LIFE IS ETERNAL

 

LIFE  IS  ETERNAL

Death is the most important topic that engages the attention of human beings soon after they become a little mature.  They know from their everyday experience that death is the end of life.  People don’t live on this earth for ever.  They die when their tenure, and each individual has his/her own tenure, ends. It can happen at any stage of life ---- childhood, youth, middle age and mostly in old age. 

Old age itself is the least enjoyable stage  because of the drained energy and the sickly organs of the body.

Though death is certain, hardly a few people welcome it or invite it.  They wish to live on in whatever state of physical or mental health they may be. To cut the matter short, , death is dreadful. Its sure arrival robs individuals of a peaceful sleep long before they actually die.

Urdu poet Mirza Ghalib (1797-1869) asks in a couplet if the date of one’ s death is fixed and it cannot come earlier, how  is it that its fear kills one’s nocturnal sleep almost daily.  

The fear of death makes many individuals timid. They abandon many activities which need courage becoming forgetful of the impending death.

               On the other side there are some great poets and spiritualists who try to motivate  us to become fearless of death.

See what the English metaphysical  poet John Donne(1573-1631) says in the following sonnet:

                        DEATH, BE NOT PROUD

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful for thou art not so;

For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow

Die not, poor Death; nor yet canst thou kill me.

 

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,

Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow;

And soonest our best men with thee do go----

Rest of their bones and souls’ delivery !

 

Thou’rt slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell;

And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well

And better than thy stroke.  Why swell’st thou then?

 

One short sleep past, we wake eternally,

And Death shall be no more; Death though shall die.

 

                        “One short sleep past, we wake eternally” is not only Donne’s belief  but also of many others who think  that the spirit of life is immortal. Dr. Sir Mohammad Iqbal, a great Urdu and Persian poet ( 1873-1938) asserts that the period of life cannot be calculated in terms of days and nights.  Life  is an everlasting entity , it has no end, no terminal stage, no stoppage. It continues to flowing like a timeless river.

 

                        The point  on which most of the poets and spiritualists have laid stress  is that individuals are a combination of body and soul. The body is not the whole of life. It is just a part of it and for that matter a material part which is perishable. The soul is the non-material part and this part is imperishable. It is immortal. This is what Lord Krishna said to his hesitant  disciple Arjuna in ‘The Bhagvadgita”. Arjuna hesitated to fight against his rival kinsmen because they would be killed and that would be sinful. It is at this stage that the great  Lord tells him the truth about the body and the soul.

 

            “As a man, casting off old clothes, puts on others and new ones so the embodied (Self ) , casting off old bodies , goes to others and new ones. Weapons do not divide the Self (into pieces) ; fire does not burn it; waters do not moisten it ; the wind does not dry it up. It is not divisible; it is not combustible; it not to be moistened; it is not to be dried up. It is everlasting, all-pervading, stable, firm, and eternal. “ 

 

            In Ancient European Philosophy, Pythagoras is believed to have taught a similar doctrine which is called “Transmigration” or “Metempsychosis”.

A story goes that Pythagoras once heard a dog howling and appealed to its master not to beat it, as he recognised the voice of his departed friend.  It was from this that the world knows he  decided to teach the doctrine of Transmigration. (Burnet, Early Greek Philosophy. P.84-85).

 

            Finally, an anonymous poem entitled: ‘THERE IS NO DEATH’ :

 

THERE is a plan far greater than the plan you know;

There is a landscape broader than the one you see,

There is a haven where storm-tossed souls may go ---

You call it death ----we, immortality.

 

You call it death --- this seeing endless sleep;

We call it birth --- the soul at last set free,

‘Tis hampered not by time or space --- you weep.

Why weep at death? . ‘Tis immortality.

 

Farewell, dear voyageur ---‘twill not be long.

Your work is done --- now may peace rest with thee.

Yor kindly thoughts and deeds ---- they will live on.

This is not earth ----‘Tis immortality.

 

Farewell, dear voyageur  --- the river winds and turns;

The cadence of your song wafts near to me,

And now you know the thing that all men learn:

There is no death ---There’s immortality.

 

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23 September 2021                                         G. R. KANWAL

 

A CREED (A Poem by Edwin Markham)

 

A   CREED

(A Poem by  Edwin Markham)

                        THERE is a destiny that makes us brothers

                                None goes his way  along:

                         All   that  we  send into the lives of others

                                 Comes back into  our  own.            

 

                          I care not what his  temples or his creeds,

                                    One  thing holds firm and fast ---

                           That in to his fateful heap of days and deeds

                                    The soul of man is cast.

