Part 1
The Wisdom of the East Series EDITED BY L. CRANMER-BYNG Dr. S. A. KAPADIA
ANTHOLOGY OF MODERN INDIAN POETRY
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
WISDOM OF THE EAST
ANTHOLOGY OF MODERN INDIAN POETRY
EDITED BY GWENDOLINE GOODWIN
[Illustration: colophon]
LONDON JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W
FIRST EDITION, 1927
_Printed in Great Britain by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury._
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE 9
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 19
AN INVOCATION 23
THE SECRETS OF THE SELF 27
WORSHIP 34
BEYOND THE VERGE OF TIME--STEPS 35
EGO--FIRE 36
THE ARTIST 37
IMAGERY 38
TRANSIENCE--O LONG BLACK HAIR--REVELATION 39
“SPRING THAT IN MY COURTYARD”--“THIS DAY WILL PASS” 40
URVASI 42
OPEN THOU THY DOOR OF MERCY 47
THE DANCER 48
ACKNOWLEDGMENT 49
REMEMBRANCE--THE VISIBLE 50
IN THE LIGHT 51
CALL AND BRING HER 52
BASANTA PANCHAMI 53
A WOMAN’S BEAUTY 54
AN EVENING ON THE LAGOON--AT THE TEMPLE 55
RAKSHA BANDHAN 56
LONGINGS--THOUGHTS 57
THE LOVERS 58
A BLUE DREAM 59
TULIP 60
RETURN TO KHAIRPUR--INDIA: ENTERTAINING TWILIGHT 61
ROSHANARA 66
IN PRAISE OF HENNA 68
IMPERIAL DELHI 69
DIRGE 70
SPRING--CRADLE-SONG 71
JUNE SUNSET 72
BUNKIM CHANDRA CHATTERJI 73
A ROSE OF WOMEN--THE ISLAND GRAVE 75
INVITATION 76
A CHILD’S IMAGINATION 77
EVENING--THE SEA AT NIGHT--LACHHI 78
AZMĒ 79
AWAKE, MY FRIEND 81
MARRIAGE SONG 82
MYSTIC LOVE SONG FROM “THIRTY INDIAN SONGS" 83
THE PUNJAB AUTUMN: THE SEASON OF THE COOLING DEW 84
RÂJHANS (THE PRINCE OF SWANS) 89
LATER LYRICS: POPLAR, BEECH, AND WEEPING WILLOW 90
ORPHIC MYSTERIES: THE YELLOW BUTTERFLY 93
MYVANWY 96
KISMET 99
TANSEN 100
“THE HIGH AMBITION OF THE DROP OF RAIN” 101
“HOW DIFFICULT IS THE THORNY WAY OF STRIFE” 102
“THY BEAUTY FLASHES LIKE A SWORD” 103
“I SHALL NOT TRY TO FLEE THE SWORD OF DEATH” 104
VOICE IN THE AIR 105
“ALL THIS IS RHYTHM” 112
“FRIEND, DWELL THOU WITHIN”--“THOU ART THE ROSE” 113
“SNOW-BLOSSOMS, SNOW-BLOSSOMS” 114
“THE ROSE OF ETERNITY” 116
“THE BLUE OF INDRA” 117
“THE SHADOW OF A FLYING BIRD” 118
LOVE’S SAMĀDHI--A CRADLE SONG 120
THE WAY OF POVERTY 121
THE LAST PRAYER--UNION WITH CHRIST 122
PEACE 123
PREFACE
Francis Bacon it was who said, “Prefaces are great wastes of time, and tho’ they seem to proceed of modesty, they are bravery.” It is necessary, however, in the present instance to make a stand against the somewhat sweeping convictions of the Elizabethan master. The call of Youth in India is a hot young call, trumpeting down the ages through a maze of polytheistic tribute, and emerging in the twentieth century with some of its original clearness of sound drowned by a Gargantuan thunder of Western drums. The Indian poet of to-day is torn, like the Indian painter, between admiration for Western models and a desire to mould himself thereon, and an inherent Indian tradition that runs in his veins and will not be denied. Indeed, it is pity to deny it. Sir Edmund Gosse persuaded Sarojini Naidu to tear up her poems about English life and to write of her own Indian bazaars and cities, villages and festivals, for which persuasion we are indeed indebted to Sir Edmund. We of the West do not want from the East poetic edifices built upon a foundation of Yeats and Shelley and Walt Whitman. We want genuine Taj Mahals and Juma Masjids, cameos of rural sweetness and the hopes of faithful hearts. We want to hear the flute of Krishna as Radha heard it, to fall under the spell of the blue god “in the lotus-heart of dreams.” For there is much to learn from the melody of Eastern thought. It is, perhaps, a minor melody born of the mating of Love and Death, but it has its seed in an innate spiritual rapture that no Western veneer can wholly cover.
