These days, most of the modern poets, function within the sphere of life of middle-class family’s lives and hence their frontiers of their spaces are limited and their travels restrained. Owing to this, there is no exuberance in the expression. No modernity. Hence, the reader feels unbearable sultriness.
But, Maharasan goes to a far extent yonder beyond all this. It puts forth the land, the fertility of the land, the prosperous life that results from the fertility of land. Or it registers the drought-stricken land and the ignominy that it causes. It depicts the peasant who strides majestically / dejected who is surrounded by herbs, creepers, trees, greeny crops, vermins, insects, water channels, rivers, seas, arid deserts, hillocks and mountains.
A brat moves forth all over the village at midnight making predictions and the next day, he arrives to collect his wages for those predictions. It is too common to collect either foodgrains or money as wages. The poet hints at that wages as “wages for predictions”. The poet claims that the brat gets what is his due. What has he given for getting what is his due. Here, it’s re-termed that what the peasant gives in return for being told the predictions are “wages for predictions” (kurikkooli in Tamil).
Since, most folks have given his dues as foodgrains, the brat’s bag is too light, the peasant-woman eyes his bag and measures out foodgrains in excess. This makes the brat’s heart thaw. The peasant woman maintains,
Who measures their words with care,
measures him with paddy grains.
Such is the life of a peasant. (verse 27)
The differences between them vanish, and a wonderful moment blossom there. This verse is the magnum opus in this collection.
Maharasan builds up his verse as an extension of oral tradition. The words that are not found in the dictionaries, come out of the tongues of cultivator and his pen jots them down directly.
“The peasant-woman sat erect sevakki”. The Tamil word “sevakki” means to sit erect. The words that have stayed with the village rustic from ancient times, just as the paddy grains. Which is why the poet writes,
The life blooming
with weight of wings
and scent of blossoms
remain sweet forever. (verse 55)
This is no ordinary expression. His phrase “seeds of words” is a noteworthy one. Yet, in another instance he writes,
..this mother with water-laden breasts
gave birth to paddy grains and words.
With water-laden breasts, like a mother she cares,
yet, she ignites flames beyond compare. (verse 26)
While he compares nature with a mother, he hesitates what to compare a natural disaster with, he brings in the element of fire, an another manifestation of nature. In this way, he stokes the secrets / memoirs of the ancient past. That he state that elderly love and one-sided love are worthy enough to be spoken of. The Tamil literary heritage ignores these as improper sex. But, today these things cannot be ignored. The new variant confinement is that formats of sex need to be spoken of.
He refers to this via Thirukural from the ancient past, putting forth women at the front.
Seen, heard, tasted and sniffed,
the deeply felt,
gushing container of lust
awaits a blaze
within the kitchen space. (verse 29)
Even as the political outlook and opposing spirit merge into one, Maharasan has a commitment to expose the ploys of cunning, slyness by causing awakening. The poet who is loyal to aesthetics, bears a witness to the brutality and cruelty that happen. Then it would be deemed that he has accomplished his contribution than ever before.
Aware of his fate of getting killed,
he sits on the altar of racism,
innocently gazing,
Balachandran’s eyes wander unknowingly. (Verse 7)
The line drawings of Pithan are moving towards creating a parallel text. Or they compliment the poems. The nature in all aspects assembles a woman, that too a mother. These drawings have bloomed a woman amidst plants, creepers, flowers and buds. The painter describes that blossoming that spreads great affection becoming a mother.
As a poet, Padma Amarnaath recreates the poems in English. The challenge of translation has been accomplished giving space to English. Without changing the text into prose, she functions in the domain of poetry. The lines,
If only by destroying fields
and killing the plants,
should the lamps continue to burn,
in that soil the farmers strew,
cursing with hunger
burning in their stomach,
let everything burn, perish and turn to ashes. (verse 35)
bring out the fierceness of curse and frustration in translation.
To sum up, the poet, the painters and the translator have clubbed together and have woven an energetic work of art. The reader who receives this as a gift has gained an opportunity.
Writer & translator,
Sahitya Akademi Awardee.
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WORDS SPROUTED IN THE LAND,
Author: MAHARASAN,
Translated from Tamil by:
PADMA AMARNAATH,
First Edition, January 2025,
Pages 120,
Rs. 100/-
Published by:
YAAPPU VELIYEEDU,
Chennai - 600076,
Cell: 9080514506.
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