Meeting M, diverse-enthusiast, I was introduced to his life, of his love for cars, his dream of producing a film called "0&1", of doing K2K (Kanyakumari to Kashmir) in his Gypsy, getting NDTV to cover it, he has charted out his life on the blueprint of his mind, its all clear. And that wonderful ending to the evening when JG made fresh Dosa's and Coriander Mint Chutney. All in all, the magic stayed another night, keeping me company day after day as I understand and constantly think of topics like impermanence, the body electric and the oneness of life. I'm waiting here, I seethesea.
And with Tagore, the sun... :)
Last Poems #13
The first day's sun
questioned
the new appearance of being –
Who are you?
There was no answer.
Years went by.
Day's last sun
asked the last question from the shores of the west
in the soundless evening –
Who are you?
There was no answer.
----
Rabindranath Tagore wrote until the end which came for him on August 7, 1941. This poem is from Final Poems recently published. They are translated from the Bengali jointly by Wendy Barker Saranindranath Tagore, a great grandson of the venerable Tagore.
According to the authors of Final Poems, this poem is the most famous of Tagore's later poems in the Bengali language. They point out its similarity to the Creation Hymn of the Vig Reda (c. 2000 BCE). This hymn begins with the unforgettable line, "There was neither nonexistence nor existence then."
It ends with these lines:
Who really knows? Who will here proclaim it? Whence
was it produced? Whence is its creation? The gods
came afterwards, with the creation of this universe. Who
then knows whence it has arisen?
Whence this creation has arisen – perhaps it formed itself,
or perhaps it did not – the one who looks down on it, in
the highest heaven, only he knows – or perhaps he does
not know.
