Bhuvaneshwari Shankar's Blog

 

 What form does bhakti take? In deep veneration it evokes intense spirituality. Can one express romantic love towards the divine? Great saints have done this time and again by adopting the 'Nayika Bhava' Andal's expression of her love for the lord through her mock anger and jealousy in these two pasurams, is a lyrical treat. 
கருப்பூரம் நாறுமோ கமலப்பூ நாறுமோ , திருப்பவள்ளச் செவ்வாய்தான் தித்தித் திருக்குமோ மருப்பொசித்த மாதவன்தன் வாய்ச்சுவையும் நாற்றமும்விருப்புற்றுக் கேட்கின்றேன் சொல்லாழி வெண்சங்கே. உண்பது சொல்லில் உலகளந்தான் வாயமுதம் கண்படை கொள்ளல் கடல் வண்ணன் கைத்தலத்தே பெண்படையார் உன்மேல் பெரும்பூசல் சாற்றுகின்றார் பண்பல செய்கின்றாய் பாஞ்ச சன்னியமே ! Do they smell of camphor? Or as the lotus flower?Do the divine lips deep red as coral taste incredibly sweet? Eager am I to learn of the taste and fragrant mouthOf the one who broke the elephant Kuvalayapeeda’s tuskWon’t you enlighten me, oh you sheer white conch from the deep blue sea? You feast on the nectar of the mouth (Who measured the three world with his foot)
And slumber in the palm of the sea hued lordHordes of women are hurling curses against you Many indeed are your injustices, you insensitive Panchajanya.
Here is a link to a rendition of this song:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWZfQ...

 

NaPoWriMo 30 GloPoWriMo 30
A HATE POEM (Written About oneself)  Hey there! Walking with your head in the airLooking down on us mere mortals with disdain Do you really think you have the best brain?  You swaggering, pompous know allI’m forever plotting your downfall. You nod at our jokes sagely Then posit a theory airily You were cottons and talk of abstinenceShaming our silk ‘n’ gold with a cold countenance. You jump up and take the mike Whenever opportunity strikes Then you sing, speak, put on an act Don’t you have any tact?Fooling others with your humble act -But you don’t fool me  I see through your ruses ‘n’ your subterfuges You large weasel strutting about like a gazelle Do you delude yourself that you’re fit for da Vinci’s easel?Why do you dress up even to throw out the garbage Like a film star at an inauguration, you cabbage? You top heavy, arrogant, megalomaniacI’m waiting to down you with a killer wisecrack.

NaPoWriMo 29 GloPoWriMo 29
Things that I miss through one or more objective correlative. This poem is about ageing, the absence of youth and the bewilderment associated with this loss.   The hands of the clock move A distinctive heart beat A never ending rhythm that thrums Ploughing through the years A mirror that watches-A child’s first discovery of herself Her self conscious little antics Later her dance, her speech practice Her changing wardrobe Her fears, joys, triumphs Her marriage, childbirth, travails Silver hair framing an anguish ridden face.  The spectacles that first came to rest on her nose Now a constant companion (except when asleep of course)The are missed often although they rest upon her crow. The little girl cannot recall how she Got here- an old, withered shadow Of her charming, lively, childhood self.

NaPoWriMo28 GloPoWriMo28   AndAdi –(Hindi -Anth + Adi) where a form / variation/ root of the ending word of the first line becomes the first word of the next line. This form has been long in use in Tamizh literature since the Sangam period. AndAdi can be written composed either as couplets quatrains or longer pieces.  


 
Her heart grows restless Rest is a word from the past
Passing from childhood has made her truant Truancy a badge youth prides Pridefully she wore her beauty and youthYouthful longings and pleasures she sought Seekers easily find recalcitrant love
Love that thrives on the blood of innocence Innocence, the sacrificial lamb of maturityMature though she grew yet she pines for the ravagerRavaging lips that plundered her body endlessly Endless tugs at her earlobes, restless the serpent exploredExploring, his voice grew hoarse, “I love you!” he saidSayings have a way of winning tremulous hearts over Overhead an angel shed tears as he envisioned her painPainful was the moment when he left without a wordWordlessly she watched his indifferent retreat Retreating into a shell the girl is now a shadow of herself
Self-destruction who do the youth seek it out eagerly?Eager as moths that rush towards flames hastening their deaths?

