Stranger than fiction- The start of a very tiny tale. Day #1 #Bar-A-Thon

The shell began to crack, the large egg moved a little and then fell apart. A creature, all wrinkled, skin moist- staggered out. Two legs, two arms a head and a torso. The sound vibrations continued- sonorous and earth shaking. Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm reverberated through the trees, the land, rivers, mountains and the skies. Another creature emerged from a neighbouring egg, stretched its limbs and looked around, squinting its eyes.

Stranger than fiction

 

Always.

Agony unleashed and lashed out

Leaving no markings, no welts

The body wracked by turmoil

Began to cave in and implode

You came, you always do

In some shape, form or manner

Washed out and cleansed

Taking away the needless

Leaving behind comfort and peace

And a certitude most quiet

You always hover around 

In the dust, the air, the people

Waiting for the space- to step in.

The monkey that spoke English- short story

Here's a little tale. Of a creature with a tail.

I found a monkey and named him Puttu.
Actually he found me.
In a train.
The train was about to pull out of the station when a furry bundle hurled itself on me and clung to my neck.
My first instinct was to jump up and brush off whatever it was that had latched onto me.
A little baby monkey fell to the seat and gazed at me with doleful eyes.

Wonder of wonders.
I looked out of the window to try and hand him back to his mum. There was no other monkey in sight. I looked at the other passengers for help on the issue. Everyone shrugged. A man told me to 'dump the creature' onto the platform.
In the meantime the little fella slunk out of sight and sat hidden behind my back.

I resigned myself to taking him home with me.
My home. A sprawling quarter acre piece of land with an old style house which would need to be pulled down soon. It had been built a 100 years back and had stayed in my family since.
I lived here with my husband, daughter and our pets.
2 dogs, a cat and a few hens.

What would happen if I added a monkey to the mix? I had to wait and see, didn't I?

My husband groaned when he saw me arrive, a suitcase and a new creature in tow. I had a penchant for bringing home strays and after that it usually fell to the practical person in the house to drop off the newcomer to the RSPCA.
 My daughter squealed in delight. 'Will it bite?' This had always been her first question when faced by a new animal. "Hasn't tried to bite me yet,' said I not meeting my husband's eye.
I put him in an empty bird cage in the backyard and rushed to the shower.

Later that night after my daughter was in bed, I was taken to task.
'How could you bring a wild creature home, what if he has some disease and infects us all?'
'He clung on to me and wouldn't let go. I had no choice,' I  replied lamely.
'We'll see what to do with it tomorrow,' he spoke with finality. I had nothing to say.

The next morning I sauntered into the kitchen to make my morning cup of tea and heard my daughter talking to someone in the backyard.
The excitement of the previous night must have woken them early I thought and looked out of the big picture window. Her father was nowhere in sight.
She was talking to the monkey and despite our instructions had taken him out of the cage and held him gently on her lap, as she sat on the wooden bench. The monkey was answering her questions.

My eyes popped out of my head and I ran out to check. I must be hallucinating.

The little creature was actually talking, same as you and me and was speaking in English, clean and unaccented.
I could have simply asked him where his mum was instead of bringing him along with me, I thought distractedly, another part of my mind wondering if I had gone raving mad.

'How did you fall down and how come the fall didn't wake you up? someone was rudely shaking me by the shoulder. I opened one eye and saw my husband looking at me as I lay bundled in my quilt on the floor, next to the kingsize bed.
'It can speak English,' I said.
'Who, what?
'The monkey, it can speak in English,' couldn't he understand, how daft of him.

The silly man burst into peals of laughter. My daughter sat up in bed rubbing her eyes. I sat up, my quilt still around me and looked at them trying to look as dignified as possible in the given circumstances.


                                                       **************************

First ever purely Gratitude post, thanks to Vidya Sury :)

 

The cup of my joy overflows as I ruminate

Sitting at the large glass window seeing green

The heavens pouring down last few days

Washing every little leaf and grass

Soothing the eyes and the heart.

Again I give thanks for the souls 

Encountered recently. Second cousins that

Came and stayed with us from out of the blue

Who knew that here would be a happily surprising 

Connect of true hearts and minds.