Edwin Markham was born on 23 April  1852  at  Oregon City, United States. He passed away on 7 March at Staten Island, New York, United States. His original name was Charles Edward Anson Markham. He was about 43, when he dropped Charles and adopted  Edwin.

 

Edwin as not just a  poet among poets. .  He was different because of his exclusive  interest in the unhappy life of labourers exploited by the capitalistic class. His popularity shot up the day his poem “The Man with the Hoe”, which begins with the following lines, was published. :

 

                                    Bowed by the weight of centuries he leans

                                    Upon his hoe and gazes on the ground,

                                    The emptiness of the ages in his face,

And on his back the burden of the world.

 

Edwin appeared  as the voice of the workers, when  there were  no supporters of  their rights and principles of social justice in the United States.

 

                                    “A Creed” is a great poem on universal brotherhood, in the     face of different creeds and individual houses of worship. Its message  is the unity of mankind ordained by an invisible  destiny :  

                                   

“There is a destiny that makes us brothers;

                                    None goes his way alone.

                                    All that  we send into the lives of others

                                    Comes back into our own. “

Edwin believes that “none goes his way alone” because he is surrounded by a caravan of countless co-travellers , walking with him in spiritual relationship.   There exists a spiritual bond among all human beings. It mutually affects their lives.  What we send into  the lives of others comes back into our own  because into the ‘fateful heap of days and deeds/The soul of man is cast.’ People are physically aloof but spiritually together.         

           

To put it briefly, ‘A Creed’ is a poem about  much-need religious harmony and inter-faith unity.    

 

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29^th August 2021                                                G.R.Kanwal                                                                    

THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE GLOW-WORM (A poem by William Cowper)

 

THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE GLOW-WORM

                              (A poem by William Cowper)

 

A NIGHNGALE that all day long

Had cheered the village with his song,

Nor yet at even his note suspended,

Nor yet when even time was ended,

Began to feel, as well he might,

The keen demands of appetite;

When looking eagerly around,

He spied far off, upon the ground,

A something shining in the dark,

And knew the glow-worm by his spark;HHHHHHHHuuggghhhhh/0+.21

So, stooping down from hawthorn top,

He thought to put him in his crop.

 

The worm, aware of his intent,

Harangued him thus, right eloquent;

“Did you admire my lamp,” quoth he,

“As much as I your minstrelsy,

You would abhor  to do me wrong,

As much as I to spoil your song;

For ‘twas the selfsame Power Divine

Taught you to sing, and me to shine;

That you with music, I with light,

Might beautify and cheer the night.”

The songster heard this short oration,

And warbling out his approbation,

Released him, as my story tells,

And found a supper somewhere .

 

The English poet, William Cowper, was among the most famous of his time. He was born on 26^th November 1731 and died  of edema on 25^th April 1800. According to literary history , his work was appreciated by a large audience. His attention to nature and common life , which prefigured the concerns of Romantic poets like William Wordsworth , inspired  Samuel Taylor Coleridge to regard him “the best modern poet.” He is credited to have changed the direction of 18^th century nature poetry  by his  writings  about the daily  scenes of the English countryside.

According  to William J. Long, a literary historian, Cowper shows the struggle between  romantic and classical ideals. As  for his life , it was a pathetic story of a shy and timid genius who found the world of men too rough, and who withdrew to nature like a wounded animal.

On the whole Cowper’s poems look dreary , and are only occasionally  marked by a certain gentleness and a vein of pure humor .

 

Of all his works, The Task  (1785) which carries description of homely scenes, of woods and brooks ,  of plowmen and  teamsters is the best.

Cowper is also famous  for his numerous hymns and a collection of  letters published in 1803.

Last and most famous of all is his humorous compositions is the ballad “John Gilpin” which , says William J. Long,  should be read by every student , if not the whole, at least  the last  stanza :

Now let us sing, Long live  the King,

And Gilpin, long live he !

And wen he next doth ride abroad

May I be there to see.

 

Cowper has left  many remarkable quotes like:  

 

(I)God moves in a mysterious way. His wonders to perform, He plants his footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the storm.  (II) Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face. (III) God made the country, and man made the town. (IV) Wisdom is humble that he knows no more. (V) O solitude , where are the charms That sages have seen in thy face? Better dwell in  the midst of alarms, Than reign in the horrible place. (VI) Variety’s  the very spice of life, that gives it  all its flavour.

 

            THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE GLOW-WORM is a fable with multiple morals. Both the characters in the poem have been given human qualities. The nightingale is a bigger creature. After delighting the village with his melodious song , he feels keenly hungry; spots a glow-worm and decides to eat him. The glow-worm perceiving his intention, uses his oration in such  a manner that the  nightingale takes no time to  change his mind.   

