cat e d ; 34

(2) Inferences can be made about the poet's

35
experiences, tastes, tern pe ram ent, and so on;

(3) the causes of tone, atmosphere, and mood 1n a

36
p o e m o r p I a y c a n be a n a I y sed a n d d e f i n e d ;

(4) some of the ways in which the structure of conflict

37
in a play is supported can be examined ;

(5) symbols can be traced out, either in terms of how

38
t h e y r e I ate to a r c h e types , o r so m e co m b i n at i o n .

The first two approaches relate to problems extrinsic to the

work itself, although they seek internal evidence. The

procedure involves counting all images in a given work or in

all the works of a given poet and then classifying them

according to the areas of experience from which they derive :

34
M.D. Smith, Marlowe's Imagery and the Marlow Cannon (Edinburgh: Cadell, 1940), pp. 80-94.
35
T.H. Banks, Milton's Imagery (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1950), pp. 50-59.
36
C.F.E. Spurgeon, opp. cit., pp. 43-56.
37
K. Burke, Philosophy of Literary form (Berkeley :University of California Press, 1941, 1973),
P,P· 90-114.
os Northrop Frye, Anatony QfCriticism: Four Essays (Princentos University Press, 1957), pp. 90-
53.
 188

Nature animate and inanimate, daily life, learning,

commerce and so on. 39 Since these categ aries and their

proportions represent aspects of the poet's imagination and

perception, we can draw two inferences on the basis of the

resultant charts and figures : first, that these patterns are

caused by the poet's personal experiences with life and that,

therefore, they give a clue to the poet's personality and

background ; 40 and second, that since they are unique, they

offer a means of determining the authorship of the doubtful

texts.

The third and fourth approaches relate to problems intrinsic

to the artistic organization of the work itself. 'One cannot

long discuss imagery', says Burke, 'without sliding into

symbolism. The poet's images are organized with relation to

one another by reason of their symbolic kinship. We shift

from the image of an object to its symbolism as soon as we

consider it, not 1n itself alone, but as a function in a texture

of relationship'. 41

The next and fifth approach was to reason once again from

inside to outside the work, but this time ostensibly for the

sake of returning to it with greater insight. A poem is a

dramatic revelation in disguised and symbolic form of the

poet's emotional tensions and conflicts, and if therefore some

39
C.F.E. Spurgeon, opp. cit., pp. 394-408.
-1o Ibid., p. 12.
41
K. Burke, opp. cit., pp. 68-69.
 189

idea of these tensions and conflicts 1n his personal life can

be formed, the reader will then be driven to their symbolic

meaning.

Having discussed imagery at three different levels, we may

now be tempted to ask what is involved in each definition,

how each is related to the others, what the values of each

are. Cognitive psychologists have defined a number of

different kinds of mental imagery : visual, auditory, olfactory,

gustatory, tactile, organic and kinesthetic. Obviously these

categories, although perhaps somewhat over-elaborate for

the purposes of literary criticism, are preliminary to the other

approaches to imagery, for they define the very nature of the

materials. And several valuable results have emerged from

the application of these distinctions to literature. Firstly, its

concept of mental imagery has catholicity of taste, for once it

has been realized that not all poets have the same sorts of

sensory capacities, it is easier to appreciate different kinds

of poetry, Secondly, the concept of the mental imagery

provides a valuable index to the type of imagination with

which any poet is gifted. Thirdly, the concept of mental

imagery is pedagogically useful in encouraging better reading

habits by stressing these aspects of poetry. Thus, because

the reader is encouraged to make specific images in his mind

as he reads, aesthetic appreciation can be improved in a very

literal sense.
 190

As noted earlier, imagery, whatever its sensory qualities may

be, may function either literally, figuratively, symbolically or

in some combination. Thus an investigation of figurative

imagery involves such problems as that of rhetorical types,

that of the kinds of relationship which may obtain between

subject and analogue, that of the nature of the symbolic

expression and that of the use of figures in poetry, which the

study of mental imagery has either confused or ignored.

Rhetoricians like Quintilian developed elaborate systems of

classification for figures of speech. In our discussion of the

sources of the sublime we found how the third source of the

elevated style concerned itself with the proper formation of

the two types of figure-the figures of thought and figures of

speech (On the Sublime,8,108). The common types

distinguished now, however, have been reduced to about six:

metaphor, synecdoche, metonymy, simile, personification,

42
allegory, and a related but different device symbol. Each of

these figures is a device of language by means of which one

thing is said (analogue), while something else is meant

(subject), and either the subject or the analogue, or both,

may involve imagery. Thus the term imagery is commonly

used to refer to all figures of speech.

