Isavasya-Mrinalini Sarabhai’s Ode on The

ISA VASYA

[Isa vasya idom sarvam] *

MRINALINI SARABHAI’S ODE ON
THE MOTHER OF THE UNIVERSE

Awakened,
The mother of the Universe
Looked upon the vast spaces
Lying desolate

Upon the clouds of timelessness
A void
An emptiness­-
A waste
Crying out for fullness
To be created whole.
“Ya Devi sarva bhuteshu
Shahti rupenasamsthita”
She smiled
Radiance lit the Universe

Sparkling
A million dewdrops lit the azure nothing­ness.

She stretched out an arm as though beseeching
In that hushed moment;
Nature was born...

Slowly rising, unwinding herself
Gently with grace she laid out the earth
Trees grew, flowers blossomed,
Waters flowed, rivers streamed,
The earth was renewed and blessed
With each unravelling perfect
The beauty, yet incomplete
Till man appeared, primitive man.

Alone he stood, bewildered and forlorn,
softly within his mind she poured awareness,
knowledge, skill and strength
Discovering all, he hunted and he fished,
‘Learning to live among all living beings.
Yet, loneliness and restlessness darkened his hours
Till Devi herself willed into being the
deepest gift of all existence
The gift of love

Together they dwell, Prakriti and Purusha,
A wholeness of perfection.

Yet man accepts not happiness
Did not Christ call out in agony
“When I give people light
Why then do they choose darkness?’

Even with plenty, greed is born
The need for power to subjugate, destroy,
Raping the earth, not heeding
Earth mother’s cries of pain,
Ravaging her body, desecrating her soul.
Devi watches silently as she herself is stripped,
Disturbed yet compassionate her smile,
She sees around her only wreckage
All gifts bestowed, she draws within herself
Empties the land of all its wealth.

Man realises too late
She is the source
With terrible wrath
Kills her who brought him all her love
Time rolls ward
All memory lost
Man is again alone
It is the end of Brahma’s yuga.

Devi once more within herself
Draws her outstretched arm
Wonders,
When will I come again?
In silence the great mist
Envelopes her
In silence
Silence .....
MRINALINI SARABHAI

Mrinalini Sarabhai’s ISA VASYA is not the usual kind of verse we come across in magazines and journals. It is superior even to the work of talented writers who have made name for themselves as modern Indo­-Anglian poets. Wherein lies the superiority? It is the work of an artist with a vision, a profound spiritual vision. The theme of the poem rises far above the trivialities that concern most writers. Above all, the form and technique match the theme and the vision of the poem. Though the poem em­ploys unrhymed free verse and is not cast in the form of an address it reminds us of the great Odes of the past. The original Pindaric Odes are said to have been composed for performances of dance. Sometimes ISA VASYA comes very close to a dance (though very different from the kind of dance for which Pindar wrote) in the correspondence of the varying lengths of lines etc to the abhinaya of a dancer.

The vision of the poem is the boundless love and compassion of the Mother of the Universe. She creates the world and places man in it and blesses him with all gifts, the greatest of them being love. The mother gives an aspect of herself as his companion. All women, says the Devi Mahatmya, from which the poet quotes in a different context, are aspects of the Divine Mother­

STRIYAH SAMASTAN SAKALA JAGATSU

Man, filled with greed, not only destroys the world the mother has made but kills his companion. Even then the mother is compassionate towards him. She is forced to withdraw all the wealth she has bestowed on him and ultimately she withdraws herself from the Universe. But she waits silently to come to the world again.

The theme of the poem is the folly of man. He goes against the injunction of the Isa Vasya Upanishad:

            Magradhahkasya swiddhanam (Lust not after any man’s wealth).

Man is asked to enjoy by renunciation without greed. But the poet tells us.

            ‘Yet man accepts not happiness.
            Did not Christ call out in agony
            When I give people light
            Why do they choose darkness?’

In the development of the theme Mrinalini fuses the Hindu and the Christian lore. By bringing the Isa Vasya Upanishad in a poem where the Devi, the mother of the Universe, is the protagonist, the poet blends the Tantric with the Vedantic conceptions. While depicting the creation of man she identifies Adam and Eve with Purusha and Prakriti. Adam and Eve are a part of not merely the Christian lore but the whole Semitic tradition that includes Judaism, Islam and Christianity. The poet’s inclusive consciousness seeks to present a universal fact of life that transcends creeds and denominations.

“Isa Vasya” has three movements as in the Odes of the past. The first movement brings before us the mother’s creation of the world and man and her showering of all gifts including love on him. The second movement shows the birth of greed and man’s destruction of everything including his companion, an aspect of the mother herself as noted at the start. The third reveals the mother’s withdrawal from the world and her waiting to come again.

Let us analyse the three movements in detail and watch the unfolding of the theme and vision of the Ode.

We begin, not with the hour before the Gods awake, but with the movement when the mother is awake and becomes alive to what is before her and looks upon the vast emptiness. Soon we see her standing tall and erect in all her infinity:

            Ya Devi Sarvabhuteshu
            Shakti rupena samsthita

(Which Goddess stands firm and erect in the midst of all the elements in the form of Force).

The sonorous and majestic Sanskrit vocables and rhythm breaking into the En­glish add to the awe-inspiring quality of the Supreme Mother.