<!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"Cambria Math"; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman",serif; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} .MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.WordSection1 {page:WordSection1;}</style> <br /><style><!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"Cambria Math"; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman",serif; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} .MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.WordSection1 {page:WordSection1;}</style></div>

NaPoWriMo 27 GloPoWriMo27
Excitement, trepidation, anticipation,Anxiety sometimes impatience -The emotions of travel Often tired, exhausted and hungryWe trudge unknown territory Feeding on strange sights and sounds That abound.Desires unquenched, we always quest more.Some sights and sounds fade with time Some are starkly etched in our minds Through aging eyes they emerge afresh each time.I carry an image -The statue of a boy in a Vienna train station A young boy of about 10 sitting on a suitcase With the saddest eyes – his shoulders droop as if a great weight rests upon them His story is both tragic and noble -He is one among ten thousand children who fled from all that they ever knew Parents, homes and homeland, pushed away tearfully by parents Who feared for their lives before World War IIBefore the shameful, ludicrous, merciless, massacre beganTen thousand little Jewish children fleeing from Austria, Czechoslovakia, PolandWho boarded trains to safety in foster homes, hostels, schools, farms In England, most of them the only survivors in their families. An image that juxtaposes extreme cruelty and mercy Innocence and misery; untold anxiety and liberation 4/27/20An image that entwines loss and hope-The tears fell unbidden but some of them were happy ones. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kindert...

NaPoWriMo26 GloPoWriMo26

An Ekphraistic poem on the accompanying photograph  "Places you can find loveIts sits around lurking in places"When disillusionment strikes-When mankind shears itself of its rosy huesStands stark naked in ashen uglinessWhen romance is an echo in a fading oasisWhen filial love is usurped by greedWhen all aspirations and desires Are images in a splintering mirror Or dissipating shadows flashed from a faulty hologram-In that moment of stark revelation An image, a tableau, long forgotten,Buried under a debris of disappointments Shakes itself free and flashes in the inward eye-A view from a mountain ridge With evergreen trees and lush pasturesWith a meandering pearl necklace of a river That adorns the ravines and holds no sign of ravaging mankind-I savour the sight. I run to the hills, Return, retrace, retreat,Retract my hold on a savage, illusory world Drinking in the stillness I relearn peace I loll in the warmth of the cold air My eyes feast on the surfeit of green, unsatiated.I finally understand what love truly is – It is the experience of oneness with eternityLife is one long momentDeath too is a continuity. Note: The opening quote is from John Keats

NaPoWriMo25 GloPoWriMo25
The window that brings the morning sunlight trooping inShe opens first thing upon waking Though the sealed window won’t help her smell The freshness of the waking dawn She draws the curtains more to see the light and taste the warmth. At night darkness looms gloomily after the moonlight’s Perfunctory greeting and parting;Her mind unleashes irrational fears She closes the curtains cringing from the monsters she sees there. The television is her window all through the day She has made the world her family and loses herself in its affairsThe iPad is her occasional window into the lives of children farawayCrippled, she rarely leaves her room In the old age home. I carry guilt-soaked images of mother -Framed and trapped inside a windowHer nose pressed to the glass Waving goodbyeAs loneliness engulfs and drowns herStaring vacantly at the taxi that tears away a part of her each time.