Modern criticism has developed what it v1ews as a radically

functional theory of imagery. It is based on the assumption

42
Alex Preminger, opp. cit., 365.
 191

that figures are the differential of the poetic art. Its

favourable terms are 'rich', 'complex', 'concrete',

'ambiguous', 'ironic', 'symbolic', 'mystic', 'sensuous',

'unified', 'wholeness', and so on, while its decoratives are

43
'sentimental', 'prosaic', 'didactic', 'disassociated' and so on

Having discussed the nature of imagery it may now be asked

what is the function of Imagery. Imagery may be, in the first

place, the speaker's subject, what he is talking about,

whether present before him or recalled to mind afterwards.

This includes roughly speaking, people, places, objects,

actions and events. Since economy is a fundamental artistic

principle, it may be said that usually literal imagery 1s

converted into a pseudo - subject, becoming the symbol of

something else as a result of the speaker's reflective and

meditative activity. Mere scenery is rarely enough in itself

except in descriptive poems, to justify its presence 1n a

poem. Thirdly and lastly, images may function as analogies

brought into the poem from outside the world of the speaker,

apart from his literal subject to function in a purely figurative

fashion.

It may be asked, finally, what the poet gams by the use of

such devices. Imagery, especially of the figurative or

symbolic sort, may be in the first place, serve as a device for

explaining, clarifying and making vivid what the speaker, is

43
Ibid. p. 367.
 192

talking about. Secondly, and correspondingly, the terms in

which he is making that response serve to reveal implicitly

the mood of the speaker. Thirdly and consequently, it

stimulates and externalizes his mental activity. Fourthly, the

poet's handling of imagery, through his selection of detail

and choice of comparisons, serves to dispose the reader

either favourably or unfavourably toward the various

elements in the poetic situation. Fifthly, imagery may serve

as a way of arousing and guiding the reader's expectations.

Having noted these observations on imagery, we may now

turn to the other aspect of this discussion, i.e., to the aspect

of diction after which we shall make the study of form 1n

terms of imagery and diction of Indian English Poetry.

Although the term diction or specifically poetic diction

assumed importance in the 19th century with Wordsworth's

Preface to Lyrical Ballads (2nd ed. 1800) we find its first

discussion in Aristotle : 'The clearest diction is that which

consists of words in everyday use, but this is commonplace, -

--on the other hand, a diction abounding in unfamiliar usages

has dignity, and is raised above the everyday level' (On the

Art of Poetry, 22,62). Longinus, we have already seen,

favours the choice of appropriate and high sounding words

which moves and enchants the audience and reminds us that

such choice is always the highest aims of all orators and

authors (On the Sublime, 30, 139). It is this choice that

 193

imparts to style grandeur, beauty, mellowness, weight, force

and power. Advising against the use of grand diction all the

time, especially in the use of trifling matters, he favours and

recommends the use of homely terms which 1s sometimes

much more expressive than elegant diction. It IS taken from

everyday life, is at once recognised and carries more

conviction from its familiarity. Wordworth's Preface, his

attack on false diction and Coleridge's vindication of true

poetic diction, laid down the principles and prepared the way

for much valuable criticism in the 19th and 20th century on

the question of diction in poetry. We are, however, not going

into the intricacies of the issue because it may tend to

deviate us from our main concern which is to study the form

of Indian English Poetry in terms of its imagery and diction.

Indian English poets have derived their images from various

sources. The main body of the images falls into two groups-

the a b st ra ct and con crete . 44 T he cat e g o r y of ' a b s t r a c t'

includes images from life, death, light, darkness, day, night,

colour, dreams visions, etc. The 'concrete' is divided into

animate and inanimate which are further subdivided into

human and non-human and natural and artificial respectively.

