Arrival of Sanidhya's birthday is a new year for me when I open my eyes to feel and see ...
My Dearest Beta Sanidhya,
The year gone by as the previous year, time moved at its own pace and took me with it. Each moment had a distinct thought of yours, so I closed my eyes and floated as time took me to its memory lanes, passing by …
every year,
every month,
every day,
every morning,
every evening,
every moment … moments with you,
moments with your smile,
moments with images of your tiny hands, small-tiny abrupt laughter-giggles.
Each year on this day, your birthday, I open my eyes to release some prints of my journey without you, some of my writings which give glimpse of celebration of the feeling of pain without you with me, these sacred green leafs photosynthesized with my omni thoughts, wrapped in the most cherished memories of you with me. So today let a father and also a fakir enjoy and relinquish the celebration of …
your heart beats in your mother’s womb,
the sweat on my forehead on every pregnancy checkup of you and your mother,
tears of joy when I held you in St. Vincent ,
shiver in my hands when I gave your head a bath just after your birth,
joy of my soul when I held you against my chest and you slept,
feel of your mouth when I finger fed you,
smell of the air and dirt when I cleaned the house so that you can come to the house,
excitement and sweet whispers in air on my way back from apartment to take you and your mother’s discharge from St. Vincent ,
lifelessness of my spine, shaken soul, my helplessness how life can change within few hours,
taste of my tears when I saw you in a bed of wires and machines,
numbness of my body and sound of ticks in my brain during my discussions with doctors,
stoneness of eyes on watching every day and night the readings on the machines,
loneness and feeling of being scared,
vibration of my lips with prayers,
transformation of cold sobbing becoming warm as the color of your body turned to pink,
heaviness of my eyelids,
wonderful sleepless nights with your infanthood, see you growing,
tense moments with various regular visits to specialists,
sound of your tit-bit snores,
your first turn around from front to back and vice versa,
excitement to hear pa-pa-ma-ma-da-da-.... from you,
impressions of your first crawl on light brown velvety carpet,
your first holding on feet of blue chair,
your first steps,
warm sweat of my body in snow with you warped in my clothes,
relief to see you dry and warm after that,
glitter of your first teeth,
your stumbling run to catch the ducks,
idling with you and me feeding fish in the pond with bread crumbs,
warmth of the wetness of the bed as you grew,
playing cricket and football with you,
running with you on my shoulders,
endless walks with my hands holding you and you sipping juice in your usual way,
both of us crying shameless in front of your school,
changing cartoons together on TV,
watching animations together,
endless stories till you sleep,
picking and eating raw corn flakes together one by one ,
watching dadaji teach you,
….. and then …..
lets also celebrate the.. .. ..
feeling of coldness, suddenness of events, harshness of life, sound of the people in uniform, both of us confused, and then .... dryness in my throat …. numbness in my body …. strange images with strange arguments …. harshness of wind of lies, deceit, insults … and then my life stopped …. your face, your confusion, your fingers touching mine and then …. only touch remains …. and everything stopped for me …. everything is backwards and inwards towards your moments with me …. nothing else matters …. hope and prayers have moved mountains and so it may …. it shall … happen …and I know … and I hope! I will pray for that you are and will always be safe and healthy and happy and for my hope to never dwindle to meet you and to see you! May my faith that you will always be safe, protected, healthy and happy, grow with each year, each month, each day, every passing moment of separation.
Truth is, that my love for you has been same if not more, my desire to see you increases day by day, my pain to meet you and to be with you is consistently increasing. I hope your creative brilliance and ability to see objects in our environment and imagine and create different applications is not eroded in monotonous and so called disciplinary attributes of education. An education which is reflected in our society which is clearly no better than it was yesterday. An education which prepares machines to create bartering papers at any cost sometimes without compassion, sometimes without honesty and sometimes with cruelty. I don’t know exactly where you are and how you are, but I pray that you can still laugh as heartily as before, you can still listen to the sound of water coming out of the tap, you are still are able to splash water out of the tub, you can still run freely and carelessly, you can still make houses out of mud and sand, you can still see and smell rainbow, you still imagine gas lighter as different appliances, you still watch moon and stars and create new stories daily, you still color and draw on the walls. Beta Shanu don’t worry if you can’t write cleanly because you can create new images and objects in your mind and remember them, writing is just one of the mechanisms to remember and communicate ideas. Why we are not together confuses me and if you have same confusion then you are not alone beta, sometimes I also don’t have answers and I’m scared too, but it doesn’t mean that I’m not hopeful to see you one day and I pray and hope it will be sooner than latter. Each moment without you has been captured in my soul and as I try to depict it in my prayers, hopes and pain; my love for you hopefully will protect you from impurities and will keep you healthy and happy, I hope and I pray.
May god enable you to harness your creativity to create original work with unique thoughts. May god enable you to become a truthful, honest, compassionate human. May you always be happy and cocooned with rainbow of joy, laughter, energy, creativity, green grass with drops of dew, blue clear sky, saffron colored flowers, tiny tadpoles in clean water, bright multicolored butterflies, fruit trees, sweet chirping of birds.
On your birthday I remember the birthday of Sri Rama, I ‘m crying in peace don’t know why but you have been so similar to him, my Krishnu, the name which is mine and mine only for you. I’m remembering you not for you but for me, this is a strange feeling which is sadness in peace, your remembrance in my consciousness calms me but thirst to see you creates tremendous pain.
On this beautiful day when my year starts and end, here are some of the beautiful garlands of words to celebrate it. May be Rabindranath Tagore knew about me and you when he wrote these gems, so this is for you and me my polar star …
“
I have made You the polar star of my existence;
never again can I lose my way in the voyage of life.
Wherever I go, You are always there to shower your benefience all around me.
