Prof. Akavoor Narayanan Writes on DrTPS-Poems

Prof. Akavoor Narayanan retired as professor of modern Indian languages, Delhi University. He has authored several books on classical arts and literary criticism in Malayalam.

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EFFLUGENCE OF WISDOM AND LOVE

Dear Sasi:
I have carefully gone through the poems in your book “Life of Love”; I deem it a privilege and honour to be asked to say a few words about such a book of exquisite beauty and grandeur. But at the same time I must confess that it is not without a trace of diffidence that I scribble these lines, because of two factors. The first is my doubt of my own fitness and competency to comment on the quality of these poems of high thought since I consider myself as a layman as far as principles of metaphysics and modern science are concerned. The second reason is that I was not in a position to read and write about a book, physically and mentally, when you presented it to me. Now I feel a little better and relaxed and refreshed. The pleasure and satisfaction derived from enjoying these rejuvenating poems emboldens me to venture an attempt.
These poems, I think, essentially reflect the core of Indian thought expressed in poetry. As everybody knows, information and knowledge do not make great poetry. We get poetry of good flavour only when knowledge distils into a mystic and sublime sensibility. Otherwise it remains mere prosaic statements. In these poems I experience deep and unique thoughts on life and death based on our ancient wisdom fortified, corroborated and tempered by modern science as expressed in these, crisp and exact words. Even these few lines of the first poem, “THE RACE OF BIRTH” set the tune:

My birth was a battle
Anyone could have received life
Instead of me
The sperms from my father
Fought to reach my mother’s egg
I was conceivedWhen I raced with many of myUnborn brothers and sisters
I am the winner

How beautifully, one would wonder, the poet has expressed the process of conception and reproduction! Another gem of a thought based on one’s own experience in given expression in these words of poetic finesse:

The mornings were bright
The days sunny and bright
The evenings gloomy
And the nights too chilly
Alone once again
I wished that someone
Would keep me company
And share my grief in failure!
(I NEED SOMEONE)

It is only natural that our hopes in the evening of life that

I need someone
To keep me company
And be with me forever
In happiness and in sadness too!

The anger and anguish of an enlightened scientist with a human heart have found powerful expression in another poem “THE UNDIVIDED EARTH”. It is only in the fitness of things that a scientist with brain and heart like you visualizes the total destruction of the whole world as a result of the mindless and heartless pursuit of modern scientific advancement, and pray:

GOD, grant me another birth
With less of brain
And more of heart
To live free and fair
To see the earth
As the undivided one!!!
(THE UNDIVIDED EARTH)

It is so refreshing and heartening that a pure mind having absolute faith in the real God without any attributes recognizes and values the ultimate truth, which is stranger than fiction. Though in a lighter vein, you have uttered a profound thought with the lines

‘Carrying before marriage is a problem.’
………
‘Not carrying after marriage is a problem.’
(MARRIAGE AND MIS-MARRIAGE)

I would like to place another poem “BETTER BE BLIND” besides this

Love was blind
Marriage an eye opener…
Get married…
Close your eyes…
Love the spouse…
Better be blind !!

You have realized that

Surrender (is) so sweet beautiful and natural
As the flow of the river;
Graceful movements in a dance
The subtle symphony of life
As one surrenders the mind
To God in all empty moments
Attaining the best in harmony with the self
(GRACEFUL SURRENDER)

As our scriptures say, self knowledge is the highest and greatest knowledge. You have given eloquent expression to this wisdom in the modern context of medical treatment

Now the doctor says
He will open my heart
To remove a small block !
There are secrets
In my heart
That he must never find,
I would rather die
My secrets safe within me
(OPEN HEART SURGERY)

I have quoted only a few specimens from your poems, which are really distilled products of decades of dedicated study and teaching enriched by retrospections and ruminations. I am profoundly thankful to you for providing me the sublime bliss of true wisdom and true poetry. My hearty congratulations for this lovely poetic gem which lives upto its name, “LIFE OF LOVE”.

With warmest regards,

Yours,

(Prof. AKAVOOR NARAYANAN)

Mayur Vihar, Delhi,
4th February 2009.