Between animate and inanimate we have a vast body of

images, for example, images from adult life and childhood,

images from animal and vegetable life, images from nature

44
The concept of 'abstract' and 'concrete' type of classification each taken from Derek Deckerton,
'Prolegomena to a Linguistic Theory of Metaphor', Linguistic Perspectives on Literature, (ed.).
M.K. Ching (London : 67 Routelage and Kegan Paul, 1980), pp. 43-61.
 194

and images from house, door, window, etc. Thus the ma1n

division of images, that is, the grouping of the images under

concrete and then, further, the subdivision of concrete into

human and non-human and then again into natural and

45
artificial can well be illustrated by the following diagram.

All phenomenon

Abstract Concrete

Animate Inanimate

Human Non - human Natural Artificial

Now we shall proceed to our study of the language of Indian

English Poetry. One may again begin with Toru Dutt, the first

major poet, and her poem, "Our Casuarina Tree", the first

maJor poem. Thus starting with the formal feature, the

figures, we notice that the structure of the poem is based on

the art of weaving image upon image. Thus in the first stanza

we notice how the poet opens this poem with the simile of a

'huge Python' likened to a 'creeper', that goes 'winding round

and round' the 'rugged trunk indented deep with scars' and

45
The diagram is slightly modified from the one given in Derek Dickerton 'Prolegomena to a
Linguistic Theory ofMetaphor', (ed.), M.K. Ching, opp. cit., p. 53.
 195

which holds 'crimson flowers', and in 'whose embraces bound

I no other tree could live' :

Like a huge python, winding round and round

The rugged trunk, indented with deep scars

Up to the very surumit near the stars.

A Creeper climbs, in whose embraces bound

No other tree could ever live.

Instead of simply starting the poem with the statement that

the tree is 'huge, tall, strong and charming' the idea is

conveyed in the most tasteful manner by building with the

basic simile, the figures-the poetical fancy, the vicarious

reference, the metaphor and the exaggeration. This

excellence of the poet consists in the art of contrast. Moving

to the second stanza, we shall see that through the

employment of the figure of condensed expression, the poet

brings up the image of winter and then the images of natural

things that are active in this season. The illuminating quality

is found in the comparison, 'statue like', 'like snow-

enmassed', and 'alone'. Against these images of 'stillness'

the poet draws up a series of images that co-exist with the

sprmg season thereby creating contrast. The illuminating

quality is here found in the verb spring as in 'off spring ;

water lilies spring,' and then in 'sunrise', 'leap about and

play' as well as 'kokilas hail the day'. In the third stanza we

notice a series of images drawn up to convey the idea of

pathos. Hence the images of 'hot tears', 'dirge like murmur',

 196

'sea breaking', 'tree's lament' and eerie speech. In the fourth

stanza the poet faced with the desire to see the light of truth,

weaves image over image which convey the idea of peace.

Hence the images of 'sheltered', 'gently kissed', 'tranced',

dreamless swoon', 'music' etc. come up. Here we may also

notice the perspicuous beauty arising out of the figure of

exaggeration. The main role of this figure is to make things

appear in their transcendal dimension. The fifth stanza holds

up aesthetically the union in opposition of the personal

creation and the impersonal ideal which the poem signifies. A

number of contrast is to be noted in the poem. Thus the

choice of words reveals a unique art in the blending of

apparently dissimilar objects and ideas. In this context we

may notice the use of paradoxical 1mages 'light' and

'darkness' 'scarf' and flowers, 'far' and 'near', 'spring' and

'winter', 'sea- breaking' against 'sheltered-bay' etc. Thus the

structure reveals itself in the balance and reconciliation of

like and desperate images. It hence reflects the typical

romantic conflict of emotional desires and material realities

being resolved by a subtle integration of images, based on

both senses and sound.

We also notice artistic turn in sound in accordance with the

underlying motives of emotion. Hence the alliterative art is

seen to work in union with meter and rhyme to serve the

cause of excellence as well as style in promoting emotion.

The aesthetic experience is successfully brought about by the

 197

style reflected in the words and their meaning. Thus the

success of the poem lies in the fact that it is wrought with

fine artistry, with an end to enrich the experience of the

reader through delighting.

We shall now cite a few examples from other poems of Toru

Dutt to show the zest behind the amazingly original and vivid

imagery of her poems. Notice the vigour and force with which

she writes the following lines :

The fireflies gemmed the bushes all,

Like fiery drops of rain. ("Sindhu", p.170.)

Or the robustness with which she conceives the following line

The curse of blood is on thee now.

