An exercise in translation: Loving Loneliness by Poet Pazhani bharathi

Loving Loneliness – a poem by  pazshani bharathi

In the current issue of KUmdham   Life  dt  26-10-2016.

It’s a pleasant feeling to love loneliness

As there is no one new there

Beloved people are close by your side.

In the empty cup in front of us

We shall take our smiles as fog /mist porridge

And drink it( abundantly)

We shall drink  the tears like a

Bitter alchohal

Like the outer mirror of loneliness.

we shall see our face staring it.

We shall float our  heart

As a bubble/a ripple on water.

When that is  sparkling on us

We may be there or cease to exist.

It is a pleasant sensation

To love loneliness.

Translated by prof d Sambandhan of

Pondicherry centrl university.An  

I exist because of you and vice versa

We live in an interdependent system where everything depends on everything else,In all we eat and wear the infinite labour of many is involved;noone is an island.We need to depend on others for our needs. The same is also the case with them

So  while this interdependence is obvious and apparent and all of us influence and interest each other  how come hostility, hatred and all kinds of enemity creep in  and there is a dance of violence all around

Jalaluddin said long ago: the existence mine on earth depends upon the lives of my fellow beings.I exist because of you and vice versa”

His classic saying “go beyond your own needs and merge yourself into the ocean of compassion”.

The recent Cauvery water row is a fitting testimony of the dominance of hatred over love, insanity over reason and throwing away of all the canons of ethics and principles of federalism.

Two neighboring states behave like enemy territories and the idea of India is hardly visible ;indeed the surgical operation must have been conducted to discipline the rogue neighbor  but alas  this is a country where the short sighted politicians eye only on the election prospects ignoring the long run ramifications of their action on the very survival and unity of this nation which is more of a continent size….All of us are together on the map but not at all having the spirit of  Indian and TN has suffered more for parading that spirit of  Indian and displaying a cultured behaviour 

Keynes General Theory at 80

Keynes GT at 80

A few preliminaries for beginners.

In 1930s the capitalist segment of the world economy plunged into a great depression. The stock market crash and the mass bank failures created huge unemployment, social unrest and political uncertainty. The contagion was pervasive n the US, UK and Europe.

Keynes’  General Theory of Employment ,Interest and Money was conceived in the shadows of depression and  addressed  Itself to the problem of unemployment and offered a solution. For the pre- Keynesian classical orthodoxy balanced budget was an article of faith and they would never deviate from that fiscal conservatism even when the conditions of deflation would threaten the economic structure.

Keynes in his GT,  brought about  a transformation in the outlook and attitudes of  the economist and statesmen towards economic problems. By changing the character of public finance ie by advocating the unbalanced (deficit) budget to balance the economy , he introduced a radical policy shift towards lax fiscal policy to combat depression;monetery policy becoming  ineffective in  Liquidity Trap situation,Keynes, fiscal policy began to command more professional respectability and immediate public relevance.

Summing up its relevance I think it is Paul Davidson who wrote in his, The Age Of K eynes thus:” the economics which Keynes preached in his masterwork , the 1936 General Theory  Of  Employment interest and Money, split Cambridge opinion,outraged former teachers and colleagues of the moment and set in motion  an ideological quarrel among professional economists  which lasted a decade at least.’’

“ His mind was powerful, flexible and inventive, a  trio of qualities infrequently found in  each other’s company   ….he longed to divert public officials from mistaken policy to enlightened action,:

It is something very strange but true that when Keynesianism was on the decline and monetarism emerged as a counter revolution Nixon told: we are all Keynesians now/

The decade old global economic crisis gave fresh oxygen to the economics of Keynes and I have already written a small  monograph. In the remaining period of life I will read kural and the financial crisis more and supplement with my accumulated notes crying for publication   

Nobel prize for contract Theory: simple meaning /Relevace for Cauvery Row/pay hike for academics and others

This year Nobel prize in economics has gone to Oliver Harts and Bengst Holmsstrom, the British and Finland economists for the research work carried out in the 70s and 80s on conract theory which has wide applicability from governance to constitution law. All of us  know real life events and incidents revolve around contracts and indeed all transactions depend on implicit or explicit contract: there are employment Contracts, credit contracts and insurance contracts and so on .you will concede that better contracts and improved institutions will go a long way in making the country strong.

Should providers of public services such as schools, hospitals or prisoners be publically or privately owned? Shoud teachers health workers and prison guards be paid fixed salary or should their pay be performance based?.There is no definite, unique or any conclusive answer. The economists raise this kind of questions and with the help of the theory attempt to find  the answer .

In this connection I would like to quote Keynes from memory:

The theory of economics does not furnish a body of settled conclusions immediately applicable to public policy;.It is only a method rather than a doctrine an apparatus of mind a technique of thinking which help the possessor to draw correct conclusions”

The Nobel laureates talk about the power of theory in real life situation .For eg, if the manger is rewarded  for his short term cash flow management  the long term heath of the company may be affected. Very recently it has been found that privately managed prisons are not efficient in the U S and they are thinking of bringing it under government domain.

CONTRACT THEORY HAS RELEVANCE FOR RESOLVIG CAUVERY WATER ISSUE AND PAY FIXATION FOR ACDEMICS

Given the compulsion I will read more in future.Right now I can make use of their frame work to see the politics and ABSENCE of  economics behind Cauvery issue. Why  karnataka does not want to come under the contract law and defy the constitutional law? Every contract involves some conflicts and they must be resolved by the established contract law history and some give and take in the agreement. But it is saddening to note all the canons of economics and the system of governance are thrown to the dustbin and the so called officers are keeping quiet .That rogue state wants to appropriate all the benefits in a federation  without being monitored by any neutral agency in contractual terms  ie they want an  inefficient outcome for the nation and no benefit at all to TamilNadu.This is against  economics, ethics and  will amount to dirty , divisive and destructive politics affecting the very stability of the society.