The lines, as indicated above, are from the Devi Mahatmyam (also called Chandi or Saptasati) Canto V. The first gesture of the statuesque figure of the mother is her smile which lights up the universe.

The lighting up of the universe is described in the brief stanza that follows with a very short line succeeded by a very long one,

‘Sparkling
A million dew drops lit the azure emptiness.’

The vast empty blue spaces being paved into a long milky way of stars, small and big, is shown as it were by the long line, whose length is emphasised by the short­ness of the line that precedes it. “Sparkling” means, of course, twinkling or shining.

It is in the next three lines we come very close to the correspondence of the length of lines to the limb-movements of a dancer:

            ‘She stretched out an arm as though  beseeching
            In that hushed moment Nature was born...’

The first long line literally stretches itself out to correspond to the movement of the arm. It also indicates the infinity of the mother whose arm stretches out to bound­less space. The second line is shorter and the third shorter yet. The gradual shortening of the lines is a gesture indicating the Infinite becoming finite in the birth of Nature.

The mother’s gesture silences every­thing to make the birth of Nature possible. The lines bring out the dramatic quality of the great event.

The correspondence of the move­ment of the lines to the limb-movements of a dancer is not always obvious. Let us return, for a movement, to the second stanza to study the subtlety and skill with which it is shown. The very syntax, the incomplete sen­tence followed by another incomplete sentence from Sanskrit (the lines Ya Devi... form a clause, not a sentence) succeeded by two short sentences are splendid suggestions which conjure up a series of postures of a dancer conveying rapidly the awakened mother who has looked upon the desolate vasts standing up firmly in the vastitudes of eternity and infinity and smiling and lighting up the universe.

The stanza opens with rather a long line,

            Upon the clouds of timeslessness...

Clouds veil, look vague and cause gloom. Eternity (timelessness) on which the dark
empty spaces hang, looks like a dim and gloomy stretch of clouds. The three short lines

            A void
            An emptiness
            A waste

reveal the insignificance of the vast spaces because of their vacuity. They cry to be filled up. Then we see the Supreme Mother’s form rising before us standing firm and erect in the midst of the all the elements. She smiles and her smile lights up the universe.

Even the opening stanza of the poem, in the light of what we have seen, is a dance gesture suggesting by the symmetry of the lines, –a long line, two short lines, another long line, - the Mother’s opening of her eyes and looking on the vast nothingness.

The fifth, sixth and seventh stanzas of the poem form the second movement describing the creation of the world and man and her showering her gifts on him. Slowly rising in her stature she lays down the earth gently with grace as though she is unwind­ing herself. Trees, flowers, waters (oceans, rivers) unravel the beauty of the earth which becomes complete and perfect with the creation of man. The mother pours on man various gifts and endows on him the final gift – love. The gift implies the creation of a companion for man-the woman. Man and woman are presented as Purusha and Prakriti.

The form and structure of stanza five suggests the vigorous footwork of the dancer,­

            ‘Trees grew, flowers blossomed,
            Waters flowed, rivers streamed...’

The movement of the body is de­scribed in

            Slowly rising, unwinding herself...

The limb-movement is obvious in the line,

            Gently with grace she laid out the earth...

Stanza six concerned with the primitive man on whom Mother showers her gifts suggests the appropriate abhinaya,

            Discovering all, he hunted and fished,
            Learning to live with all living beings.

The Seventh stanza makes us see Purusha and Prakriti, Adam and Eve, the two in one.

            Together they dwell, Prakriti and Purusha, A wholeness of perfection.

One remembers the comment of Sri Aurobindo, (Sri Aurobindo Birth centenary library edition, Vol 12 p.46)

            ‘The Man and Woman, universal Adam and Eve, are really one and each incomplete without the other, barren without the other and inactive without the other.’

The last movement of the Ode shows man’s deliberate destruction of all that Mother has made and given him.

The eighth stanza beginning the last movement strikes the key-note with the ago­nized cry of the Saviour of Man-who can save him? Christ himself could not do it:­

            When I give people light
            Why then do they choose darkness?

The ninth stanza that shows man’s rape of the earth and Mother’s withdrawal of gifts suggests a brisk movement of the dancer’s limbs.

            Even with plenty, greed is born...

The Supreme Mother identifies her­self with the Earth Mother who is stripped. Even then the Mother of the Universe does not lose her compassion,­ -

            isturbed yet compassionate her smile,
            he sees around her only wreckage.

But she has to draw all gifts bestowed and has to empty the land of all its wealth.

he penultimate stanza of the poem sees Man all alone because he kills his com­panion, herself a form of the mother, source of everything that provokes his greed and the subsequent destruction. The Brahma-yuga or the era of creation comes to an end.

The Devi, whom we see at the start awaking to the desolate spaces and creating a marvellous world, has to draw the outstretched arm. Yet she wonders as to when she should come again. Her grace is abounding and love infinite. But for the present, silence envelops her.

The second line of the last stanza,

            ‘Draws her outstretched arm’

much shorter than the one the first line of the fourth stanza which stretches itself out as it were, is a beautiful gesture of the act of withdrawal. There are many such gestures in the poem like the repetition of silence in the last two lines which make the whole vision “dance” before our eyes.

* This is for the habitation by the Lord (Isa Upanishad verse, Sri Aurobindo’s translation) Courtesy ‘Main Stream’ - April 1991