Blood calls for red blood stiii.("Sindhu", p. 172)

Or the daring literal translation of an Indian folk saying, to

evoke the poignancy of mother's hearts yearning for the

safety of her son, in the following lines :

Who do my bowels for him yearn,

What ill has crossed his path? ("Sindhu", p. 174.)

Further the sweep and melody of her limes is noticeable in

the following lines:

Once and once only, all submit

To Destiny,- 'its Gods' command

Once and once only, so 'its writ',

Shall woman pledge her faith and hand;

 198

Once and once only, can a s1re

Unto his well- loved daughter say,

In presence of the witness fire

I give thee to this man away

Once and once only, have given

My heart and faith 'its past recall'

("Savitri",p.118)

Past all the houses, past the wall,

Past gardens gay, and hedgerows trim,

Past fields, whose sinuous booklets small

With molten selver to the brim. ("Savitri" p.119)

One can add, if one wishes, a long list of beautiful and

illustrative examples in addition to those listed above to show

the musical quality and the skill of the poet in weav1ng

wonderful images. But that is not our purpose here.

Aurobindo's language, on the other hand, tends to evoke

grandeur. This is amply evident in the numerous poems he

wrote. Apart from the epic poems which always express the

stateliness of thought and expression, this trait of

Aurobindo's poetry is evident in his small poems as well, in

the sonnets for which he had a particular fascination. Thus,

of the numerous sonnets Aurobindo wrote, one may take

"Shiva" to show how the choice of words etc. tend to evoke

grandeur. This is how the sonnet opens :

One the white summit of eternity

 199

A single soul of bare infinities,

Guarded he keeps a fire screen of peace

His mystic loneliness of nude ecstasy.

The image that is created in the above lines has both power

and pure environment. The poet's pictorial description and

presentation of Lord Shiva is achieved through the choice of

his words and phrases 'white summit of eternity', 'single

soul', 'bare infinities,' 'fire screen of peace: 'mystic

loneliness' and 'nude ecstasy'. These words evoke the image

of Lord Shiva as he 1s seen. Again, in the next lines, the

same choice of powerful words and elegant diction is

observed :

But touched by an immense delight to be,

He looks across unending depths and sees

Musing amidst the inconscient silences

The mighty Mother's dumb felicity.

Again words and phrases like 'immense delight' 'unending

depths' 'inconscient silences' and 'dumb felicity' have the

power to sweep the reader off his feet. The whole poem is

full of words which carry a sense of deep power and

impression. Thus in the remaining six lines of the poem

Half now awake he rises to his glance ;

Then, moved to circling by her heart beats will,

The rhythmic worlds describe that passion - dance

Life springs to her and Mind is born ; her face

 200

She lifts to Him who is herself, until

the spirit leaps into the spirit's embrace.

We find how the 'Divine awakening' is reached. Again words

and phrases as powerful as 'Half now awake', 'passion

dance' and the sentence 'Life springs to her and Mind is

born' carry the true Aurobindonean stamp which is to be

noted again and again. Notice the music and sweep, the

rhythm and unity in such lines from 'The Tiger and The Deer':

Brilliant crouching, slouching, what crept through

the green heart of the forest

Gleaning eyes and mighty chest and soft soundless

Paws of grandeur and murder ?

Where else can we find such grandeur and sweep? The very

words, 'brilliant', 'crouching', 'slouching', 'gleaning eyes',

mighty chest and soft soundless paws of grandeur and

murder reveal the grandeur of the tiger. The poet almost uses

the inevitable word to manifest his ideas, as K.R. Srinivas

Iyengar says : 'In his poetry everything hinges on the word'.

Notice the description of the forest and the tiger in the next

lines :

The wind slipped through the leaves as if afraid less

Its voice and the

Noise of its steps perturb the pitiless splendour

Hardly daring.
 201

The image of the wind slipping its leaves, its being afraid of

its own voice and the noise of its steps is truly remarkable for

its description. So is the phrase 'pitiless splendour'. The

moment of the final decision of the tiger to pounce on the

deer is again terrific and picturesque :

But the great beast crouched and crept, and

Crept and crouched a last time, noiseless, fatal,

All suddenly death leaped on the beautiful wild dear as

it drank

Unsuspecting from the great pool 1n the forest's

coolness and shadow,

And it fell, died remembering its mate left sole in the

deep woodland

Destroyed, the mild harmless beauty by strong cruel

beauty in Nature.