 

Thanks to the universe for the blessing in disguise

Of issues in the little one's last place of study, wherein

 

Lay the key to getting towards a Gurukul style Steiner

Way of learning keeping the entire Be-ing together.

 

Blessings abound and here I link this to one sweet blogger

I am happy to know, Vidya Sury it is and I am sure you know of her. 

 

 

Loving connections and The Liebster award :)

The wonderfully prolific Dahlia of https://mysilverstreaks.com  made the phewww feeling after the A to Z challenge last month deepen into a feeling of gratitude for not only keeping me company all through the A to Z but awarding me the Liebster award in the week just after :) Thanks a ton for that and the questions you sent me. 

The Q and A 

1.How did you begin blogging?     

I began in November 2006 when my little one was around six months old. I wrote very less and mainly about her and the joy she brought to our lives and hearts. I had been reading quite a few food blogs at the time and my dear friend's blog http://mysoorean.blogspot.com.au/    regularly. This inspired me to start a blog of my own.
2. Where do you see yourself in 5 years (as a blogger)? 
 I have no idea at all. Life is ever-changing and every breath we take is all we have.
3. When you are not blogging or thinking about it, what do you do? 

I don't blog so often that it takes over my mind fully and it usually the A to Z blogging challenge month which completely submerges me into blogging. Rest of the months I blog when I want to. I cook, clean, read, write, sketch, do art, listen to music/sing, play with my pup and spend time with my daughter. I also teach Yoga in all its holistic glory.

4. Does anyone from your family read/comment on your blogposts?

Yes my mum does and its very satisfying that she does :) My daughter has just begun to read my posts too and says she wants to start up a blog of her own soon :)

5. Could you tell us something about your part of the world? 

Australia is a nature lover's delight. There are a wide variety of people one gets to see from various corners of the earth. The true land owners however are seen on the fringe of society and this pinches the heart. The government has a number of policies in their benefit but the damage done is very deep and it will take a while for some real change to happen.
6. Any favorite quote/s that you would like to share? 

I would like to share one I just read on a wonderful blog I began to follow from the last two months namely http://drishtikone.com/  and the quote is- Mark Twain once said of India "Anything that can ever be done either by man or God has been done in this land".

7. Could you recommend a book or a movie (feel free to add as many as you like) for my bucket list?

There are many but I will post just one of each that struck me on reading the question.

Movie- Black               Book- Anna Karenina

8. What’s the craziest thing you have done? 

Taken a lift home riding pillion behind a stranger. Not a complete stranger because this was the driver of my bus from Mysore to Bangalore when I was in my early twenties and a naive lass. When the bus reached the city terminus, there were no buses to take me home which was a good 18 kms away and since I was the last passenger to get off I spoke to the driver to ask if he knew of any buses that would take me home at that time- 10 pm. He said , there were none and offered to drop me home. I accepted and all the way chanted Hanuman Chaalisa since in those days that road was no well lit and had eucalyptus forests on either side, half the route. He dropped me home safe and sound, the Blessed man and left after drinking one glass of water. Now that I am a mum and have learned to mistrust people just a little, I can only laugh at my folly.

9. How do you de-stress?  

Art, cooking, meditation, a walk, playing with puppy and daughter and writing.
10. Anything about yourself that you would like to change?     

My tendency to speak from the heart, because this has got me in trouble a few times.
11. What do you feel most blessed about?      

My offspring

Eleven random facts about me ;) 

1. I have one child and I had her in my mid-thirties

2. Our pup Bibbel was bought on the insistence of my daughter and this also fulfilled my life-long longing for a dog of my own :)

3. I sing and love music and can give up an entire night's sleep only for music, even the best book I am reading will see me in bed at least at 2 am.

