Poetry at Sangam
Poetry at Sangam showcases poetry in English and translations as well as essays on poetics and news of new releases.
Shobhana’s recent book of haibun, A Sky Full of Bucket Lists, published by Red River in 2021, was conferred the Rabindranath Tagore Literary Prize 2021-2022. The book has also been awarded The Touchstone Distinguished Books Award, 2021, Honourable Mention, instituted by The Haiku Foundation, USA. She is a memoirist, biographer and chronicler of regional histories and people with seven published works. She has two books of poetry published by Writers Workshop. Her poem, ‘Just Married’ was selected and translated by Gulzar in his monumental work, A Poem a Day, published by HarperCollins, in 2020. Forthcoming, are a work of collaborative translations from Tamil to English.
She is founder of Small Differences, an NGO that works with the elderly homeless, transgender community and vulnerable women and children. She also works in the spaces of education and branding.
‘Thiruvasakaththirkku urugaathar oru vasagathirkum urugaar’
‘The heart that does not melt for the sacred utterances of the Thiruvasakam will melt for none other at all.’
This is an ancient saying that succinctly encapsulates the experiential bliss of savouring the 51 cantos, 658 poems, written in a supreme state of Ananda, by poet-seer Manikkavacagar.
I was gifted a copy of Thiruvasakam’s translation by Reverend G.U. Pope more than a decade ago by Tamil scholar, Thiru Veera Sakthi. Naturally, I was drawn to the original rendition. I began to study this sublime offering and I was drawn for life. A quiet urge to attempt translation of this masterpiece began to niggle inside me, growing into an unassailable urge to embark on the task in the recent years. I was introduced to an in-depth study of the text by Dr. Neela Venkatachalam, disciple and daughter-in-law of world-renowned Saivite scholar, Smt. Swarna Somasundaram. Over the brief number of times that I listened to Dr. Neela, she would often pause and begin to weep at the magnificence of the verses. This was my scholarly introduction to Thiruvasakam.
For many years, I merely listened to audio renditions of the various hymns and readings, and each time, the lyric, metre and words overwhelmed me. Translation seemed daunting a task, for how does one begin to work on a canon? In a chance conversation with senior translator, Priya Sarukkai Chabria, I was struck by the depth of her scholarship in bhakti poetry. Her work soars from the text, leaping into the subliminal layers of what poet seers like Andal and Manikkavacagar have envisioned in their work. When she invited me to collaborate, it was a Guru’s beckoning.
My versions of the extraordinary verses by Saint Manikkavacagar begin and end with the attempt of a bhakta, devotee, an eternal student, and one who is endlessly in awe of the aphorisms, the sense of complete surrender in the words, beauty of the Tamil language, and the mysticism enshrouded in the text. The recurrent theme of eschewing everything that is true of this world—aavanam / ego, kanmam / karma and maya / illusion, is for me, a call for constant recentring of thought and action.
Manikkavacagar renders these songs in various stages of exaltation, illumination and oneness with Him. He travels the span of Tamil country, moving from Thirupperunthurai, where he consecrates a temple for Lord Siva with the money the king has apportioned for the purchase of Arabian horses, to Thiruvannamalai, Uththarakosamangai, Thiruvarur and several others, and culminates in Thillai, Chidambaram, where he ultimately walks in and merges into the Light.
For the poet–sage, every aspect of daily life becomes a metaphor to see and seek the ultimate truth—the dragonfly, flowers for worship, the koel, a game of dance and song, a recital of deeds of glory. He alternates between different states, from the rapturous, to wonder, amazement, pleading, beseeching, but always in relentless pursuit of the ultimate—ridding oneself of the endless cycle of birth and death and surrendering at the Lord’s feet. Therefore, every word becomes an entire world in itself, endlessly giving in meaning and metaphor.
When reading the lines together, Priya and I were often stunned at the possible interpretations a word offered. At these moments, we would brim over, and our experience of writing and translating would take on a meaning that we did not know we were coming into. This is where the benefit of having two approaches elevated the experience for us.
The symbol of the feet speaks to me, for this is the highest offering of a bhakta—to seek refuge in divine benevolence. In my effort, I have refrained from all capitalisation except those that belong to the ultimate, Siva, Him. Everything else, even the other gods belong to one ground, He to another. Punctuation is intentionally sparse, for in close reading, one word is a vein exploding into another. Punctuation sometimes mars the willingness of the reader to be taken through the subliminal strata.
Space is the motif and meaning of the temple at Chidambaram. It is the Chidambara Rahasya, an open space that is revealed to the seeker by physically lifting a veil. When the seeker peers into the expanse, the reality that all else is maya, and what remains is the all-pervasive being of Oneness, comes upon her as the Ultimate Truth. Chidambaram is where the Lord wrote down the entire text of the Thiruvasakam as Manikkavacagar dictated it, and left at the door of the sanctum sanctorum of the presiding deity. Space, therefore, is an interpretation that I have explored in the manner of placing the words, lines and stanzas. It is also a reference to the paucity of language and expression when attempting to describe notions, experiences, emotions and states of being.
When reading the verses aloud, one is struck by the beauty of the aural register. Internal rhyme, refrains, alliterations and brevity all come together like a forest orchestra. In writing in English, I have attempted to recreate some of these experiences of listening to the verses.
Interpretations have been sourced from numerous iconic interpretations and commentaries—Dr. Neela Venkatachalam’s instructions, the lucid explanations of the corpus by Pulavar Ve. Sivagnanam, Uraiasiriyar Ka. Subramania Pillai, Uraiasiriyar Va. Tha. Ramasubramaniam, on Saiva Siddhantham by Ve. Veerabhadran and illuminating lectures by legendary scholar of Thiruvasakam, Professor So. So. Meenakshi Sundaram. Reverend G.U. Pope’s is the gateway to understanding the magnitude of the verses in the language I now imagine, think and write in.
The three verses translated from different cantos draws from three principal ways in which Priya and I have approached our work. The offerings begin with Priya’s translation of Thiruvandappagudhi. The Thiruvempavai carries two interpretations for each verse, one Priya’s and the other, mine. In Keerthi Thiruagaval, we present one verse that I have independently translated. In Thiru Tholnokkam, both of us have translated different verses. Our intention is to offer but a glimpse into the worlds that Saint Manikkavacagar takes the bhakta on.
My offering of this body of work is that of the seeker, and all flaws in it are mine alone.
Canto 2: Keerthi Thiru Agaval / Song of Glory
Canto 7: Thiruvempavai / Song of Awakening
Canto 15: Thiru Tholnokkam / Song of Clapping
Poems 2023
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