Everything of the whole situation is brought before our eyes

The expressions are most suggestive and to the point. The

most pathetic scene is brought out in the words; 'died

remembering its male left sole in the deep woodland'. The

repetition 1n the words 'crouched and crept, and crept and

crouched' 1s musical and suggests the restlessness of the

tiger.

The above cited lines from the two poems of Sri Aurobindo

are enough to show the mastery and forcefulness of the

language of Sri Aurobindo. In the preceding pages of this

 202

chapter we have already cited a number of sentences and

passages of various hues and colours which carry the stamp

of Sri Aurobindo. One can especially refer to the passage

describing the divine love of Urvasie and Pururavus. The poet

using a number of figurative expressions such as similes etc

as in 'like a mishandled lily', 'as a fallen moon', 'like a slim

tree', 'as two shipwrecked in a surge' evokes a picture of

holy love which remains in our mind for ever. The passage is

truly remarkable for its beautiful and grand evocation of love.

The words and phrases such as 'Divinely lifting', 'A warm rich

splendour exquisitely outlined I Against the dazzling

whiteness', 'a sea of mighty joy', 'wonderful hair loosened',

'glorious mouth of heaven's desire' come like hammer strokes

in true Longinian spirit. These and the one cited from Savitri

are just a few examples to show the enormous range and

variety of the lexis of Sri Aurobindo but these are sufficient to

show the grandeur of his thought as well as his diction.

P. Lal's observation on Sri Aurobindo's diction, 'The entire

game is reminiscent of Roget's Thesaurus, where redundant

familiars like 'soul', 'spiritual, 'subtle', 'deeps', and 'death

less' enjoy a private tea - party' (Modern Indo Anglian

Poetry, p. II) does not sound valid. Even a cursory glance at

the vocabulary of Savitri will show that the choice of words

here is one of the most comprehensive and varied and one of

the great achievements of Indian English Poetry. Aurobindo

created in Savitri a great epic diction which is commensurate

 203

with the lordliness of the theme. The lexis is not restricted to

'poetic' words alone. There is daring used of particular words

related with particular field. Sri Aurobindo went on changing

his strategy according to the changing subject matter and

used great variety of diction to reach great heights.

Notice how Sri Aurobindo uses concrete terminology

borrowed from the sciences:

The tree of evolution I have sketched,

Each branch and twig and leaf in its own place

In the embryo tracked the history of forms,

And the genealogy framed of all that lives.

I have detected plasm and cell and gene,

The protozoa traced, men's ancestors,

The humble original from whom he rose.

(Savitri, p. 158)

The passage shows Sri Aurobindo's great capacity to use

unusual words. Notice again, Sri Aurobinod's use of scholarly

words. In the following passage he uses technical terms to

describe the archangels that try to know the truth from within:

Imposing schemes of knowledge on the vast

They clamped to syllogisms of finite thought

The free logic of an infinite consciousness,

Grammared the hidden rhythms of Nature's dance,

Critiqued the plot of drama of the world,

Made figure and number a key to all that is.

 204

The psycho - analysis of cosmic self

Was traced, its secret hunted down and read.

The unknown pathology of the unique. (Savitri, p 245)

The reference to syllogism, logic, grammar and psycho -

analysis shows how different words can be used in live

contexts.

The impression of what P. Lal calls the vague 'luminosity' of

form is, therefore, not justified. There 1s a remarkable

evidence of imaginative as well as emotional precision in the

diction of Savitri which is not to be found anywhere else in

the entire corpus of Indian English Poetry. So far as the

poetic words are concerned, such as eternity, change, lean,

wrap, fated journeying, star, spaces, waking, limitless,

scattered, sealed, depths, luminous, fire, silence,

consecration, vibrant, fail, altar, hill, wind, pray, revealing

etc, we find a romantically significant use of adjectives as in

'fated journeyings', 'limitless eye' and 'revealing eye'. There

is the Keatsian use of double adjectives which are not

separated even by a comma : 'a great priestly wind'. 'wide -

winged' in 'wide-winged hymn' is a compound word coined by

Sri Aurobindo and most will agree that it qualifies 'wind' with

marvellous propriety. 'Altar hills' is a collocation modelled

after the manner of Keats and other Romantics who

themselves took it over from the Elizabethans. Sri Aurobindo

is very fond of such combinations of substantives and they

are to be found in profusion in Savitri.