4. I am a practising Yoga teacher and insist on chanting shlokas and getting my students to Om at the end 

5. I abhor allopathy and only an emergency takes me to it

6. My first point for pain-relief is Pranayama- nadi shuddhi

7. One of my first poems as a seven year old was on a street pup that I had named Sheroo

8. I have lived in Jharkhand, Bihar, U.P, Andhra, Karnataka, Duabi and Australia

9. I love public speaking

10. I can vibrate my eyeballs, bwahahahahaha, really and it freaks the daylight out of anyone that has had the privilege to see this 

11. I am gypsy at heart and traversing every inch of India is a dream I will fulfil

This was fun :) and here is a cuppa for anyone reading through my post in a beautiful terracotta cup from Pondicherry before we proceed to the most exciting portion

I get to choose 11 blogs to pass on the award to and so here goes my list of eleven wonderful bloggers and people that connected and gave company through the A to Z and also otherwise. May our connection bloom and grow :)

1. http://relaxnrave.blogspot.com.au/
2. http://www.geetikagupta.com/
3. shilpaagarg.com
4. http://titli15081977.blogspot.com.au/ 
5. www.kaapitimes.com 
6.  shutterbug-rajlakshmi.blogspot.com.au 
7. http://happinessandfood.com/ 
8. https://fabulus1710.wordpress.com/ 
9. http://sulekharawat.com/ 
10. https://inderpreetuppal.com 
11. http://obsessivemom.blogspot.com.au/ 

If my nominees accept, and I am pretty sure they will, since each of them is a good sport, here are the rules that must be followed:

RULES OF THE LIEBSTER AWARD

If you have been nominated for The Liebster Award and you choose to accept it, write a blog post about the Liebster Award in which you:

• Thank the person who nominated you, and post a link to their blog in your post.
• Display the award on your blog — by including it in your post and/or displaying it using a “widget” or a “gadget”.
• Answer 11 questions about yourself, which will be provided to you by the person who nominated you.
• Provide 11 random facts about yourself.
• Nominate 5 – 11 blogs that you feel deserve the award, who have a less than 1000 followers.
• Create a new list of 11 questions for the nominees to answer.

List these rules in your post (copy and paste from here). Once you have written and published it, you then have to:

• Inform the people/blogs that you nominated that they have been nominated for the Liebster Award and provide a link for them to your post so that they can learn about it (they might not have ever heard of it!)

And here are the 11 specially crafted Questions for my nominees to answer in their own time 
1. 1. What is your prime motivation for blogging? 
2. Have you visited a place that gave you a sense of Deja Vu? 
3. If you could visit another century briefly when and where would you go? 
4. Who do you love the most and who loves you the most? 
5. What do you find most inspiring about life?  
6. What dish do you like to eat and what do you like to cook? 
7. Where do you see yourself as a writer in ten years?
8. If you had to close down your blog and give up writing altogether, how would you feel?
9. What kind of music do you like?
10. Who could you picture yourself as, in the history of Bharatvarsh?
11. Where would you like to be born in your next life?

Hasta Manana till we meet again dear readers.

 
I wish you Happy LIVING,
HAPPY READING AND WRITING.

Returning to the elements- a short reflection on death. A post in English and Devnagari Hindi.

Disappear element-body

The heat and anxieties returning to Agni

Imagination- speed to Vayu

Ashes to the Prithvi

Fluids to Jal

Prana to the Akasha

And you who resides within all of it

Back to wherever it is you came from.

This last week-ten days has been one of deaths and information of a death that occurred a few months back.
So this is what my being dwells on right now as I feel and contemplate sitting within the shell of my own body when I can during the day and night, while carrying on with the business of living life alongside.
Death- a doorway to returning to a formless existence, either to return in a new shell or stay formless, in synch with the formless energy which runs the Universe/Universes.

First it was an inspirational, loving, learned and much loved and respected blogger Usha Menon ji whose words are immortalised on http://eccentricgrandmum.blogspot.com.au/  
There is a little bit about her on https://blogarhythmblog.wordpress.com/2015/01/24/link-up-opens-featured-member-usha-menon-2/

We bloggers were in the throes of the A to Z challenge when we got to know about this. Everyone reeled. May she be in a loving literary place.

Before this had sunk in I was told by two of my friends and ex-colleagues that one of the 'loveliest on all levels' ex-colleague, Sandhya Prasad, had passed on while on a pilgrimage last November. Vivacious, mature, wise, sincere are only a few words that describe her. Sandhya was a Sri Krishna devotee and involved with the Iskcon Bangalore deeply. May she rest in the beauty of Lord Krishna.

