Letters from a Young Poet (16 page)

Bolpur
Tuesday, 17 May 1892

‘
Jagate keha n
ā
i, sab
ā
ipr
ā
ṇe mor
' [The world is empty, my heart is full]—that's the special feeling of a certain age. When the heart first wakes up and extends its arms, it's as if it wants the entire world. Just as Renuka feels about her newly grown teeth—that the entire world may be ingested—it's only gradually that the mind understands what it really wants and doesn't want. Then, that all-encompassing heart's vapour takes on a more limited, narrow aspect, it begins to burn and to make others burn. If you go and lay claim to the entire earth you don't get anything—finally, if you manage to immerse yourself heart and soul in some one thing, only then do you enter the infinite.
Prabhātsaṅgīt
was the first enthusiastic outward expression of my inner nature, that's why it has no discrimination or judgement at all. I still love the whole world in a way—but not with that wild enthusiasm—a ray from the lighted world of my love is reflected upon all mankind—in that light, on certain occasions, the world seems very beautiful and very intimate. The movement of your mind is not obstructed by those whom you love a great deal; in them, your heart can always roam—those whom you don't love so much aren't never-ending for you in that way. You see them partially, just the part that's visible to you, that's why if they brush up too close they enclose you from all sides like unclear walls of glass; if you want to let your thoughts have a free run, your thoughts stumble upon them at every step and return irritably again. That's why one doesn't like ordinary company all the time. When you're in a room, the walls seem like a good thing; in fact, it's impossible to get by without them. When you go out, if the walls accompany you, you don't like it. So if I've been complaining about crowds of people, don't
think it's because I've become a complete
misanthrope
—I only want to say this much, that there are times when it's better not to have so many people around…. You see, I don't have an iota of patience, Bob. Perhaps that's the way men are—they want to fall upon things and devour them in an instant—they can't do anything with slow, silent finesse and beauty—they have been reduced to this state because they have worked as labourers in the world through the ages. Women are nowadays trying to lessen men's load of paid labour, and that wouldn't be such a bad thing for our race of dispirited fellow men—it might give us some time to practise a little finesse—but it doesn't seem as if these large-limbed wretched idiots are going to pay much attention to that aspect—perhaps if they have extra time on their hands they will eat like a python and sleep like a python instead. It seems that in the not-too-distant future men are going to face a time of great disgrace. Civilization is progressing so much in the direction of fineness and beauty that these big animals will be in a great deal of trouble. At the beginning of the world, large creatures like the mammoth and mastodon were plentiful—they had so much strength, their skins were so thick—they're all extinct now. Now the thin-skinned, three-and-a-half-cubit-high man is king of the world. But our time's almost up—now's the time for those even younger….

Bolpur
Wednesday, 18 May 1892

The other evening, Bela and Khoka got into an argument on a subject that's worth citing. Khoka said, ‘Bela, I'm feeling hungry for water' [
Jal kshide peẏeche
]. Bela said, ‘Nonsense, gap-tooth
[
dhūr, phokl
ā]! You don't say hungry for water! Thirsty for water.' Khoka, very firmly—‘No, hungry for water.' Bela—‘
Āyei
, Khoka, I'm three years older than you, you are two years younger than me, do you know that? I know so much more than you!' Khoka, suspiciously, ‘You're that old?' Bela—‘Okay, why don't you ask Baba?' Khoka, suddenly excited, ‘And what about the fact that I drink milk and you don't?' Bela, scornfully, ‘So what? Ma doesn't drink milk, does that mean she isn't bigger than you?' Khoka, completely silent, with head on pillow, thinking. Then Bela began to say, ‘
O father
, I have a tremendous, tremendous
friendship
with somebody! She's mad, she's so sweet!
Oh I can eat her up!
' Saying this, she runs to Renu and hugs and kisses her till she starts to cry.

