Keteki

By RAGHUNATH CHOUDHARY
(Rendered from the Assamese by Prof. P. Goswami)

Translator’s Note: Keteki is the Assamese for the Indian nightingale with its haunting cry heard in open heaths and at the dead of night. Sri Rashunath Choudhary’s Keteki, published in 1920, is a paean to this bird of mysterious voice and no less mysterious presence. It consists of five ‘Waves’, of which the first and second are here rendered into English.

The Keteki had haunted the Poet since his childhood days. It was rather late in life, in an orangery a few miles from Gauhati, that he was shown the bird by a Mikir tribal dwelling there. It was a sort of revelation and the Poet set about celebrating this voice, this mystery, which had for him the message of sympathy and love and appeared as the awakening pulsating through the universe. In language which is simple and repetitive as in the folk-song of the countryside, the Poet describes the reactions produced by the bird’s music in his mind and in the life of Nature.

The Poet’s early life (he was born in 1879) was one of considerable suffering and bereavement. He had a fall from the verandah and this lamed him for life; he lost his parents, and what property he had his relatives managed to take away. He grew up with his uncle at Gauhati. He did not marry. Late in life, before and during the World War, he came to edit two magazines. This editorial work brought him in touch with younger writers whose standpoint he can appreciate. During these two or three years he has suffered considerable physical pain. He fell twice and thus twisted his wrists, he had fever and somehow managed to lose the power of one of his eyes. But nothing seems to daunt-him: at present he is leading the Peace Movement of the State.

With just a few years’ schooling, what little learning the Poet has is culled from Assamese, Bengali, and Sanskrit sources. His greatest teacher has been Nature. Personal sorrows and a sense of loneliness seem to have drawn him to the beauties and soothing features of Nature; and birds, especially, came to symbolise for him all that he has missed in life. Before he composed his Keteki he had anticipated this major poem in one or two lyrics on the Keteki and the dahikatara. Rightly has he been entrenched in the Assamese reader’s heart as Bird-Poet. In this poem is a synthesis of a Western way of looking at Nature with an Indian way of expression. It is undeniable that modern Indian poets have been deeply influenced by the mystical attitude to Nature of the English Romantic Poets.

FIRST WAVE

Whence have you come, my pet,
Which way are you flying,
and why have you come this far distance
roaming all alone?
Shunning habitation in this desolate region,
in language that cannot be followed,
what you are crying for
I cannot make out, O bird!
What treasure, rare to gods, have you brought?
to whom will you give it?
or perhaps, the best there is in this land
you are carrying away?
On peaks of unscalable mountains
do you make your melody,
sometimes on banks of streams
you break the silence.
In lone forests, in open heaths
what do you carry about in your mind?
where have you left the jewel of your heart
to move about so disconsolate?
I cannot make out, insensitive that I am,
what so obsesses you,
what you wail about,
what it is that gnaws at your heart.
Your parents, your brothers, all you’ve left
you have left your birth-place,
and the nest that you made of leaves and twigs,
what magic potion made you do so?
This land is not the Nandan garden,
it is not Amaravati,
there ale so many paths–true and false,
there is so much trouble.
Do you realize, O bird, that in the magic forest
you are sojourning,
magicians in magic guise will
catch your neck in meshes?
The snares of delusion
the wicked hunter has laid out well;
consider what you do, O bird,
cautiously do you move.
You have come expecting
some rare thing to find, to peck at,
there’s a lot of tempting things,
you might get befooled!
Selfless love you won’t find here,
you won’t find real happiness;
who will proffer you tender words,
who will realize your grief?
To share your weal and woe then
is there anyone–
mate in life, half of your soul?
has she accompanied you?
Though, O bird, a puny creature you are,
and poor in strength,
there is in you a world of love
to pour forth day and night.
For the welfare of the world
did you take bird shape,
with the pure thread of love
the entire world did you entwine.
It is Providence at the start of creation
that carefully shaped you,
to hand on the taste of love have you come
in the guise of a divine messenger.
Reaching out your neck this way and that
what do you peer at,
at whose separation
does your heart melt?
Whose message have you brought, dear,
to whom will you speak?
at your melting voice
so deeply I am moved.
If you have brought news of loss
do not let us hear of it,
if you have brought news of union
sing out in tender melody.
The moment you came you entranced the seas,
entranced the hills and forests,
with one nectar-flowing note
you entranced the entire world.
In desolate and desert lands
you sang your vitalizing song,
and in ground that was dry and barren
you made a superb garden.
In the kingdom of love you became queen
and did wonders,
pouring streams of melody
you decked Nature in youthful raiment.
I was deep in the sleep of delusion,
neither sensation nor consciousness I had,
then you sang and roused me
and now I am wild with joy.
In the palace of illusion I was seeing
a series of transient dreams,
at your song loosened
the ties of my obsession.
Though I was born a mortal
following the ways of the world,
it was your song which taught me
of divine love and affection...
It is because you come with the message of love,
there is the speech of affection,
the soft smile, the sidelong glance;
of the dispirited you are the stay...