In the bulk of Indian poetry religious feeling predominates, as is only natural in a country of many but steadfast faiths.
“To act, to think, to feel aright until He knows his will as one with Allah’s will.”
Subjugation of the Self leading to a merging of that Self with God. India writes largely from the “Inner Vision.” This disallows of foreign influence, but the poet is necessarily inspired as well by an everyday atmosphere which he enriches from the strength of his own perception. The steps of the bathing-ghâts in Calcutta may be of Sheffield cast-iron, but the country that could produce a Taj Mahal--“stone turned into a dream,” D. G. Mukerji calls it--will never lose the innate artistic vision of her soul. So the creative prayers of this mighty cosmopolitan multitude surge upwards in a song of glory till they reach the stars. Love of life is love of art because life is art and art is life. We chase after fleeting perfection, a rosy cloud, a glint of eternity in a lily-pool, a drop of dew trembling on a flower-petal, moments of heaven in worlds of chaos. To catch a mood of Nature and transfer it to paper; to wring from the heart of an instrument one swift emotional phase after another: is it futile? is it useless?
“Am I one of the trees in the night, Or are the trees human beings?”
asks Harindranath Chattopadhyaya in one of his poems not published here, echoing the cry of Li Po:
“Chuang Chou in a dream became a butterfly And the butterfly became Chuang Chou at waking: Which was the real, the butterfly or the man?”
In Indian poetry, the mystic element shines through the outer decorative aspect.
“Our dreams and longings cover deeper dreams And longings in the silence far away.”
We are roused from the beautiful lyrical lilt of Chattopadhyaya and of his sister, Sarojini Naidu, by the thunder of Muhammad Iqbal’s persuasive eloquence. He is a barrister-at-law at Lahore, an active Moslem opposed to Platonic illusion and non-progressive idealism.
“Plato, the prime ascetic and sage, Was one of that ancient flock of sheep. His Pegasus went astray in the darkness of philosophy And galloped over the mountains of Being. He was so fascinated by the Ideal That he made head, eye, and ear of no account.”
Whether one agrees with his outlook or not, the fact remains that one cannot fail to be stirred by the intensely fiery spirit of Iqbal’s rhetorical writing. He is a leader. He sweeps everything before him like a great wind swirling through a forest of pines. He would re-create Islam, an active, non-Imperialistic, non-sensual Islam. In his own words, he is “the voice of the poet of To-morrow.” As Mr. R. A. Nicholson (his translator) says, the book “Asrar-i-Khudi” (Secrets of the Self), from which I have taken the extracts, “presents certain obscurities which no translation can entirely remove.” That is, of course, to European readers or to those not conversant with Persian poetry. For the book was originally written in Persian.
“Although the language of Hind is sweet as sugar, Yet sweeter is the fashion of Persian speech.”
He is an inspiring philosopher.
“Thou art fire: fill the world with thy glow! Make others burn with thy burning!
* * * * *
Up, and re-inspire every living soul!”
I have spoken of the Youth of India, but the contributors to this volume range in age from the twenties to the seventies. There is little need for me to speak of Rabindranath Tagore. Mr. Edward Thompson (to whom I am indebted for the three translations) has acted in a Boswellian capacity, and the poet is as well known in England as are the great poets of our own nationality. I would draw attention, however, to the beautiful concluding lines of “Urvasi”:
“On the night of full moon, when the world brims with laughter, Memory, from somewhere far away, pipes a flute that brings unrest, The tears gush out! Yet in that weeping of the spirit Hope wakes and lives; Ah, Unfettered One!”