 205

Finally, the literary allusiveness in the lexis of Sri Aurobindo.

Eliot has shown to us how quotations from other poets can be

fitted into new contexts in a manner which endows them with

the novelty that distinguishes original writing itself. Sri

Aurobindo does not quote. But he has oblique and indirect

references to famous phrases and lines of poetry which come

like hammer strokes, uplift the soul and show that this can

result in great poetry.

Now com1ng to the language of Sarojini Naidu, one notices

that there is a luxuriousness of imagery and an abundance of

figures. The colourfulness of her metaphors is evident in her

early poems which 'are a little too buoyant and optimistic'---

'over exuberant in spirit and wordy almost to the point of

tiresomness; they are more effervescent than full of

substance. It is perhaps this wealth of words and dearth of

matter that the answer in The Broken wing is not an answer

at all to the question that has been asked : 'Why does thou

bear a broken wing ?' The why is answered with an evasive

'nevertheless', and the lack of logic and relevance is covered

up by loud talk of a far - reaching throat, an unconquered

heart and a dauntless spirit that can scale the stars even on

a broken wing. The diction too is elaborately remote and

romantic : the air is a little too full of 'poetic' butterflies like

 206

'bough' and 'morn' and 'ape' and 'realms', it even holds such
46
a r a r e m o t h as ' m i n e a n c i e n t w o r I d '

The string of images follow in the later poems also. Pathetic

Fallacy and metaphors again abound. Thus, in a number of

poems we find these figures used skillfully. A beautiful

example of the figure of Pathetic fallacy is the poem "The

Song of Princess Zebun Nissa". Thus, Roses when they look

at the unmatchable beauty of the princess, turn pale with

envy and 'from their pierced hearts, rich with pain, send forth

their fragrance like a wail', her perfumed tresses outdo 'the

honeyed hyacinths'. Examples of metaphor are found in many

poems. Thus, in "The Snake Charmer", the snake is the

subtle bride of the charmer's mellifluous wooing ; in "Bangle

-Sellers" the bangles are the bright rainbow tinted circles of

light, in "Praise of Gulmohar Blossoms", the lovely hue of the

gulmohars is the glimmering red of bridal robe, and the rich

red of wild bird's wing ; in 'Golden Casia', the golden Cassias

are the fragments of some new fallen star or the golden

lamps for a fairy shrine, or the golden pitchers for fairy wine,

or the bright anklet bells from the wild spring's feet, or the

glimmering ghosts of a bygone dream in "A Rajput Love

Song", the day is a wild stallion, and the beloved wishes her

lover to be a basil - wreath to twine among her tresses, a

jewelled clasp of shining gold to bind around her sleeve, the

Keora's soul that haunts her silken raiment, a bright

46
Dustoor, opp. cit., p. 15.
 207

vermilion tassel in the girls that the she weaves, the scented

fan that lines upon her pillow, a sandal lute, or silver lamps

that burn before her.

We shall like to cite a few examples to show her vivid

imagery :

The wind lies asleep in the arms of the dawn

Like a child that has cried all night.

("Coromandal Fishers")

Like a joy on the heart of a sorrow

The sunset hangs on a cloud. ("Autumn Song")

A parrot- plumes outshine the dying day. ("Leili")

And exquisite, subtle and slow are the tinkle and

Tread of their rhythmical, slumber- soft feet.

("Indian Dancer")

Ere the quick night upon her flock descends

Like a black panther from the caves of sleep.

("The Indian Gypsy")

Time lifts the curtain unawares

And sorrow looks into her face. ("The Purdah Nashin")

Death is in truth the vital seed

Of your imperishable bloom.

("The Royal Tomb of Golconda")

 208

and lastly

A caste mark on the azure brows of Heaven,

The golden moon burns sacred, solemn bright.

("Lei I i")

J.H. Cumins remarks on the image of the moon as caste mark

on the brown of Heaven are worth quoting : It 'lifts India to

the literary heavens ; it releases Luna from the asylum-

keeper and gives her instead the office of the remembrance

that the Divine is imprinted on the open face of Nature'. 47

From this brief analysis of the language of Sarojini Naidu we

notice that the ideals which she seeks to portray is that of

aesthetic experience of beauty. In her the 'beautiful' is made

aesthetic through sensuous descriptions of movements and

physical forms. Seasonal changes in nature and bodily signs

of inner feeling are coloured richly to create a dense

atmosphere of passion. The endless intoxication at the touch

of beauty reveals a spontaneous understanding and

acceptance of the Indian point of view on the question of

man's relationship with nature. According to this view man

and nature are seen to enrich and complete each other.