  NaPoWriMo24    GloPoWriMo24


It was quite a tall task to write a poem using pun, malapropisms and spoonerisms.   Comance (Romance) in Rorona (Corona) mites(Times)The poached cotato that hibernates in the sofa risesExamines its surroundings in profusion (confusion)Proceeds to the kitchen eager for a solutionThat morning delusion - the pancake(panacea) for all ills-Ambles in without a preamble.Non greeting, non hugging, grunting, tappingThe shemale inversed (immersed) in music andDemands accusingly “Where’s my coffee?”“It will come!” she thunders from a music infused earThough she often thunders from empty headphones.They are magnates (magnets) in north pole.He lingers. Looking askance at his countenance she misreads the presence.She does a break dance-Jiggles, wiggles, tickles his knuckles - he stumbles, fumbles.Grabs her waist - mid stance.She regards the eye of her guyEagerly. The beaver plonks her down - the killer joy.(Kill joy) “Break fast!” He mouths pronouncedly.“Compost ...err... bread toast!” she shouts.There escapes a snort from a seething snout. The hulk ambles off in a huff.There goes my russet potato manacle clad ( A spinoff of Shakespeare’s famous line Look the morn in russet mantle clad) she muses, sighs and retreats.Dead meat trapped in lives dead beat.<!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"Cambria Math"; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman",serif; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} .MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.WordSection1 {page:WordSection1;}</style><style><!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"Cambria Math"; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman",serif; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} .MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.WordSection1 {page:WordSection1;}</style></div>

NaPoWriMo 23 GloPoWrimo 23
Today my muse is the mad Girl Sylvia Plath.Lines from Sylvia Plath’s poem 'Mirror':‘’I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.Whatever I see I swallow immediatelyJust as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.I am not cruel, only truthful ‚The eye of a little god, four-cornered.’’We all see ourselves in the mirror every day, and some days, we might swoon over our reflection there, while some days, we might find we are incomplete and fragmented, torn and twisted.Which reflection would you love to own as yours?Write an unappeasable, unapologetically true poem about your reflection in the mirror. 

Oh mirror, mirror on the wall I never wish to be the fairest of them allI vowed never to let jealousy be my fall. Nor am I lost in my looks like Narcissus wasAs he did, staring at his reflection without a pauseI may not spend my time thus without a cause. Oh mirror, mirror on the wallHow I wish you were a mere shutterbugFreezing me in frames that I digWhy did you have to be a callous painter? Who reveals the fault lines in my demeanor?  To be Woman has its own set of woesDespite the push back against body shaming The bravado falls to the floor  The soul naked stands examining itself harshly One is either too tall, too short, too thin, too fat One’s frame is too full or too fallow Blemishes, wrinkles multiply manifold Causing misery untoldThe skin too pale or too sun tanned Or it sags and looks too wan The nerves show of are covered in unsightly fat. A harsh world judges Passes its judgement through looks and wordsAnd the fight is constantly on to school our girls and ourselves Yet there is a relentless visual attack Of models, sports icons and superstars Flashy magazines, fashion shows showcasing divas-Emaciated, impossibly tall, thin figures in size zero. And what of the dolls our girls buy in stores?How does one fight this all with mere words and ideas?The world has been consistently careering downhillWhere lies the wisdom in our daughters to instill?

TSL NaPoWriMo 22 GloPoWriMo22
Art cannot be divided into sections and often one flows into the other. Painters may use a great work of literature as their theme while poets can be inspired by paintings and sculptures. This is a painting by Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi (c. 1386 – 13 December 1466), better known as Donatello, an Italian sculptor of the Renaissance period.The sculpture is called the 'The Penitent Magdalene' which is a wooden sculpture of Mary Magdalene created around 1453–1455. It is located in Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Florence.    
The love for the master is like no other It begins ritualistically Simple practices, short meditationsAnd longer commerce with life No upheavals in the sea of commonality  Till the ripples begin The form in the heart’s cave Grows in stature It dominates The talons of the world fall one by one She is gripped by the force of the OneIn meditation sustained deep She sees his form constantly She talks to him constantly But Knowing is not seeing Knowing is not parleying Knowing is commingling It is the Becoming She becomes as one with the One  She goes about her life in bliss Only the world will see The transformation to her mortal frame Embraced by grace She has a new visage Of a woman withThe hair The look The stance The muscular arms Of the Saviour.