I was processing all this when I was informed just as I went to bed at night, the day before yesterday, that my aunt Rajani had at 62, suddenly breathed her last.
The night was spent oscillating between praying and trying to fall asleep.
She was my mama's wife and a large part of my life since I turned ten. A simple lady in every way, she interacted with every member of the family and outsider in an ego-less and sweet manner.
This was a blow delivered to stun.
Rajani attamma, you will always be thought of fondly and missed greatly. Whitefield will never be the same without your smiling presence. I am certain everyone that knew you has felt shock at your leaving us so suddenly. May the ache in our hearts subside.
May you have everlasting peace.

For me it is expressing through words and other art forms which helps clarify and heal amidst other benefits. So meditation and words it is that I seek succour from in that order.

                                                      


 एक ह्रदय कितना कुछ झेले
क्या क्या सहे और क्या कुछ छोड़े

सब जान कर भी अंजान है ये
सब बू झ कर भी अन्बुझ है ये

पञ्च तत्त्वों से बनी ये काया
पर उस काया में वास है जिसका

कितना भटकाती है उसे माया
मन का आदि अंत न पाया

श्वास के रथ पर बैठे हम कब 

पल में हो जाएँ विलुप्त क्या पता

समय से पहले कहाँ कोई गया और 

उस से पहले कोई न आया 

व्यर्थ हि भागमभाग मचाते 

किसको कुछ है लेकर जाना 

हे ईश्वर रख हमें सतत सन्तुलित 

जीवन बहे जैसे जलधारा। 

A to Z challenge 2016- Time to Reflect

                                     

 

Done and dusted. Phewwww.

That is the first feeling and the one word that dominated me for many days, after posting my Z post and sharing it with the various groups.

My initial thought was to do this post in free verse too but my poetic muscle needs some rest so I let it be. Also I miss writing prose :)

This is the second time I have chosen to do the challenge and finished it, which I would, since my personality has a problem with letting go of anything at all midway, which can just become a non-positive at times.

The actual research, reminiscing and writing itself of my mytho-historic poetry was extremely enjoyable and I found myself submerged in joy while going about the creative process.

One decision I have made to make the whole of April even more enjoyable is that I shall never ever again go through the A to Z in the fashion I have done, which is of writing and posting daily. Not only does this take away from the pleasure of reading others blogs and commenting but also I felt I have gone through a sugar-cane press. This time was much harder than the first since I was in Australia and thus had much more daily work on my hands than in 2014, when I was in the motherland.

Also the little one just turned ten and being an only child, looks at me to double up as a sibling/playmate....you get the drift I am sure :) Here there is no one around our home to go out and play with too.

At times I felt I would lose my mind and for sure the hormones had something to do with that too ;)

So next year and for however long I do the A to Z I will ONLY do it if I have most of my posts written and ready.

Interacting with fellow bloggers who went through the challenge and some who didn't, connecting with them through the soul that comes through in each one's written word, reading comments and replying, commenting on other blogs, discovering new human beings and new blogs- this is quite a journey and I appreciate it and thank everyone from the bottom of my heart. I am not mentioning individual bloggers/friends much as I would like to, from scarcity of time but the ones that followed many of my posts and the ones whose many posts I followed hold a special place in my heart and you know who you are :)

Touched and inspired from my mum and my daughter reading all my posts.

Thanks to the creator of the A to Z challenge, Arlee Bird and here is the link to the A to Z challenge site, just in case  http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com/

Zzzzzz The cosmic sleep of Sri Vishnu. Letter Z of the # a to z challenge.

You sleep on the primordial waters of chaos

The Ksheerasagara- ocean of milk

Transcendantal consciousness that is Brahman

Every potentiality stays poised within you.

Ananta Shayana meaning one who rests

Atop the infinite Shesha Naaga*

Omni present- omni potent

Creator of the creative urge that is Brahma*

All pervasive, ever present.

We look all over- in any

Nook of the cosmos- any 

Other cosmos it is you, it is You.

All of us in you and you in us

This is how it is, for it is you- that

Resides in this shell, as the light and 

Airy element, that which escapes

When the rest of us falls to dust 

Back to you, the energy that runs everything.