Yesterday Bela came to me very upset. What happened was—yesterday the Swayamprabhas had gone to the small bungalow to cook fish. A madman had taken shelter there with some mangoes—Choto-bau and the Swayamprabhas were afraid, so they sent him off. I was lying down quietly in the second-floor room. Bela returned from the small bungalow and began to plead with me, ‘Baba, there's a very poor man. The poor fellow is very hungry, that's why he was sitting with some mangoes in the lower bungalow. They chased him away with a stick.' She kept repeating, ‘The wretched fellow is very poor, he has nothing, he's wearing only one little piece of cloth, maybe he doesn't have anything to wear in the winter, and he feels cold. It's not his fault. When they asked his name, he told them. He said he lives in heaven. They chased him away, and he didn't say a word! Just went off!'—I found this so sweet! Beli is really very kind-hearted. Yesterday she pleaded with such real anxiety—she found this needless cruelty so wanton! I was very moved to hear her. When Beli grows up, she will be a very affectionate, simple, good girl. Khoka too is very affectionate. He loves Renu so much. He caresses her so gently and puts
up with all her tantrums with the sort of kindness that many mothers themselves may not show.

Bolpur
Friday, 20 May 1892

Witticisms are very dangerous things—if they arise spontaneously, with a pleasant and smiling face, they are first-rate; but if you pull and push at them then there is a chance of them misfiring completely. The comedic [
h
ā
syaras
] is like the ultimate weapon [
brahm
ā
stra
] of old—those who know how to use it can deploy it to deadly effect in war—and the poor wretch who doesn't know how to throw it, yet wants to handle it, in his case, the weapon turns around like the brahmāstra and destroys the user, it turns the wit himself into a laughing stock…. When women try to be witty, but become garrulous instead, then that's a most unseemly sight. In fact, I think that it doesn't suit women to try to be ‘
comic
', whether they do it successfully or not. Because the ‘
comic
' is a very bulky and large thing. There's a relation between ‘
sublimity
' and ‘
comicality
'—that's why elephants are
comic
, camels are
comic
, giraffes are
comic
, largeness is
comic
. Beauty, in fact, is better displayed alongside sharpness, as the flower with the thorn—similarly, sharpness in speech is both very effective from, as well as very suitable in, women. But women should never tread anywhere near the sort of scornful witticism that has any trace of heaviness about it; that is for our
sublime
(in Chandranath-babu's language—‘huge' [
bir
ā
á¹­
]) sort. A male Falstaff will make us laugh till we split our sides, but a female Falstaff would have been very annoying.

Bolpur
Saturday, 21 May 1892

What a storm we had yesterday! I had just completed my daily writing for
S
ā
dhan
ā and was proceeding upstairs for tea, when suddenly a tremendous storm arrived. The sky became dark with dust, and all the dried leaves in the garden came together and began to whirl and dance around the garden like a spinning top—as if every ghost in the forest had suddenly woken up and begun a phantom dance. All the trees in the garden began to shudder and shake like the tremendous mythical Jaṭāẏu bird flapping its wings and straining against its chained legs. What roaring, what chaos, what a hectic affair! Looking at the storm I was reminded of the descriptions I had read occasionally of the
American ranch
—of six or seven hundred wild horses suddenly breaking down a fence and running away at full speed in a whirl of dust, followed by men on horses with lassos to chase them down and bring them back—the sound of their whips whistling through the air on whatever it finds—the open skies and fields of Bolpur seemed to be witnessing a similar wild outbreak and chase—a run and catch and flee and smash and bang and crash sort of affair. All the servants here were busy trying to save the temple—in case that coloured glass bubble is broken and bursts. It has been covered with very large curtains made of a strong material—but the storm cuts the curtains to pieces, tears the ropes into bits, breaks the curtain rails into sections and then those flap against the glass walls of the temple and smash them into smithereens. Earlier, in another storm, the temple keeper's head was split in two by a blow from one of these curtain rails. Going upstairs, I see my son standing on the north veranda in the middle of this tremendous
revolution with his small, immature nose inserted between the gaps in the railing, silently taking in the smell and the taste of this storm. It began to rain heavily and I said to Khoka, ‘Khoka, you'll get wet in the rain. Come and sit here on this chair.' Khoka called his mother and said, ‘Ma, you sit on the chair here and I'll sit in your lap.' Then he took possession of his mother's lap and continued to feast upon the rainy scene in silence. Sometimes one gets a hint as to what Khoka is thinking about when he sits silently by himself and smiles to himself and makes faces—one can see that he too is ruminating on the handful of early memories of his very short life. I've seen that he suddenly asks, out of the blue, ‘Baba, there was a river in Shilaidaha, wasn't there?' After much thought, he says to his mother, ‘Ma, we were very happy in Shilaidaha.' The other day he asked Choto-bau, ‘What day is it today?' Choto-bau said, ‘Sunday.' Khoka said, ‘Then today the steamers are not plying in Shilaidaha.' But more than anything, I like to observe the crazy affair going on between Khoka and Renu. The moment Renu sees Khoka lying quietly somewhere, she will immediately launch herself upon his shoulders, put her face upon his face, kiss him, pull his hair, beat him and begin the most violent demonstrations of her love for him—Khoka is so sweet and kind, caressing her, calling her, ‘Rani, Rani,' and putting up with all of it. If Renu sees Khoka sleeping, she will promptly push him, pull him, beat him—then Khoka pleads with her and says, ‘Rani, let me sleep a little.' But still when Renu will not leave him alone he sits up and begins to play with her—doesn't express the tiniest bit of irritation. But the two of them are not really friends with Beli that much—Renu, in fact, is always expressing her regal displeasure at Beli in very clear terms. It seems as if they are temperamentally different from Beli—she's outside their group.