The flute-call of memory bringing restlessness and a strange peace on its liquid cadences. And a dimness of tears to stir the dust of Hope to life. “Ah, Unfettered One!” I have included some translations of Indian songs as sung by native singers, because I thought they might be of interest from an indigenous point of view. Dr. Ananda Coomaraswamy, of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Mass., is responsible for their English rendering. The one commencing “Quietly come, O Beauty, come,” has a mystical meaning. We drift then into the Punjab, the Land of Five Waters, and find Puran Singh, the Sikh poet, breathing the musk of God-love through nostrils ever open to receive a spiritual fragrance.
“The dew is falling everywhere, And wet is every rose. The gentle breath of heaven blows.”
It blows the perfume of the Beauty that is Worship into the heart of this devout enthusiast. His mind is a casket that holds the most precious gems of the Sikh religion and ideals, and gives them forth to an unenlightened world. Nanak, Gobind, Teg Bahadur, the names of the Ten Masters (whose lives he has written) sound in his ears day and night.
The loneliness of exile rings through the quivering poems of Manmohan Ghose.
“Lost is that country, and all but forgotten ’Mid these chill breezes ...”
All true poets love trees; Manmohan Ghose is no exception:
“Willow sweet, willow sad, willow by the river, Taught by pensive love to droop, where ceaseless waters shiver.”
Mrs. Pankajini Basu is represented by one poem, “Basanta Panchami,” a description of the famous Spring Festival. One line, in particular, stands out: “Ever sorrowful, ever ill-starred, are we women of Bengal, all of us,” and, one might add, ever devout, ever faithful. The eternal question of Indian womanhood cannot be dismissed with a shrug of the shoulders. Mrs. Naidu’s lines:
“What further need hath she of loveliness Whom Death hath parted from her lord’s caress?”
seem to strike at the heart of the matter. Time alone will solve a problem which at the moment is very vexed indeed. It would seem almost that in their poems these Indian women express all the fullness of their hearts in love-songs, hymns of conjugal devotion, lamentations, praise of physical beauty, and tributes of faith. Emotional outlets of warm, loyal natures, yet always with the underlying sadness that is the birthright of Hind, like an anthem at evening or the eyes of a convent sister. Melancholy glides like pearly vapour through “The Island Grave” of Sri Aurobindo Ghose:
“And I will meet thee in that lonely place, Then the grey dawn shall end my hateful days And death admit me to the silent ways.”
Death, to the Oriental, is a small and yet a great matter. He welcomes rather than fears it. The body, being but the shell of the soul, is of little account, save, perhaps, for its procreative value as a creator of further beings in the image of God. Death, then, is a joyful thing, and there is but a thin line between the wedding-song and the funeral dirge.
The blue bird of truth is flying against a sky of such intense blueness as to be almost indistinguishable--Ananda Acharya’s “blue of Indra.” This poet sends his “snow-blossoms” of Indian thought forth from the cool earth of Norway. He lives there amid his “Arctic Swallows,” and in his later work has grafted Asian feeling, in a curious way, upon a shoot of Scandinavian origin. There is, of course, a strange affinity between the Nordic peoples and the Asian. The strain flowed through Northern Russia, south to Persia, and thence into India, the type gradually changing from blue-eyed, fair-skinned folk to olive skins and “flaming eyes, like thunder skies. So deep and dark....”
Jehangir Jivaji Vakil’s three little poems have not hitherto been published. The one commencing “O long black hair of love” has an almost Japanese brevity, and compresses into four lines quite a wealth of ardent feeling.
India is rich in legendary history and does not lack for romantic and dramatic episodes in her actual chronicles. I have, nevertheless, found little of the narrative style of poetry among the modern poets. Historical and legendary references are occasionally met with, but they are usually incidental, and little use has been made of a richly-equipped storehouse. Adi K. Sett has utilised this method in “Roshanara,” Inayat Khan in “Tansen,” and Tagore (in a measure) in “Urvasi.” Apparently the lyrical style or the sonnet-form has the greatest appeal.