You, that defies description

And we that love forms

We make such a pair

You, manifestation of everything beautiful

We that run after shadows

Give us a pinch of your cosmic sleep

Oh lord, so we float above the ocean

We live in, detached as much as needed

Poised within ourselves, in touch

With the infinity inside our own self.

I am writing poetry based on Indian mythology/history for the April 2016 A to Z challenge. Please read, comment and share freely and do come back :)

Yudhishtira son of Yama. Letter Y of the # a to z challenge.

There is something amiss

I cannot quite understand
Do tell me dear reader if you

Perchance figure it out.

Kunti's son from Yama*

Righteous and chaste was he

However being a mortal man

Prone to blunder and gaffe

Let us not judge, let us not call names

Simply run a glance over one

Incident that wrenches the heart

Yudhishtira it seems had one flaw

A vice that many a person has.

Stumbled on and lost all he/she had.

And so he gambled away his kingdom

And wealth which is not all-

He also lost his brothers and their

Common wife* to a blind and arrogant lot.

Draupadi was dis-robed in front of a

Full court, only the mercy of Sri Krishna

Rushing to her rescue in the form of an

Endless length of cloth. 

What may he have felt, this son of Yama

Seeing a sight such as that....

The rules of the game sacro-sanct so

Much so that none of the five husbands

Could help the damsel out. What a pity and

What a plight, with all the elders present

Not one could give her a hand. Oh! if only

She had married Karna the brave, she would

Never have had the mishap, thought she afterwards

In secret to herself, never knowing alas

That it was Karna who was the eldest one

That Mother Kunti had begat.

Alas, for everyone and for the son of Yama himself,

Had he been with them right from the start,

Never the war would be fought, for I suspect

Karna would have stopped short at many a point

Or gone ahead in every respect.

But what can be done now dear reader

All we can do is think back, conjecture and 

Hope to learn from Yudhishtira and all the 

Pandava and Kaurava band, what misery one can 

Go through, for the sake of one's land.

 

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yama

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draupadi

I am writing poetry based on Indian mythology/history for the April 2016 A to Z challenge. Please read, comment and share freely and do come back :)

X-iled. Letter X of the # a to z challenge.

Hold my hand and let us travel far back

In the time-machine of the heart and mind-

Once upon a time, long long ago

In Kosala desh reigned King Dasharatha

 

After a long time of giving away their first born Shanta

Queens Kausalya, Kaikeyi and Sumitra 

 

Had Sri Rama, Bharata, Laxmana and Shatrughna

Through the Putra Kameshti Yagna* perfomed

By the austere husband of Shanta, Rishyashrina Rishi .

The beautiful boys grew up, strong, learned and polite

Freeing the jungles for peaceful penance,Rama and Laxmana

Removed the demons Taadaka, Maareech and Subahu.

Sita, Sri Lakshmi incarnate wedded to her consort through

Swayamvara* returns with Rama and dwells in Ayodhya.

The ageing King, decides to crown his oldest son and here

Dear reader is where the trouble begins. Kaikeyi, the youngest

Queen of King Dasharatha, decides to use the two boons he 

Gave her at an earlier time, Manthara's poison playing havoc

In her mind. Deciding to extract her pound of flesh she descended

Upon the innocent-loving King and demanded that he send away

His son, his very life- into exile, a full fourteen years and her second

Wish was that her son Bharata be crowned which of course caused

Her own estrangement with her husband and son. Sri Rama, the ever

Dutiful, set off in simple clothes, Sri Sita and Laxmana by his side. 

Hence Vishnu, Lakshmi and Sesha Naag were off on their mission

To vanquish evil and bring about peace on earth. 