 

            The contents of the glow-worm’s speech are quite  illuminating. He tells the nightingale that  both of them admired each other’s respective qualities. The world needed both of them , one for the delightful song and the other for much-loved  light. Not only this,  both of them have been assigned these roles , not by earthly but by the same heavenly power.  

 

“It was  the self-same Power Divine

Taught you to sing, me to shine;

That you with music, I with light,

Might beautify and cheer the night.      

 

The glow-worm’s oration had the magical impact upon the  nightingale who released him immediately and ‘found a supper somewhere else.”

            Some of the morals conveyed through this fable are:  The creator of all beings is one; all have their respective roles to play; all should  appreciate each other’s qualities and  learn to co-exist peacefully.  

 

             Briefly, the poem is a plea for the politically pronounced  policy of ‘Live and let live”.  By suggestion, it is also a strong argument for avoiding violence and treating all nations, big or small , with the same degree of respect.  

  

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23 August 2021                          G. R. Kanwal

WHEN SHYLOCK CRIED In Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice”

 

                         WHEN  SHYLOCK  CRIED

In Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice”

 

In this 16^th century play, Antonia,  a Christian merchant,  takes a heavy loan from a Jewish moneylender,  Shylock,  on the condition that if he doesn’t repay the loan by the deadline, Shylock will have the right to take a pound of his flesh.

At the time the play was written, the Jews stood infamous and disrespectable. There was inter-religious disharmony which is strongly reflected in the following speech of Shylock in answer to a question by an Antonio’s friend Salarino.

Salarino. I am sure, if he forfeit , thou shall not take his flesh: what is that good for ?

Shylock. …if it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me, and hindered me (caused me to lose) half a million; laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated (incited) mine enemies; and what is his reason ? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes ? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions (limbs), senses, affections, passions ? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is ? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh ?  If you poison us , do we not die? And if you wrong us; shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian , what is his humility (kindness, humanity) ?  Revenge . If a Christian wrong a Jew , that should his sufferance (endurance) be by Christian example  ? Why, revenge. The villainy you teach me , I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better (improve) the instruction. “

        Shylock’s cry emphasises two great truths. First, all humanity is one. There is no biological difference between a Christian and a Jew. There is also no emotional and psychological difference in their personalities.  The followers of both the religions are also subject to the same physical hurts and their healing devices. Their affections and passions are no different. The second truth is  that  revenge breeds revenge. To hate and harm a person because he is a Jew will compel a Jew to treat a Christian similarly.  

            Shylock’s cry is a very loud message  for religious antagonists.  It succeeds in   establishing that creedal inequalities are man-made. For God all humans are equal. It is, therefore, necessary that they recognise amongst themselves a physical, mental and emotional co-relation  and  refrain from mutual hatred. Hatred cannot breed love, nor can revenge breed tolerance. To dream about social harmony , when we do not  treat the people of other faiths with the same spirit of love and  respect as  we do  ourselves is vain. Religious harmony  cannot be had as a gift , it has to be earned.

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19^th August 2021                                                                    G.R.Kanwal                    

     

N O W (A Poem by A. A. Procter)

      

                                     N     O      W

                                             (A Poem by A. A. Procter)      

 

RISE ! For the day is passing

And you lie dreaming on;

The others have buckled their armour,

And forth to the fight are gone:

 

A place in the ranks awaits you,

Each man has some part to play;

The Past and the Future are nothing,

In the face of the stern today.

 

Rise from your dreams of the Future----

Of gaining  some hard-fought field;

Of storming some airy fortress,

Or bidding some giant yield:

 

Your future has deeds of glory,

Of honour (God grant it may!)

But your arm will never be stronger,

Or the need so great as Today.

 

Rise  ! if the past detains you,

Her sunshine and storms forget;

No chains so unworthy to hold you

As those of a vain  regret :

 

Sad or bright, she is lifeless ever,

Cast her phantom arms away,

Nor look back, save to learn the lesson

Of a nobler strife Today.

 

Rise ! for the day is passing:

The sound that you scarcely hear

Is the enemy marching to battle ----

Arie ! for the foe is here !

 

Stay not to sharpen your weapons,

Or the hour will strike at last,

When from dreams of a coming battle,

You may wake to find it past !

                          …………

            The English poet Adelaide Anne Procter was born on 30^th October 1825 at Bedford Square, London. She died on 2^nd February 1864 as a patient of tuberculosis   

 

Her biographers highlight her precocious intelligence on the basis of  her considerable proficiency in French, German, and Italian. She was also very good at drawing and in music. 

