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Poems of Majboor
Dr. T. N. Dhar
 I should begin this review with a confession; I have not read
the poetry of Majboor in the original Kashmiri. So I am happy to respond to the
translated version of his selected poems in the Waves, which I must say
at the very outset, is quite readable. The poems I have learnt from Majboor
himself, have been selected by the translator, Arvind Gigoo, from his various
published collections, and deal with several interesting themes and moods.
Unfortunately, I have no way of knowing what considerations guided his
selection, and how easy or difficult was the j ob translating them.
Because of their thematic similarities, the poems can be read
in several clusters. The first one deals with the perennial concerns of poetry:
the mystery of the creative act, its joys and perplexities, its agonies and
ecstasies. The second includes poems that embody the poet's response to his
immediate contingent reality. These deal with the appalling inequity in our
social fabric, the suffering and indigence of the common people, and the pain
and trauma of his small community, which was forced to migrate from the Valley
of Kashmir. The third is of poems that generate varied and contrastive moods:
while some mourn the loss of values and ideals, others celebrate hope and
promise and dreams of peace and harmony.
A good number of poems are about the intricacies, the
delicate shades, and the complexities of artistic creation. The Fossil,
for example, is less about an anthropological curiosity and more about seeing
objects in a moment of stasis, which obviates the fear of loss and change and
affirms the permanence of art of the "true, the good and the
beautiful" over the mutability and corruption of life. A similar mood
defines the spirit of The Broken Hand. Severed from some pristine
idol, it is not a mere relic to be treasured for its beauty, but a source of
speculative excursus into the artistic and spiritual, of dreamlike possibilities
which contrast with the nightmare of the existential burden of life. The
Painting dramatizes the very process of creation, in which the
imaginative powers of the poet are brought into full play to create an ideal
situation of the "painter getting merged into the picture". The
immensity and force of this power is seen at its explosive best in another aptly
titled poem, Creation, in which the nebulous flux of life -
suggested through its diverse and desperate images - is transmuted into
a pleasing garland of harmonious cohesion. The alchemy of the creative process
is suggested forcefully by the kinetic power of its imagery.
The poet is not content merely to create poems that please by
their exquisite shape; he wants them to embody a strong regenerative force,
which has the potential of changing the contours of the existential, of
affecting the quality of life in this world. His struggle to get the right kind
of words for shaping his new compositions, in the Chiselled Words,
does not merely reflect his anxiety to create an impressive poem but also his
eagerness to invest it with the power to regenerate and to renovate. Poems, in
Majboor's estimation, can "wash the pale earth" to "cover it with
light". to "sweeten stale conscience'', and to "light lamps in
the dark meandering streets". The poet's wrestling with the agonizing and
ecstatic aspects of the creative process, in the Secret. are suffused
with the same aspiration, for:
"The silence of the night
and
its solitude
are a hope for the morning”.
The same hope permeates the texture of Wilderness.
The poet is painfully aware of the "dusty cobweb" that has besieged
him, but he is hopeful of lighting "a lamp in the whirlwind." This
consoling thought animates even a murky poem like the Funeral, in
which he sees the truth of our continuous involvement with "cold
funerals", but also affirm that life is still livable, because it is full
of ever-new possibilities. Hope also colours the vision of a dejected
lover. for he sees that
New twigs will sprout
The mirror will speak,
The earth will smile,
the rising sun will watch
her dream and her dance.
A number of poems provide a scathing criticism of the society
of our day, the most-prominent being The Topsy-turvy Tree.
The image in the title of the poem is emblematic of the physical and
environmental degradation of the world as well as of confusion in its scale of
values. The images of devastation. decay, and sterility dominate its landscape
to create a kind of Eliotian Waste Land, where the reverberating moans give us
intimations of the world of pain, suffering and bondage. The Hungry Man
is a sharp picture of the growing injustice and unfairness of life in the
"sinful city". The hungry man, its central focus, is in a deplorable
condition of want and misery central focus, is in a deplorable condition of want
and misery which contrasts starkly with the opulence and affluence of the vulgar
few. Even though he finds a stone with which to hit at the unjust system, he
fails to achieve anything; and his pausing "for a thought" suggests
more his impotence than stoic wisdom. This sharpens our disgust towards the
archetypal city of our times. Another concretely realized picture in The
City is of the city the poet had to leave because of the rise of
militancy there. It exposes the stupidity and confusion of the people who took
control of its affairs from their wise forebears, creating false knowledge, in
which violent ways are confused with the struggle for attaining freedom. Moved
by the pain and suffering of the people of his community who had to flee their
homes and hearths to take refuge in camps, the poet In Prison
laments that their condition is worse than that of prisoners in jails.
The poems of pain, suffering and displacement stem from the
experience of the poet. But this does not diminish his hope in the intrinsic
goodness of human beings. With the help and blessings of goddess Saraswati,
the muse he knows so well, he charges his poems with the power to shape a new
world of hope, love and peace. The poem embodying this vision is appropriately
called The Coming Millennium. This very hope, vain though it might
seem to many of us, informs the spirit of the longest poem in the collection, To
the Swan. The poet pleads with the swan to go to his native land over
vales and hills, and to all the beautiful places which lie ravaged at this
moment to tap their spirit and energy for accomplishing what lie earnestly
wishes:
"To restore peace in the valley
to cure all aching wounds
and
to end grief."
Several poems in the collection stand apart. While A
Juggler's Trick skillfully brings out the evanescence and
evasiveness of life, The Fowl, though meant to dramatize the
stubbornness of self-styled intellectuals, is somewhat coarse and plain.
With deft strokes, the Portrait of a Child builds the contrast
between the purity and innocence of childhood and the corruption that overlays
the process of growing up. A similar skill is in evidence when the poet
transmutes the familiar images of a Snowman to emphasize a vital
truth about us, that we are constantly moulded by physical and social pressures,
which prevent us from acquiring our distinct identities. The playful act of a
child, which is a common sight in the valley of Kashmir during winter months,
is used to telling effect.
All in all, the poems in the volume are uplifting. As is
evident in the translated version of the poems, the poet has handled themes
with skill, economy, and with a surety of touch. Except for an odd line or
phrase, which makes the reader stop for a while, the poems read well. A little
bit of retouching will help smooth such rough edges. We hope that the poet and
the translator will sit together to make that possible, and also produce another
volume of translated poems, so that Kashmiri poetry can reach a larger audience.
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