There is a common stream of life, a rhythmic power, which

animates both nature and man. Sarojini Naidu portrays this

harmony between nature and man in her poetry. Hence the

.~ Quoted in A.F. Dustoor, opp. cit., p. 20.

7
 209

figures that she employs, the simile, the metaphors etc. are

all based on the principle of analogy.

Now, coming to the language of the modern poets, their use

of images and their choice of words, one feels that there lies

a particular fascination and obsession with the images of

human anatomy revealing extreme sensuality and sexuality.

We shall focus on this aspect of the language of the modern

poets to show whether there is something noble and elegant

in the choice of imagery and the use of words. In the hands

of modern poets, body becomes the overall apparatus and

touch the lens bringing the body into focus. This is repeated

in poets after poets where we shall find an excess of sexual

imagery. A few illustrations from different poets will support

our point. Here is what Nissim Ezekiel, one of the pioneers of

modern English poetry, has to offer:

A feeling for the mystery

of man and woman joined, exhaustion

At the act, desire for it again.("To a Certain Lady")

Notice the choice of words and the use of lines, 'breasts like

roses', 'breasts and buttocks as fruits', 'thighs as tree

trunks', 'unconfined threshing thighs', 'threshing thighs and

breasts', 'the threshing thighs and the singing breasts I

exhausted by the act, desiring it again', 'his thighs as though

they were not part of him', 'small breasts', 'big breasts'

'breasts and buttocks', 'your breasts are small, I tender I like

 210

your feelings', 'lips and thighs', 'she I let me touch her

breasts', 'her breasts and thighs are beautiful', 'orgasm' and

'frigidity', 'whore of love', 'great woman beast of sex', 'the

eyes are large I so are the breasts', 'your thighs are full and

round, I thin and flat I'd love them too' which find numerous

expressions in the poetry of N i ssi m Ezekiel. 48

Thus poems like "Situation", "Lines", "Marriage Poems",

"Tribute", "For Her", "Question", "Report", "A Short Stay",

"Two Nights of Love", "Old Abyss" are poems under the

category of poems of body. The poet is always found to be

watching 'your midriffs moist and your thighs unruly, I

Breasts beneath the fabric slyly popping' for instance, in 'At

the Party' 49 or he is eager to see 'the naked Cuban dancer'

shaking her breasts and dropping' 'the thin transparent skirt

s h e w o r e ' , f o r ex a m p I e , i n 'At t h e H o t e I' . 50

The common human urge for sexual pleasure is found to be

very dominant and the poet believes that in the modern world

man-woman relationship relies too much on the sexual

aspect. Therefore, the description of submission to the

indiscreet sexual urges in the 'body poems' of Ezekiel. The

poet believes 'That woman, trees, tables, waves and birds, I

Buildings, stones, steamrollers I cats and clocks I Are here to

be enjoyed'. The very thought of the poet to view woman as a

48
Nissim Ezekiel, opp. cit., Examples have been taken from different poems scattered in the
collection.
49
Ibid. opp. cit., p. 98.
50
Ibid. opp. cit., p. 112.
 211

sex object, as a thing to be enjoyed and put her

simultaneously with, buildings, stones, steamrollers, cats and

clocks etc is shorn of any compassion and noble emotions.

Notice again, how he views in 'A Woman Observed' all that

sensual movement bursting through the dress' or sees Radha

- Krishna myth from a different angle : Krishna's tricks I are

not for him I nor Ratha's wiles I for her I They have a

different truth I within a kingdom of their own'. 51 Notice, again

the lust and the hunger displayed in the lines:

Don't she says don't

convincing all the same

short of tearing her clothes

he's using all his force

soon he's had what he wanted

soft, warm and round . 52 (" H y m n s 1n Darkness")

Thus 'breasts, thighs, buttocks I swinging I now towards him I

53
now away from him' seem to obsess the poet's mind'.

Naturally V.K. Gokak, singled out Ezekiel's poetry for not

being rooted in Indian culture, and for lacking depth of

thought (Times of India, 15 August 1991 ).

