On hindsight, a writing as scattered as this is so heart-breaking to read. but for the sake of noting it down let me do it here. god i hope i never get to this again. that year- last year was very very scary- full of accidents of every hue and possibility. i dont even want to recount the horrors of it- including the Jamia experience. (very deliberately i have chosen this image to match with the poem as it shows 'the illumined one'- am sure all of us understand that expression!)
my dear brother, sister, and child
its my birthday today
another one filled with soul solitude
with and without all the stones cast by you and yours'
so please bless me- and let go of the anger or grouse if you carry one from the past
I am known as prateeksha
music therapist
(man, child and goddess
dog, philosopher and bread all rolled into one
god's own musicians travelling across annals of time
Now in my pristine glory revealed
WITHIN EACH ONE
Now meditating on ragas in India)
See my face www.hansadhwani.com
Hear me sing soon on my website, or come to my home in kalkaji
Call me at 91-011 2648 7442…I sing indian classical music or call 0 98113 76060
I am
Allah baqsh
Gunahgaar (preeti)
Khudai khidmadgar KKK-
Khud hi khidmadgar
Khud ke khidmadgar
Khuda ke khidmat kar
Khuda ki khidmat angar
Allah baksh
Kalki comes sailing across sands of time
O world
Desperate, mole-like blind world
How will you know when kalki would come a calling?
You wait and fill pages of time with ageless age
Look into signs left behind by those departing to tell you of Kalki
Thinking kalki to be a man, beast or animal of prey
Knowing not that kalki is naught but a woman
She is the wife of the king of Persia
Loving the king, the people and the Song of the eternal that hums within her
And she lends ear to the song of the ether-
And would sing only for the king of hearts,
For she is the queen of hearts, not the queen of diamonds
And she would save You from your pain of being a desperado
Who is pining and on the defensive, bring down your fences
And she would have, by then, be born and quietly saved
Her soul and the soul of the World that she watches over
From the cat that slowly prowls near her,
The stealer of souls,
The keeper of souls
The horse among the grasslands
Dog among the predators
And she would be known to the hindu as Kalki
To the Moslem as the queen of Persia,
To the Faithful as the Homecoming
To the Sikh and the Sufi as the wife of the King
To the rest as the King himself
And to the bird, the beast and the predator
As one among themselves-
And yet, how would you discern her when you see her
What would she look like?
Would she be a bird, a cow or like the boar?
Oh nay, nay, nay!
Let me tell you ignorant silly world
She would be none of these or what you take her to be.
She would be the voice of the world
The cry of the weak, the Azan of the Moslem
The face of Christ, reminding of the weakest
Sometimes in the voice of a Mahatma, sometimes as the Sai
Sometimes she would be leading hordes
Sometimes crying alone in the dead of the night
Sometimes she would carry the dead weight of the white man’s burden
(and I know how heavy it is,
for having being born on the 20th of April,
the Year of our lord 1972
it is as heavy as it gets, for the cruelest of the cruel was born today
and while the world rejoices the cruelty of the man
I shun him, cursing that I share my birthday with him;
Knowing that constellations alone do not determine anything
And if such a hater of the soul of the earth could be born,
So can such a lover as me can
On the same day,
Just to prove those astrologers a sham
Me Prateeksha sharing my birthday with Adolf Hitler!!!)
Among the animals I am not the boar
But the horse grazing alert in the grasslands
The cat sleeping by the queen,
The goat who sacrifices herself on the sands of Arabia
The Arab who bends towards Mecca kneeling
Among men, I am NOT a man
But a child, with the face of a woman
A woman with the heart of a child
A child with the mirth of the winds
Winds with the ferocity of fire
Fire with the coolness of the star spangled sky
Sky the infinity of the cosmic grandeur
Here here world I have come
Kalki, astride a boar, having no signs of the Kalki you wait for
Filled with mirth and laughter coz you see signs of me everywhere
Making calendars drink milk and daughters feed pigs to their children
Filled with rage, yet forgiving
And seeing NAUGHT me the midst of you
The voice of the lost and the losing
The soul of the dying,
The laughter of the fires
And the water of the volcanoes,
Seeing me inside your soul while you only self yourself,
Naught the self not me either
The poet among musicians and the musician among poets
The woman among men and the Man among Children
The joy concealed in sadness and the sadness veiled in Age…
I am Here, There, everywhere
Walking in Khan Market, as much as on the steps of Jama Masjid
Where you kill me among the Innocent
And among the demanding who die for water
I have my vehicle broken down by mobs
And get chased for life by mobs
But still do not curse those mobs
For I know they are ignorant in their anger
Yet I in my love-
I love them even though they betray me on the table
And feed me with rotten Pork in my age old
Sit by the rivers of Kiribati
And meditate mid cold winds of the Himala
Being like Him myself
Saving my son, Ganesha from the fire of his father’s ire
And lighting a new fire to douse that fire
Innocent to the fact, how many fires this new one would raise
I the poet among men
Hansadhwani among ragas
Rose among flowers
Woman among men
The Gita among the confused
The Koran among warriors
The Granth among the devout
Am Kalki
Not anyone you would ever imagine
Just a simple village girl
Filled with comprehension about everything
And so much pain
To spend another birthday alone
Quiet, meditating, singing to the Self
Singing to my soul
For the first time, not worried today
In the wee hours, watching the soul of the world
Sleep and guarding it
Knowing that I am the KEEPER, the reaper and the solitary one
And my Time has come;
Who else could I have been but a woman
Who tends to the bones of the wolves
The healer, the mystic, the shaman
The one who Nature bears testimony to
Not mere men;
Who else could I have been but a woman
Who loves all like her own
Because YOU are her VERY OWN
And though single in body, in soul she is YOURS
The simple village lass who lives by the goddess Kalka
In a nearby house, a locality named Kalka
Who some also affectionately add JI to, so kalkaji
See me now and hear me sing
For I am the Sole keeper in society
The quiet, quieting and the quietude containing
Ending the prateeksha, the waiting, to reveal the CHOSEN ONE
The ‘Pratyaksha’- the revealed one…
My love to you
Today is my birthday and I turn 34.
Please share this poem with anyone you wish to
And this would be your blessing to me.
I was born on April 20, 2006
And every day of the world when a new baby was born
I love you and I LIVE you
So NOW why don’t you too live me?
Prateeksha?