Surrounded by a favourable environment, she developed a keen interest in literature and  started composing poetry at a very young age. She was just eighteen when she contributed her poems to the “Book of Beauty”.

Procter  wrote profusely.  Charles Dickens, the novelist,  got her poems in the magazines with which he himself was associated.  

Procter is stated  to have become not only a  famous  poet of Victorian era but also a favourite poet of Queen Victoria.  Her success never went to her head. Her father was also a poet. She is reported to have  remarked: “Papa writes poetry; I write verses.”

 

               Procter was a practical humanist. Her concern  for the sick, the    destitute, homeless, and less fortunate of her own sex was of a very high degree.

 

                  “Now “ is an inspirational poem. Its very first line is a wake-up call. It tells the lethargic soldiers to get up because  others have already buckled their armour ‘and forth to the fight are gone.”

 

The lethargic soldiers are absent from their ranks. They have failed to realise that  each man has some part to play, and moreover it is the present moment which is most important doing one’s duty.

 

Compared with the stern present, the shadowy past and the hazy future are totally insignificant. Dreams about winning great battles in the future are unrealistic  because  dreamers will not be so strong  then as  they are today.    

 

                 The poet advises the readers to get up and disallow the bright and dull times of the past to detain them from going to their fields of action. The past whether it was sad or bright is now lifeless. Its phantom arms  should not be allowed to hold them back.

 

The past  can be  good only to learn the lesson of fighting  a nobler strife    

Today.

                    The poem is a repeated call to the lethargic to become instantly active.  They should not lose even a single moment in sharpening their weapons because any delay will  result in their irreversible defeat and  their dreams about fighting future battles will also end once for all.  

 

                     The title of the poem is “Now” which means only the current moment real.  Dwelling on the past is wasteful and dreaming about the future is sheer stupidity.

                                               

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18^th August 2021                                 G. R. Kanwal

                                                                          

 

H A P P I N E S S

 

H A P P I N E S S

Happiness is a poem by  Emily Perkins  Bissell,  an American social worker and activist  (May 31, 1861-March 8, 1948) who wrote under the pseudonym Priscilla Leonard.

She was born in Wilmington, Delaware, where , at very young age, she became famous for establishing in the city its first public kindergarten and  for introducing in the state the child labour laws. According to her biographers,  in 1883 , she founded an organization, currently known as the West End Neighbourhood House to render social services to German families and immigrant Irish of Wilmington.

HAPPINESS is one of her best- known inspirational poems. It reads as follows:

HAPPINESS is like a crystal

Fair and exquisite and clear,

Broken in a million pieces

Shattered, scattered far and near.

Now and then along life’s pathway,

Lo! Some shining fragments fall;

But there are so many pieces

No one ever finds them all.

 

You may find a bit of beauty,

Or an honest share of wealth,

While another just beside you

Gathers honor, love or health.

Vain to choose or grasp unduly,

Broken is the perfect ball;

And there are so many pieces

No one ever finds them all.

 

Yet the wise as on they journey

Treasure every fragment clear,

Fit them as they may together,

Imaging the shattered sphere,

Learning ever to be thankful

Though their share of it is small;

For it has so many pieces

No one ever finds them all.

           

            Happiness, which is the theme of this poem, has no definite meaning.  It is lexically described as cheerfulness, high spirits, carefreeness, euphoria, ecstasy, merriment and bliss. There are many more descriptions.  For example, a happy man is expected to be a  pleased, delighted, gratified, satisfied , fortunate or  contented man. On  the basis of such expectation, some social scientists and philosophers assert that the existence of happiness is an illusion; the reality is  its ceaseless pursuit.

 

All the states of happiness listed above are transitory. They go on changing. AS the English novelist  Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) said happiness is an occasional episode in a general drama of pain;  and American author Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-64) says: “Happiness in this world , when it comes, comes incidentally,--Make it  the object of pursuit, and it leads us a wild-goose chase, and is never attained.

           

Priscilla Leonard’s poem begins like this:

           

Happiness is like a crystal,

            Fair and exquisite and clear,

            Broken in a million pieces,

            Shattered, scattered far and near.

            Now and then along life’s pathway,

            Lo! Some shining fragments fall,

            But there are so many pieces

            No one ever finds them all.