The King could not bear the loss and died of a broken heart and 

All of us know what happened after the start of that famous x-ile*

 

*Fire rituals performed by one desirous of having children
*Swayamvara (Sanskrit: स्वयंवर), in ancient India, was a practice of choosing a husband, from among a list of suitors, by a girl of marriageable age. Swayam in Sanskrit means self and vara means groom in this context.
*Rama and his brothers Lakshman, Bharat, Shatrughna were the chaturvyuha expansions of Vishnu (Vasudev, Sankarshan, Pradyumna, Aniruddha). Rama's life and journey is one of adherence to dharma despite harsh tests and obstacles and many pains of life and time. For the sake of his father's honour, Rama abandons his claim to Ayodhaya's throne to serve an exile of fourteen years in the forest. His wife Sita and brother Lakshmana decide to join him, and all three spend the fourteen years in exile together. While in exile, Sita is kidnapped by Ravana, the Rakshasa monarch of Lanka. After a long and arduous search, Rama fights a colossal war against Ravana's armies. In a war of powerful and magical beings, greatly destructive weaponry and battles, Rama slays Ravana in battle and liberates his wife. Having completed his exile, Rama returns to be crowned king in Ayodhya and eventually becomes emperor, rules with happiness, peace, duty, prosperity and justice—a period known as Rama Rajya.

I am writing poetry based on Indian mythology/history for the April 2016 A to Z challenge. Please read, comment and share freely and do come back :)

Wonder of mythology. Letter W of the # a to z challenge.

Simple song I bring you today

While I take a breather

To stop short and wonder on

This eternal-timeless ocean

That our love never seems to end on.

Lots of it real history,

Some of it not.

Every tale of peerless beauty

And lessons to match,

For the wise and merry alike

For epicure and saint.

Take your pick dear reader-

There are pearls aplenty if you want

And there is huge and searing pain

Agony and ecstasy abound.

In this heavenly harmony all is open for the taking,

What you choose is yours to keep, for learning and thinking, 

Perhaps even further to dig, delve and maybe get reading .

                                                  

I am writing poetry based on Indian mythology/history for the April 2016 A to Z challenge. Please read, comment and share freely and do come back :)

Veer Barbarik. Letter V of the # a to z challenge.

 Many a tale we have gone through, you and I and yet

A stranger tale does not exist than this one here of Veer* Barbarik

Sri Krishna asked all present, on the eve of the battle at

Kurukshetra, how many days each would take to finish

The war, Each had a number ranging twenty to twenty-eight.

Further on, in guise he stopped a young lad on horseback,

All set for war and put before him the same query, the one

He had already asked all the ancients and the greats.

Barbarik the rider, replied, skipping not a beat- 'one whole minute.'

The dusky Lord then proceeded to prod and reveal, through

Question and answer, getting Barbarik to explain thus-

'Of the three arrows that are my blessing, dear man...

The first will mark out the innocents, bystanders and non-aligned,

The second- friends, while the third will raze to the ground all unmarked- the foes.

Also I have promised my mother that I will fight on the losing side

At all times.' At which point Sri Krishna intervened to show him what

Barbarik hadn't thought of, the war could never be won for he would

Stay moving from one losing side to the other. This oscillation

Coupled with the three- arrow boon would result in a

Total annihilation leaving only him standing alive and alone.

This scene when described to the grandson of mighty Bhima-

Barbarik, the son of Ghatotkacha and Maurvi began to see the goryness

He was about to unleash in his naivete.

Krishna now told Barbarik, he wanted something from him

And was promised anything his heart fancied, upon which the Lord

Still in disguise asked for the head of the, now shocked Barbarik

Understanding dawned on the brave young man that all was not

As it seemed and he begged of the stranger to disclose identity.

Seeing who it was in reality, he fell at the blue-hued feet.

The Vishwarupa* was shown and thus graced, the lion-hearted Barbarik

Agreed to lose his head, with a single plea that he be allowed to see

The whole war and this fulfilled with his head sitting atop

The Khatu hill. Known as Belarsen and Khatu-Shyam

Worshipped even now is Veer Barbarik.

*Universal form. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vishvarupa

*Brave

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khatushyam

I am writing poetry based on Indian mythology/history for the April 2016 A to Z challenge. Please read, comment and share freely and do come back :)

Uttara. Letter U for the # a to Z challenge

Uttara danced the day away
Only stopping to untie her anklets
When the Sun began his descent
In the Matsya kingdom
The daughter of King Viraata
And her teacher Brihannala,
 
Arjuna in eunuch dance-teacher form
A curse that turned blessing in disguise
To the Pandava Princes in their year of
Agyaatvaas, where living incognito they
Spent the year somehow.
Later on the princess became

The self-same Arjuna's daughter-in-law
Wife of the young and valiant Abhimanyu
Young- beautiful couple, they were until
The war and the fateful thirteenth day
Took him away and she was left alone
Widowed too soon.