Narayan Vaman Tilak was a Christian mystic. His poems breathe all the fervour of the convert.
“Saith Dasa, Christ, upon Thy pallet-bed Grant me a little space to lay my head.”
I have included Zahir, Ghalib, and Amir, because, though not modern in a strict sense, as is, say, Fredoon Kabraji, they have been translated by living people, namely, Mrs. J. D. Westbrook and Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan.
Whether this is the dawn-time of a new era of Indian poetic thought, who shall say? These Eastern singers, Bengali, Punjabi, Hindu, Mohammedan, Sikh, Christian, have upon their shoulders a yoke of heavy responsibility. They have to support and become worthy of the mighty tradition that lies behind them. Song should be theirs naturally, but it is one thing to preserve the metre in their own particular tongues and another to wrestle with the technicalities of English. There are many more modern poets in India from whom I might have chosen, but the scope of the book forbids the inclusion of more material.
The Indian twilight descends, gentle and swift, “wizard clocks ring out and rend the calm.” The dark rich blue of night, peridot-studded, swings a baby-moon high above inky palm and gleaming tomb. The poet sits in contemplation. “The lotus dreams upon the lyric melodies of day....”
RIGHT GWENDOLINE GOODWIN.
HANG SHEFFIELD, _December 8th, 1926_.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I beg to acknowledge indebtedness to the following for permissions accorded to reproduce poems:
1. _Oxford University Press_ (Heritage of India Series). (Poems by Indian Women.)
Professor Farquhar, of Manchester University. Mrs. Margaret Macnicol, Miss D. Whitehouse.
2. _Messrs. William Heinemann, Ltd._
Mrs. Sarojini Naidu. “The Golden Threshold.” “The Broken Wing.” “The Bird of Time.”
3. _Blackwell_ (_Oxford_)
Poems of Manmohan Ghose. Mr. Laurence Binyon.
4. “_Poetry Review_” (_Mr. Galloway Kyle_)
Poems by Mrs. Elsa Kazi.
5. _Longmans, Green & Co._
Nanikram Vasanmal Thadani. “Krishna’s Flute”
6. Adi K. Sett.
“Roshanara.”
7. _Srinavasa Varadachari & Co._
Sonnets. Prof. P. Seshadri, of Benares Hindu University.
8. _Indian Press, Ltd._ (_Allahabad_)
Prof. P. Seshadri. “Vanished Hours.” “Champak Leaves.”
9. _The Sufi Movement_ (_Southampton_)
Inayat Khan and Mrs. Jessie Duncan Westbrook. “Diwan.” Hindustani Lyrics.
10. _J. M. Dent & Sons, Ltd._
Puran Singh and Bhai Vir Singh. “Sisters of the Spinning-Wheel.” “Nargas.”
11. Jehangir Jivaji Vakil.
(Three poems hitherto unpublished.)
12. _Messrs. Ernest Benn, Ltd._
(Augustan Books of Modern Poetry.) Poems of Rabindranath Tagore. Mr. Edward Thompson. Mr. C. F. Andrews.
13. _Messrs. Macmillan & Co., Ltd._
“The Secrets of the Self.” Muhammad Iqbal (Lahore). Mr. R. A. Nicholson. Sri Ananda Acharya. “Book of the Cave” (_see Notes_).
14. _The Brahmakul Gaurisankar_ (_Alvdal, Norway_)
Sri Ananda Acharya. “Saki.” “Usarika.”
15. _Theosophical Publishing House_ (_Adyar, Madras_)
Harindranath Chattopadhyaya. “Feast of Youth.”
_Shama’a, Madras_
“Out of the Deep Dark Mould.” “Magic Tree.”
16. Fredoon Kabraji.
17. _Messrs. Luzac & Co._
Thirty Indian Songs. Ananda Coomaraswamy.
18. _Association Press_ (_Calcutta_)
Poems of Narayan Vaman Tilak. Mr. D. N. Tilak (Copyright of Marathi originals). Rev. J. C. Winslow.