 

English biographer John Aiken (1747-1822)  echoes this idea in these words:  The sunshine of life is made up of very little beams that are bright all the time.” Add to this the words of John Porter, American authoress (Born 1960): “Happiness is a sunbeam which may pass through a thousand bosoms without losing a particle of its original ray; nay, when it strikes on a kindred heart, like the converged light or a mirror, it reflects itself with redoubled brightness. It is not perfected till it is shared. “           

 

For Priscilla happiness is a collective noun comparable to a crystal ball which is not only blear but also fair and exquisite.  In its shattered and scattered shape, one can see its million pieces along life’s pathway. These pieces symbolise various sources of happiness like beauty, love, honour, health and wealth and many more.  However, no human being can collect all these pieces and make them his own exclusive share.  The pieces of this ball are meant to be shared by the entire humanity.

 

The metaphor of crystal ball selected  by Priscilla has spiritual significance. Whereas the crystal ball  is used to make predictions, it also  registers its presence on many pious  occasions like weddings and sacred celebrations. It is therefore a divine gift for which man should be readily grateful. What Priscilla intends to say is that health and happiness, love and beauty, honour and fame are bestowed by God , in whatever measure,  and it is the religious duty of man to express his gratitude to God.  The wise, says she, treasure every fragment clear…learning ever to be thankful, though their share of it is small, for it has so many pieces no one ever finds them all.      

 

 Finally, the following words of French philosopher, Blaise Pascal (1623-63): ”Happiness is neither within us only, or without us, it is the union of ourselves with God.“

 

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3^rd August 2021                                                                                  G. R. Kanwal

 

 

 

 

 

 

THESE ARE THE GIFTS I ASK (A Poem by Henry Van Dyke)

 

THESE  ARE  THE  GIFTS  I  ASK

    (A Poem by Henry Van Dyke)

 

Henry Van Dyke (1852-1933) was an American clergyman, author and diplomat.  Between 1899 and 1923 , he was, for more than two decades, a professor of English literature in Princeton University. During the years 1908-09, he served as an American lecturer at the University of Paris. It was in 1913 that his former classmate, President Woodrow Wilson, appointed him Minister to the Netherlands and Luxembourg.

 

Henry Dyke is famous for a host of readable books like: The Story of the Other Wise Man; The Mansion; The First Christmas Tree; Little Rivers: A Book of Essays in Profitable Idleness; The Poems of Henry Dyke and the builders and other poem. All these books are still available all over the world.

 

Henry Dyke is also remembered for some of his wonderful quotes:  

 

“Time  is too slow for those who wait, two swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those wo rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity.”

 

“A friend is what the heart needs all the time.”

 

“Some succeed because  they are determined to succeed, but most succeed because they are determined to.“     

 

“Some people ae so afraid to die that they never begin to live.”

 

“Be glad of life because it gives you the chance to love, to work, to play, and to look        up at the stars.”

 

“Happiness is inward, and not outward, and so, it does not depend on what we have, but on what we are.”

 

             “THESE ARE THE GIFTS I ASK” is one of the best-loved poems of Henry Dyke.  It is very short, but very significant. Its text reads as follows:

 

            THESE are the gifts I ask

            Of Thee, Spirit serene:

            Strength for the daily task,

            Courage to face the road,

            Good cheer to help me bear the traveler’s load,

            And , for the hours of rest that come between,

                          An inward joy of all things heard and seen.

              These are the sins I fain

              Would have Thee take away

               Malice and cold disdain,

               Hot anger, sullen hate,

               Scorn of the lowly, envy of the great,

               And discontent that casts a shadow gray

               On all the brightness of the common day.

                                      

Anthologists  have appropriately included this poem in the ‘Faith and Immortality’ section. The poet’s prayer here is addressed  to God , Spirit serene’. He wants Him to grant some gifts. Before we proceed further, let us note that gifts are not rights. They come to us as tokens of love or boons and  benedictions which you can turn into your natural attributes, and can use them,  as in  this poem,  to get rid of such behavioural infirmities which succeed in  robbing  you of your much-needed  serenity in day-to-day affairs,

 

In the first stanza of the poem,  the poet seeks from God the qualities of an upright, strong man who can firmly discharge his daily duties, bear the burden which a traveller has  carry on his head while walking on the tedious road of life. The journey is long, but dotted   with intervals,  during which the poet wants ‘An inward joy of all things heard and seen.’

 

According to the poet, the serenity sought by him cannot be obtained , if by  the blessings of God, he does not liberate himself from the evils of malice, cold disdain, hot anger, sullen hate, scorn of the lowly , the envy of the great and the discontentment which turns a bright day into a shadowy one.     

             

            The central idea of the poem is that we inevitably need divine help both in acquiring cardinal virtues and abandoning deadly vices.      

 

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30 July 2021                                                                                    G.R.Kanwal