Parikshith in your womb and you
Managed to stay alive and sane.
Thanks be to God for that, as this
Son of yours went on to be surviving
King of Hastinapur. The kingdom which caused
The Mahabharata war, was his and then

Passed to your grandson Janamejaya.
How did you spend your days young lass
Apart from bringing up your son....
Did nightmares haunt you of the Chakravyuha*
Which your brave husband entered to save his uncle
Knowing full well that he knew only the entry,

Or did his courage and valour fill you with pride
Giving you the strength to carry on, instead of
Giving up on life. Blessed was he and blessed you were
For holding on with your head held high,
When all you must have wanted to do- lie down and die
You didn't. You proved to be truly Abhimanyu's bride.




*Chakravyuha
The Chakravyūha or Padmavyūha was a special formation (Vyuha), and knowledge of how to penetrate it was limited to only a handful of warriors on the Pandavas' side: namely Abhimanyu, Arjuna, Krishna and Pradyumna, of which only Abhimanyu was present at the most-famous occasion of its use. Because he had never learnt to escape the formation, he was trapped upon entry and fought alone. After Abhimanyu had penetrated the sixth tier of the formation, all the Kauravas' commanders attacked him simultaneously, against the righteous rules of warfare Dharmayuddha, and gradually exhausted and killed him.

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abhimanyu


I am writing poetry based on Indian mythology/history for the April 2016 A to Z challenge. Please read, comment and share freely and do come back :)

Trishanku Swarga. Letter T of the # a to z challenge.

Satyavrat the Suryavanshi* King dear reader
Son of Prithu, ancestor of Sri Rama
Parent to Raja Harishchandra
Is the man of my tale today.
Stay with me and we shall traverse
His life's strange ambition and how it all
Connects back to us today.

Ready to retire King Satyavrat gave up the
Throne and crowned his son King.
He felt he deserved Swarga and he did
Only hitch being that he wanted to get
There and stay there in his mortal shell
Against the laws of nature this was and
So he was denied his entry to heaven.

His guru, Rishi Vasishta refused performance of rites
To help his ascent and so Satyavrat approached
Shakti, oldest son of Rishi Vasisht for this
The son was unswerved and knew his father
To be right. Cursed he the king and then on
The king turned to Trishanku, a hideous form
Full of debilitating afflictions.



Now on we shall call him Trishanku, dear reader
And he was one steadfast man for he never gave up
And went about on a wander in the wilderness
Before he met Sage Vishwamitra with his plea
He still wanted to get to Swarga in his mortal form.
The Sage agreed, only to feed the fire of his rivalry
With the wise Rishi Vasishta.

Rituals began and Trishanku began to rise, reaching
Right up to the heavens. The devas led by Indra
Were shocked to see an actual person and ended
In pushing him back. The Sage not to be defeated
Kept on with the strength of his rituals to push him back
Finally even constructing a parallel heaven mid-air
To the south and this was called 'Trishanku Swarga'

Trishanku restored to his stately form, the Sage now
Began the task of crowning the man, new Indra at which
You guessed right. Indra and the Devas rushed to him and
Begged him to stop, apologising and explaining their
Previous act. The Sage was in a quandry, he had to
Agree to the good sense of the Devas and also uphold
His own promise to the quirky King.

A compromise was reached and everyone appeased
Trishanku got his own Heaven and hangs there upside
Down, Yet under the regime of Indra of Swarga and here
This story of mine finds its timely end but not before
We think a little on how we can easily trap our Self
In a limbo and hang between our needs and wants
Wanting what is not ours and that which never should be had.

* Solar dynasty
* The phrase "Trishanku's heaven" is used widely in India to describe similar situations faced in life. * It is also believed that Trishanku and Vaivasvata Manu are both the same.
* In astronomy, Trishanku corresponds to the constellation of Crux, also known as the Southern Cross

I am writing poetry based on Indian mythology/history for the April 2016 A to Z challenge. Please read, comment and share freely and do come back :)