Your face is ever present before my mind's eyes.
If I lose sight of You even for a moment, I almost lose my mind.
Whenever my heart is about to go astray, just a glance of You makes it feel ashamed of itself.
“
The painful memories of past since the last touch of your fingers slowly descending from my palms, your dark big eyes looking at mine as confused as mine, as scared as mine, the silence between your eyes and mine, hence some words depict this apathy, that silence, that moment of last touch of a father’s palm with son’s gentle fingers, that last stare , that moment of injustice and sadness, that forced empty nest…
“
Music is silenced, the dark descending slowly
Has stripped unending skies of all companions.
Weariness grips your limbs and within the locked horizons
Dumbly ring the bells of hugely gathering fears.
Still, O bird, O sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings.
It's not melodious woodlands but the leaps and falls
Of an ocean's drowsy booming,
Not a grove bedecked with flowers but a tumult flecked with foam.
Where is the shore that stored your buds and leaves?
Where the nest and the branch's hold?
Still, O bird, my sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings.
Stretching in front of you the night's immensity
Hides the western hill where sleeps the distant sun;
Still with bated breath the world is counting time and swimming
Across the shoreless dark a crescent moon
Has thinly just appeared upon the dim horizon.
--But O my bird, O sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings.
From upper skies the stars with pointing fingers
Intently watch your course and death's impatience
Lashes at you from the deeps in swirling waves ;
And sad entreaties line the farthest shore
With hands outstretched and crooning ' Come, O come ! '
Still, O bird, O sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings.
All that is past: your fears and loves and hopes ;
All that is lost: your words and lamentation ;
No longer yours a home nor a bed composed of flowers.
For wings are all you have, and the sky's broadening countryard,
And the dawn steeped in darkness, lacking all direction.
Dear bird, my sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings!
“
… and then my wait and my prayers and my letters and my writings and inherent convergence of pain and breath and thus these following pearls to depict the wait …
“
The song I came to sing
remains unsung to this day.
I have spent my days in stringing
and in unstringing my instrument.
The time has not come true,
the words have not been rightly set;
only there is the agony
of wishing in my heart.....
I have not seen his face,
nor have I listened to his voice;
only I have heard his gentle footsteps
from the road before my house.....
But the lamp has not been lit
and I cannot ask him into my house;
I live in the hope of meeting with him;
but this meeting is not yet.
“
… and then this day comes, your birthday, thus my new year, my hope to hope for a happy new year, the year to materialize my prayers to get one dignified look at you … so lets celebrate this with some great fusion of words and precious sentences, to depict the manifestation of the first rays of the first sunrise of this year, to feels the rays of hope and its warmth , enjoy the following words, because my hope is alive and I still have faith and sun still glows as always as ever…
“
The Sun of the First Day
The sun of the first day
Put the question
To the new manifestation of life-
Who are you?
There was no answer.
Years passed by.
The last sun of the last day
Uttered the question
on the shore of the western sea
In the hush of evening-
Who are you?
No answer came again.
“
… thus bathing in the rays of this precious day, I wish you and celebrate your arrival and longevity … Following song of celebration is reflection of my bliss on your birthday and for me it brings a new fresh layering on the existing hope. May this always hold true for you, always! May this prayer always cuddle and keep you blissful.
“
This song of mine will wind its music around you,
my child, like the fond arms of love.
The song of mine will touch your forehead
like a kiss of blessing.
When you are alone it will sit by your side and
whisper in your ear, when you are in the crowd
it will fence you about with aloofness.
My song will be like a pair of wings to your dreams,
it will transport your heart to the verge of the unknown.
It will be like the faithful star overhead
when dark night is over your road.
My song will sit in the pupils of your eyes,
and will carry your sight into the heart of things.
And even when my voice is silenced in death,
my song will speak in your living heart.
“
The best way to end this letter (not its journey) is with hope and faith , hence I’m holding on to what I have, which is remembrances of you and me together, hence I will ring the bells and I will keep ringing and my prayers will continue and thus my faith will be intact . … thus the following words depicting it…
“
The birds they sang
at the break of day
Start again
I heard them say
Don't dwell on what
has passed away
or what is yet to be.
Ah the wars they will
be fought again
The holy dove
She will be caught again
bought and sold
and bought again
the dove is never free.
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.
We asked for signs
the signs were sent:
the birth betrayed
the marriage spent
Yeah the widowhood
of every government --
signs for all to see.
I can't run no more
with that lawless crowd
while the killers in high places
say their prayers out loud.
But they've summoned, they've summoned up
a thundercloud
and they're going to hear from me.
Ring the bells that still can ring ...
You can add up the parts
but you won't have the sum
You can strike up the march,
there is no drum
Every heart, every heart
to love will come
but like a refugee.
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.
That's how the light gets in.
That's how the light gets in.
“
So my dearest Sanidhya, your father with crack in his soul prays to Goddess Gayatri, may goddess Gayatri be always with you and make you blissful, healthy and wise. And I recite to the Almighty Supreme God, the Creator of entire cosmos, the essence of our life existence, who removes all our pains and sufferings and grants happiness beseeching, His divine grace to imbibe within us, His Divinity and Brilliance which may purify us and guide our righteous wisdom on the right path. May all you pains now and in future be mine, may my share of happiness be bestowed on you, may fear never touch you and nature provides you wisdom and knowledge.
Om bhurbhuvah svah tatsaviturvarenyan bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo yo nah prachodayat!
You are always in the consciousness of your Dadadji and Dadiji and mine. We pray to the Lord and Cherisher of the Worlds Who created us and you, and it is He who guides us; Who gives us food and drink, And when We are ill, it is He who cures us; Who gives us cause to live --- to be always be with and envelope and protect you with his warmth. Om !
Your papa
Ravi
