Reading is an act of silent communion between the reader and the author. In this fiduciary relationship, the writer is enjoined with the onus of navigating the reader through the innumerable labyrinths of thoughts opening to the light of words. This is how I discover and cherish my oldest poet companions as DH Lawrence, Vladimir Nabokov, Ezra Pound, Zbigniew Herbert, Derek Walcott, Tagore, Jayanta Mahapatra and Kamala Das.
This summer, I choose to meditate in the quiet corner of a book house where the exclusive poetry section is unarguably unparalleled. Of the many volumes of contemporary English poetry in the alcove of poetry section, my glance falls on a red-hued volume meditating in the warm tone of earth. A silent indomitable will of the universe draws in.
Gently gleaning the volume Nairatmya - She Who Has Risen Beyond Self with cover art that resembles a horoscopic depiction, I discover Anand Thakore’s Seven Deaths & Four Scrolls. Chronological order is only a forced necessity. For an intuitive astrologer or lawyer, any random page from the multitude of facts is insightful. Any day is a good day to learn or alternatively, to die. Therefore, unsystematically systematic, discarding chronological order to sense the pulse of words in poetry and law, I open Pandit Anand Thakore’s Scroll Four to read:
‘Because being human is more than I have deserved,
And to exist is to want something, even in this dimension,
I request to be reborn amongst the higher mammals’
The complex layers unfold an acute metaphysical awareness of the present, intuitive remembrance of the past, the strength to seek a desire and the wisdom to surrender the myth of choice.
Music and poetry at their pinnacle have the intangible power to disassociate “Atman” from the perishable.
“Iam here to surrender the myth of choice
Let the fleshless voice that Iam wish on it while I can –
No not for the wings of mountain eagles, nor, though both have been considered
For the serpent’s infinite flexibility;”
On a spiritual stratum, the voice of the poet, an accomplished Hindustani classical vocalist, discards human identity to ‘become fleshless voice’. This higher state is strangely and delightfully reconciled in the recognition that human existence is reduced to the helplessness that can only ‘wish’. Here nevertheless, the words ‘ though’ and ‘considered’ unmistakably convey the power of intellect and analysis of choice that distinguishes human life from that of other mammals.
The sacred knowledge that ‘desire is survival’ enables the soul to sleepwalk seamlessly through layers of existence. And that knowledge makes one ‘pray’.
To pray ‘to make one less than human, but warm-blooded’ as soul exits the body, ‘with a prayer to the earth to receive oneself,’ is the true incantation of committing the body to the ground, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, in sure and certain hope of eternal life as ‘one loses sight of oneself.’
When one sets out on that final journey in a calm state of knowing, unperturbed, undeterred, one may muse upon what lies ahead thus:
“That some strange range of possible, assorted births
Might lie before one, simultaneously, for one’s own choosing”
While canonical law and criminal law have imposed deterrence on suicide from the earliest days of an organized society, in the Chapter on ‘ Hermit in the Forest’ Manu’s Code says: “Or let him walk, fully determined and going straight on, in a north-easterly direction, subsisting on water and air, until his body sinks to rest."
Charting the course of discussions on decriminalisation of suicide in India, interestingly, it would be relevant to recall the judgment in Maruti Shripati Dubal Vs State of Maharashtra, wherein Hon’ble Bombay High Court while holding Section 309 of Indian Penal Code ( the section which makes attempt to suicide a punishable offence) ultra vires of Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution of India relied upon eminent French sociologist, Emile Durkheim’s threefold classification of suicides made on the basis of the disturbance in the relationship between society and the individual: “(i) Egoistic suicide which results when abnormal individualism weakens society’s control over him; the individual in such cases lacks concern for the community with which he is inadequately involved; (ii) Altruistic suicide which is due to an excessive sense of duty to community; and (iii) Anomic suicide which is due to society’s failure to control and regulate the behaviour of individuals.”
The Law Commission of India in its 210th Report in 2008 on ‘Humanisation and Decriminalisation of Attempt to Suicide’ draws reference to P Rathinam Vs Union of India wherein the Hon’ble Supreme Court while examining the constitutional validity of Section 309 of the Indian Penal Code went on to hold that the Right to Live of which Article 21 of Constitution of India speaks of can be said to bring in its trail the right not to live a forced life, and therefore, section 309 of Indian Penal Code violates Article 21 of Constitution of India. This judgment was subsequently overruled by a Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court in Gian Kaur v. State of Punjab, holding that Article 21 of the Constitution of India cannot be construed to include within it the ‘right to die’ as a part of the fundamental right guaranteed therein, and therefore, it cannot be said that section 309 of Indian Penal Code is violative of Article 21 of Constitution of India.
Recommending decriminalisation of attempt to suicide, the Law Commission has succinctly stated that attempt to suicide is more a manifestation of a diseased condition of mind deserving of treatment and care rather than punishment and therefore it would not be just and fair to inflict the additional legal punishment on a person who has already suffered agony and ignominy in his failure to commit suicide.
This is where Anand Thakore’s poem Scroll Four (which is part of the collection Seven Deaths & Four Scrolls brought out by Poetrywala) moves away from the reasoning put forth in legal discussions to explore an elevated stratum. The poem meanders in a meditative state before transcending to an unearthly journey. There is no suffering, no pain. There is a surprise, desire, prayer and unconditional surrender.
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The poem is preceded by a news article that appeared on 7th Jan 2013 on a 24-year-old Buddhist monk who committed suicide. He did not leave any suicide note but had written in his diary that he wanted peace of mind. He was to catch a train to Bodh Gaya the next day.
In the poem Scroll Four, one discovers the alignment of planets in the preternatural reflection of Nairatmya that binds and loosens language in the measured tone of the music which at once liberates and draws in the controlled reflections of voice. The flow of poetic agility is unhindered and scrupulous and even where it slows down it has the grace and power of water that takes shape through the plains it traverses and is seized with the consciousness of its ability to flood the wastelands of stolid resistance.
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Unarguably this poem from the musical maestro elevates the reader from wakefulness to dream with its imaginative power, poetic intelligence and rich Oriental sensibility. Certainly, a poem that waits on the eyelashes of summer while rainclouds gather above the Sea to the incantation of Raga Malha.
(Smitha Sehgal is a corporate legal professional and a bilingual poet)