Bolpur
Sunday, 22 May 1892

Yesterday in the evening there was tremendous storm and rain; however, that's not a matter of regret. In fact, good; let the trees and the earth and the grass cover become green and shining and luscious. Let the eyes find rest at the sight. Let the sky be covered from one end to the other with downy, vaporous clouds—let the forests turn dark and shadowy, the unceasing rain make veils with which to cover the horizon's brides, the woods resonate with the sound of pattering rain on the dense leaves, the still, immense land come alive with the childish restlessness of the sound and variety of the līlā of the many temporary big and small rivulets of water. And that is exactly what has happened. This morning, the sky seemed to be drooping with the weight of the clouds made heavy with water, and, all around, the shadow of the rain has made everything calm … Khoka cannot express himself well, so everything on his mind stays in his mind, and all his enthusiasm works gradually within it, that's why the lines of his thought cut very deep. Bela talks continuously and so doesn't find time to think about anything properly—all her energy is spent in her incessant speech. But she's extremely soft-hearted—she tried her utmost to stop Khoka from killing an ant the other day. I was very surprised to see this—I was like that when I was a child; I couldn't tolerate even insects and birds being hurt in any way. But I have become so much harder now on growing up. I remember feeling such a wrench of the heart at others' sorrows in those days. Where does that happen any more? Will Bela too become harder as she grows older? Maybe not—after all, she's a girl. In the first place, she will never have to do anything cruel by her own hand, besides which, women's minds have a sort of
elasticity
: they do not
harden with ripeness. If I was as sensitive now to the pain of living things as I was in my childhood, it would become impossible to step out into the world; perhaps I would then be hurt by sorrow and death at every step and keep lamenting and regretting it like Pierre Loti.
^*
That would have been a nuisance! Besides which, if you express your pain about something that most people ordinarily don't feel any distress about, then other people get very annoyed; they think—this fellow's trying to be superior. I remember that when my elders did not show pity towards the pitiable, I wanted to be able to say something, but embarrassment would hold me back—what if they thought, ‘Oh, I see this righteous Yudhishthir has come to knock us down a peg!' It's most troublesome to have a greater sensitivity than others all around you. The logical and rational thing to do is to hide it at first, and eventually to lessen it. I remember I was once travelling with Jyoti-dada in the carriage when a Brahmin wayfarer stopped us on the road and said, ‘Can you make some place for me in your carriage? I'll get off on the way.' Jyoti-dada got very angry and shooed him away. I was dreadfully upset by that incident—as it is the man was a weary traveller, on top of that he was insulted and shamed and had to go away hopelessly. But I found it very embarrassing to show any pity where Jyoti-dada had not—I couldn't say anything in spite of feeling very troubled, but my admiration for my brother suffered a grievous blow.