SECOND WAVE

It is Spring, the mango blossoms,
the jack-fruit buds,
and the sweet-tongued cuckoo to see you
comes with her hair parted.
She is not good to the eye,
her body is black,
but singing on the soothing fifth note
she carries the merchandise of love.
At your music the maid Bahagi¹
decks her youthful person,
with you comes your associate
the cool southern breeze.
In the gardens, shrubs and creepers
put on new foliage, and
making superb arbours,
happiness on earth they spread.
At the gate of the tree-shaded cottage
there is the red asoka
it now pays you homage
and proffers clusters of blossoms.
The soft breeze stirs softly
the greenery of grass,
how they sparkle in the sunrays–
the bead-like pendulous flowers!
Various fragrant flowers
their fragrance waft and tender you
the affectionate greeting
they cherish in their heart...
Alighting on a tree at early dawn
you sing songs of the morning,
the silent earth rises
and stirs wave on wave.
The dahikatara in amourousness
frisks in various modes,
it but memorises your music
to pour it out again.
At the brink of the marsh
the chakravaka calls out,
and the stirring music
vibrates in the body of the wild duck.
It is at your music that innumerable birds,
in various dulcet tunes,
in deep forest and wild valley,
in praise of the Lord sing...
You have another associate,
the songstress maina,
she moves gracefully among tall trees
and sings Bihu songs. ²
The heart of the songstress, as it were,
is full of passion,
how it perches and sings.
how moving the music is!
It is you who taught wild birds
to sing so pleasingly
and the artless Flower-maid
to raise her veil and see...
Your mysterious magic voice
takes on different shapes,
for joy and sorrow
in the same tune ring.
How wildly you sing
at dead of night,
how you shoot your charm
and hit the soul of the chakravaka!
At separation from her lord, the sad bird
becomes mad, as it were,
and reaching out her neck for her love
in mistake she but peers at you.
At your music of separation,
the wives that are left behind,
remember their sojourning husbands,
and indulge in unaccountable thoughts!
The words of love spoken in days gone by,
the joys of meeting,
on the strings of their tender heart
how you play those old memories!
What is it you sing, O bird,
that entrances heart and soul,
that saddens the mind
of these poor ladies?
How at your voice
the mind of a person responds!
I cannot describe what he thinks,
whose image he cherishes.
At your voice the shy daughter-in-law
stops weaving at her loom,
the shuttle stays in her hand
and speech she loses.
The same voice makes marriageable girls
forget themselves,
and the spindle in the spinning-wheel
stays unmoved.
Cheerfully talking of their sweethearts,
young girls
swaying like the duck,
were going to the ghat,
When stealthily flying there
from a roadside tree,
with full passion, what was it you sang,
that put them in a flutter?
With hearts yearning and enraptured,
they stood gazing at you,
from their hair loosened and fell
the malatis that were there.
You stole their hearts and flew away,
only left their minds unsettled,
now toes that are like champa buds
get knocked off against the road...

¹ Bahagi, personification of the Spring, from Bahag or Baisakh.
² Springtime songs sang at the Biha festival.