19. Sri Aurobindo Ghose (Pondicherry).
EDITORIAL NOTE
The object of the Editors of this series is a very definite one. They desire above all things that, in their humble way, these books shall be the ambassadors of good-will and understanding between East and West--the old world of Thought and the new of Action. In this endeavour, and in their own sphere, they are but followers of the highest example in the land. They are confident that a deeper knowledge of the great ideals and lofty philosophy of Oriental thought may help to a revival of that true spirit of Charity which neither despises nor fears the nations of another creed and colour.
L. CRANMER-BYNG.
S. A. KAPADIA.
NORTHBROOK SOCIETY, IMPERIAL INSTITUTE, S.W.7.
ANTHOLOGY OF MODERN INDIAN POETRY
AN INVOCATION
O, Thou art as the soul in the body of the universe, Thou art our soul and Thou art ever fleeing from us. Thou breathest music into Life’s lute; Life envies Death when death is for thy sake. Once more bring comfort to our sad hearts! Once more dwell in our breasts! Once more let us hear Thy call to honour! Strengthen our weak love.
We are oft complaining of destiny, Thou art of great price and we have naught. Hide not Thy fair face from the empty-handed! Sell cheap the love of Salman and Bilál! Give us the sleepless eye and the passionate heart! Give us again the nature of quicksilver! Show unto us one of Thy manifest signs, That the necks of our enemies may be bowed! Make this chaff a mountain crested with fire, Burn with our fire all that is not God! When the people let the clue of Unity go from their hands, They fell into a hundred mazes. We are dispersed like stars in the world; Though of the same family, we are strange to one another. Bind again these scattered leaves, Revive the law of love! Take us back to serve Thee as of old, Commit Thy cause to them that love thee! We are travellers: give us devotion as our goal! Give us the strong faith of Abraham! Make us know the meaning of “There is no god”! Make us acquainted with the mystery of “except Allah”! I, who burn like a candle for the sake of others, Teach myself to weep like the candle. O God! a tear that is heart-enkindling, Passionful, wrung forth by pain, peace-consuming, May I sow in the garden, and may it grow into a fire That washes away the firebrand from the tulip’s robe! My heart is with yestereve, my eye is on to-morrow: Amidst the company I am alone. “Everyone fancies he is my friend, But my secret thoughts have not escaped from my heart.” O, where in the wide world is my comrade? I am the Bush of Sinai: where is my Moses? I am tyrannous, I have done many a wrong to myself, I have nourished a flame in my bosom, A flame that seized the furniture of judgment, And cast fire on the skirt of discretion, And lessened with madness the reason, And burned up the existence of knowledge: Its blaze enthrones the sun in the sky, And lightnings encircle it with adoration for ever. Mine eye fell to weeping, like dew, Since I was entrusted with that hidden fire. I taught the candle to burn openly, While I myself burned unseen by the world’s eye. At last flames breathed from every hair of me, Fire dropped from the veins of my thought: My nightingale picked up the spark-grains And created a fire-tempered song. Is the breast of this age without a heart? Majnún trembles lest Lailá’s howdah be empty. It is not easy for the candle to throb alone: Ah! is there no moth worthy of me? How long shall I wait for one to share my grief? How long must I search for a confidant? O Thou whose face lends light to the moon and the stars, Withdraw Thy fire from my soul! Take back what Thou hast put in my breast, Remove the stabbing radiance from my mirror, Or give me one old comrade To be the mirror of mine all-burning love! In the sea wave tosses side by side with wave: Each hath a partner in its emotion. In heaven star consorts with star, And the bright moon lays her head on the knees of Night. Morning touches Night’s dark side, And To-day throws itself against To-morrow. One river loses its being in another, A waft of air dies in perfume. There is dancing in every nook of the wine-house, Madman dances with madman. Howbeit in Thine essence Thou art single, Thou hast decked out for Thyself a whole world. I am as the tulip of the field, In the midst of a company I am alone. I beg of Thy grace a sympathising friend, An adept in the mysteries of my nature, A friend endowed with madness and wisdom, One that knoweth not the phantom of vain things, That I may confide my lament to his soul And see again my face in his heart. His image I will mould of mine own clay, I will be to him both idol and worshipper.
_Muhammad Iqbal._
THE SECRETS OF THE SELF
PROLOGUE