Skip to main content

The Music in the Background


What seas what mountains what planets
Or a honeymoon cottage on an exotic isle
   with a bride on hire to suck the lust
What car what villa what gadget
Or a smorgasbord spread out in paradise
Where does it end, this pursuit?

How many millions or billions should the bank balance be
How many villas and hectares will this body need
How many parties bacchanalian and rumbustious
Before I hear the music in the background?


Note: This is the first poem I've written in years.  Maybe, when you sit idle with your foot caged in plaster of Paris poetry forces itself into your soul.  I have an excuse, however, for letting poetry make this forceful entry: I was reading something on philosopher Schopenhauer who thought that a man who has no mental life goes greedily from sensation to sensation in search of happiness and at last he/she is conquered by the nemesis of the idle rich or the reckless voluptuary - ennui.

Comments

  1. A tremendous poem, Matheikal!
    Enormous thought and elan!
    Please keep writing even without POP:)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Amit. I must thank both Schopenhauer and T S Eliot - the thought came from the former and the style from the latter.

      Delete
  2. Matheikal,

    Even as I wish to stay away from poetry, my friends try to get me sucked into the vortex ... please :(

    But, when you say something in simple words in non-poetic form, like "idle rich", I do come alive! Are the rich ever idle? Aren't they always trying to become richer??? :))) Just curious. And, I do not understand "reckless voluptuary".


    RE

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Raghuram, it seems you don't read even the non-poetic form carefully enough :) I was quoting (not verbatim) Schopenhauer who died in 1860. The rich were simply idle in those days; the poor did all the work for them! By reckless voluptuary the philosopher meant any person who feasted on sensual delights (like food, drinks, sex...) neglecting "mental life" which only can bring more lasting happiness...

      Delete
  3. 'Quis hic locus, quae regio, quae mundi plaga?'

    A Fine piece of disillusionment and yearning for the truth. Refreshed memories of TSE's Marina.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, Uma, I imitated Eliot's opening lines in 'Marina'. But I must admit I'm flabbergasted by your identifying it so easily.

      Delete
  4. profound poem written with an edge of irony . Even deplorable is how material wealth is projected as an important measure of worthiness ! The poem points a strong finger at this state of manhood . Keep churning out such brilliant lines sir :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No, Maliny, I'm not sure I'll stick to poetry. This poem just came like that - out of leisurely meditation which my normal routine will never permit. I work in a residential school, you see.

      Thanks for the appreciation.

      Delete
  5. The message which your poem gives is worth thinking about.We want to be happy but do not know where to look for happiness.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We are like the woman who searched in the front yard for the ear ring she lost in the kitchen saying there was no light in the kitchen!

      Delete
  6. Sir, you have a soul in your writing ! :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Good attempt. It turned out to be a golden poem with lots of iron in it. LOL! Congrats and keep writing.

    ReplyDelete
  8. A poignant one, Matheikal!! Abundance is certainly not something that we acquire... it is something we tune into. It is a state of being! Highly philosophical stuff!..the word 'moksa' came to my mind suddenly.
    Nice one!Keep writing!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Panchali. It's philosophical because it was inspired by Schopenhauer.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Prelude to AtoZ

  From Garden of 5 Senses, Delhi [file pic] Hindsight gives an unearthly charm and order to the past. There can be pain too. A lot of things could have been different, much better, if only we possessed the wisdom of our old age back in those days. As a writer put it, Oedipus, Hamlet, Lear and a lot of those guys must have thought, “I wish I had known this some time ago.” Life is a series of errors with intermittent achievements. The only usefulness of the errors may be the lessons they teach us. Probably, that is their purpose too. We are created to err so that we learn, I dare to put it that way. I turn 64 in a month’s time. It’s not inappropriate to look back at some of the people whom life brought into my life so that I would learn certain lessons. No, I don’t mean to say that life has any such purpose or design or anything. Life is absurd. People come into your life as haphazardly as vehicles ply on your road or birds poop on your head. Some of these people change the chemist

Why I won’t vote

From Deshabhimani , Malayalam weekly Exactly a month from today is the Parliamentary election in my state of Kerala. This time, I’m not going to vote. Bernard Shaw defined democracy , with his characteristic cynicism, as “ a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve .” We elect our government in a democracy. And the government invariably sucks our blood – whichever the party is. The BJP and the Congress are like Tweedledum and Tweedledee though the former makes all sorts of other claims day in and day out. BJP = Congress + the holy cow. The holy cow has turned out to be quite a vampire and that makes a difference, no doubt. In our Prime Minister’s algebra, it is: (a+b) 2 which should be equal to a 2 and b 2 . There is an extra 2ab which is the holy cow. In George Orwell’s Animal Farm , the animals revolt against the human master and set up their own nationalist republic. Soon politics develops in the republic and some pigs become leaders. The porcine

How Arvind Kejriwal can save himself

Narendra Modi and Amit Shah have a clear vision. Eliminate all opposition. Decimate them or absorb them. My previous post [link below] showed a few people decimated by them. Today let’s look at the others: those who are saved by joining the Bharatiya Janata Party [BJP]. 1. Himanta Biswa Sarma  This guy was in Congress and faced serious charges related to the multi-crore Saradha chit fund scam. He also faced corruption charges related to drinking water supply in Guwahati. His house was raided by the Central Bureau of Investigation [CBI]. Then he switched over to BJP and all his crimes just vanished. It’s as simple as taking a dip in the Ganga and all your sins are forgiven. Today he is the chief minister of Assam. Nothing is heard of all the charges that were levelled against him. 2. Amarinder Singh  This former Captain in the Indian Army was a Congressman until Modi’s Enforcement Directorate [ED] started raiding him, his son and his son-in-law. He put an end to all those raid

The Good Old World

Book Review Title: Dukhi Dadiba and irony of fate Author: Dadi Edulji Taraporewala Translators: Aban Mukherji and Tulsi Vatsal Publisher: Ratna Books, Delhi, 2023 Pages: 314 If you want to return to the good old days of the late 19 th century, this is an ideal novel for you. This was published originally in Gujarati in 1913. It appeared as a serial before that from 1898 onwards in a periodical. The conflict between good and evil is the dominant motif though there is romance, betrayal, disappointment, regret, and pretty much of traditional morality. Reading this novel is quite like watching an old Bollywood movie, 1960s style. Ardeshir Bahadurshah, a wealthy Parsi aristocrat in Surat, dies having obligated his son Jehangir to find out his long-lost brother Rustom. Rustom was Bahadurshah’s son in his first marriage. The mother died when the boy was too small and the nurse who looked after the child vanished with it one day. Ratanmai, Bahadurshah’s present wife, takes her

Kejriwal’s Arrest in Modi’s Kurukshetra

For some mysterious reason, Arvind Kejriwal’s arrest reminded me of Haren Pandya. Maybe, because Pandya’s 21 st death anniversary is approaching (26 March). Have you forgotten Haren Pandya? He was the Home Minister of Gujarat before Narendra Modi assumed dictatorial powers in that state. Modi chose to teach humility to Pandya by making him the Minister of State for revenue. Pandya chose not to learn humility from Modi and resigned from that post in Aug 2002. Remember Gujarat of 2002? You should. A fire engulfed a train on 27 Feb 2002 killing 58 Hindu pilgrims who were returning from Ayodhya where they had gone to discover their god, not very unlike Christopher Columbus undertaking a voyage to discover India and messing it all up. What caused the fire in the train? Lord Ram knows probably. The upshot was that there was a riot in Gujarat by Hindus against Muslims. Haren Pandya is one of the BJP leaders who gave statements in many places indicting Modi for the riots. He asser