The same is taken to a new height in Kamla Das. The

realistic image of the lustful relationship between man and

woman is presented in a choice of words that is shocking.

51
Ibid. opp. cit., p. 215.
52
Ibid. opp. cit., p. 221.
53
Ibid. opp. cit., p. 220.
 212

The images drawn from the human body are used most

frequently to show the unending, grand flamboyant lust. The

poet is conscious of the beauty and glory of the human

anatomy and is always attracted by it. Therefore the images

of standing 'nude before the glass', 'the perfection of limbs',

the 'eyes reddening under the shower', 'the shy walk across

the bathroom floor', 'dropping towels', 'the jerky way he

urinates', 'the scent of long hair', 'the musk of sweat between

the breasts', 'the warm shock of menstrual blood', 'the

endless female hunger's ("The Looking Glass") 54 , the

'burning mouth', the 'long braids flying', and the 'dark eyes

flashing', 'my body's response, its weather, its usual shallow

convulsions'.

Notice the use of images and the choice of words in the

following lines:

Gift him all,

Gift him what makes you woman, the scent of

long hair, the musk of sweet between the breasts,

The warm shock of menstrual blood and all your

Endless female hungers. ("The Looking Glass")

and

You are pleased

with my body's response, its

weather, its usual shallow

54
R. Parhasarathy. opp. cit., p. 27.
 213

Convulsions. You

dribbled spittle into my mouth, you poured yourself

into every nook and cranny. You embalmed my

poor lust with your bitter sweet juices

("The Old Play House")

This obsession with the images of human anatomy and

physical features is found in numerous poets. Notice, for

instance, in R. Parthasarathy, 'All night your hand has rested

I on her left breast ("Exile1"), in Jayant Mahapatra,' 'big

breasted hard eyed young whore' ("Lost Children of

America"), 'she opened her wormy legs wide ("Hunger", The

Rain of Rites, 1976) etc. There is a recurr1ng portrait of

women in Mahapatra and sexual love, the encounters

between men and women is described in a II their i mmen.se

varieties. 'The flesh' is always 'heavy on my back', says the

poet. 'Hunger' and 'The Whorehouse in Calcutta' are two of

his poems that describe this. Notice K. N. Daruwalla's choice

of images, also Shiv K. Kumar's and A.K. Mehrotra's. This is

what Daruwalla writes : 'in India I the left hand is out caste I

because it cleans the arse' (Under Orion, p. 53). This 1s Shiv

K. Kumar, 'Does Krishna, your servant I still clean his arse

with milk I before filling up the can I with rain water'

(Subterfuges, p. 17). Notice again, Shiv K. Kumar's choice of

words and images in "Kovalam Beach", the vaginal creaks I

lie open- thighed I in insatiable expectancy I while the sea's

thrusts I break into surf I then recede I consummation

 214

thwarted I each time they miss an ovary' (Cobwebs l..!:l the

Sun, p. 48) or the image of 'pissing' and 'baloon' again, in

Shiv K. Kumar :

Enroute to perdition

I stop at grand central to p1ss.

where else can one ease one's nerves

to feel Buddha's peace

when the bladder fills up

I ike a child's baloon (Subterfuges, p. 18)

or the image of 'linga' and 'masturbation' 1n

I'm everywhere because I feel everything

because I feel god's pulse

in the slut's womb

because my heart has the shape of a linga

because the Traveller's companions

bind me into a unity

better than the Ramayana

because when i masturbate

the universe throbs and continents clap.

("bharatmata : a prayer")

Notice also the contextual use of Buddha's name. The

Ramayana, the holiest of the scriptures, is not even spared.

Can such compositions be called poetry at all? Not 1n

content, nor in language do they bring any edifying effects on

the mind of readers which is the chief aim of poetry The

 215

1mages and the choice of words are of the most absurd,

grotesque, weird and vulgar type.

If one makes a careful analysis of the Images and choice of

words, one will find a whole range of sexual machinery

working in modern Indian English poetry, but those cited

above are enough to show and support our contention that it

lacks noble sallies of imagination, grand conceptions and

powerful emotions, all essential ingredients of the sublime.

We are not making any study of the language of the poets

writing in the late 80 s and 90s as it has already been stated

that in 'rare cases the poetry of these poets touches and

s co r c h e s ' . 55

55
Nila Shah and P.K. Nayar opp. cit., p. 14.