     This is what I have been telling for the last one month  . Now I have explained using  this framework in a better way.  why central government which is supposed to enforce the contract  and assist the highest court of the land  is also behaving like a litigant not bothered about finding solution .Like our manager it is also maximizing its capacity to mobilize the vote bank and desire to have competitive edge over congress ie . To play politics! They also do not want to listen to supreme court and get into any contractual obligations  .Extend this logic to all micro level contracts  in all markets .Will there be any economy ?It will be like a  full fledged disobedience movement against the economic integration of   the country,and the nation  will be plunged into chaos.I miss our former RBI governor now whose  world is in the realm of ideas

Before I conclude let me also apply the contract theory  to  the new pay scales .It is definitely a boon to the world of academics ie those who read teach and do rigorous research work not cut and paste pseudo stunt .But there are many for whom the scales and the compensation  when the theory is applied is an exorbitant  and their own conscience will prick  if there is one .There are empirical evidences to show that you can become Dean without even any [publication} not even writing letter to wife  AND EVEN WITHOUT TAKING A SINGLE CLASS  more sensibly and responsively  one can become Professor and attain the position of HOD .The recent surgical strike against the VC WHO HAD SUBMITTED  the bogus resume and the callousness of the screening and selection committee  and the gross irresponsibility of the great academicians   are the reminder that contract theory is hardly enforced and that merit need not be the only criteria for elevation to higher position.

This year Nobel prize in economics has more practical applicability. It is only ideas not vested interests which will rule in the long run   but in the long run we are all dead  as Keynes told.

whatever good you want to do, do it now Mr Prime minister there is no guarantee that you will walk again here.

“Don’t talk about yourself; it will be done when you leave”

US playwright,Wilson Mizner

 “My dear beloved Prime Minister,

Namaskar vijadasamy greetings to you and all your colleagues

 I would not have written this letter but for your reference to the leader upadhyay  whose sincerity of purpose touched my heart.

 I appreciate your lauding of our neutral armed forces as it does not differentiate between the Congress or BJP  in saving the honour and survival  of our country in conducting surgical strike against the rogue neighbor who does not understand our blood relation of the past and treating our tolerance as an act of cowardice.I am with you an academician who has never lived a life of third rate politician for giving a mild shock to that  terrorist state which ia a nuisance and mjor irritant in resolving kashmir issue. I agree with you  Mr PM this year’s Vijayadasami is very special on this accout.

Like DMK fellows in Tamil nadu your BJP people, also draw their energy and ideology  and incorporate into the policy realm and that is quite understandable and acceptable given your simple majority in Parliament. But you should be careful that India was and is secular and different communities live happily and harmoniously  and at times the fundamentalists on both sides do some mischief to obtain some short run political benefits  As PM  you need not se terms like    “you attack me “ you have to make your administrative machinery to work with freedom  to put the criminals behind bars   whatever may be the party they belong to.

I do understand that the roots of your party  would put pressure   but going to Godse’s statue and garlanding when you are PM  disturbs me little  no problem I am not a great admirer of MR Mohan das Gandhi . I still feel that vallabai patel Should have been made as the first PM and Nehru could have waited .Sir I must hasten add that I  have a tremendous  respect for Our Nehru and he did build our industrial base  via  import substitution induced industrialization strategy  which is questioned by economists like Jagadish Bhagwati and others ‘

Sir , sorry for my digressin   .In my class room lecture also I do the same and I still love teaching in a good place where my students will be brilliant than me,

Mr Modiji,we do not have time today as I have to clean the debris of books  I want to conclude from  what you have said about the core of  UPADHYAYA.ie

His  core ‘’thoughts were the poor ,the village, the farmers , the dalits and the marginalized and that is why this government, is laying focus on such sections during the centenary celebration “

Sir,you sorry,  your ideological stalwart must be a good man like our Periyar and Anna  as he bleeds for the poor and argues for the oppressed and the disadvantaged;if that is the spirit and legacy how you  coud go against the interest of the farmers in Tamilnadu  by  taking  a quick  about turn and become the symbol or icon of  anti Tamil Nadu  refusing to meet our state MPs  who are larger in parliament and your party would have begged their support in case of a hung parliament and think god you escaped( you must ask Mr Vajpayee  for the full story),  because Our CM is not well or TN will not put BJP GOVRNMENT IN THE NEXT 1000 years .Sir we have farmers who are dependent on the flow of the river called Cauvery  and our Madras presidency got a better deal under British Raj. A British citizen helped to construct Mullai periyar dam. Here an Indian citizen who is more of  a foreign PM than domestic PM  does nat have an elementary sensitivity and PM responsibility  to treat all the states equally  .  Rivers are like mothers  and you are behaving like a step father although you are bachelor .Karnataka election has blinded you in taking a partisan attitude 

As an elder and as the second opposition Prime minister truly non congress PM  ABOUT WHICH I AM PROUD  as a student of political economy  you are now colluding with the congress CM  and doing politics  AND HE IS THANKING you.

 This is an offensive stand against the peace loving decent Tamils who are exercising patience and cultured silence   Please govern this country  as a rishi .I also read reports widely circulated in social media that huge benefits have been given to the corporate sector.

  I write all these as I voted for Modi and not BJP.NOT ME  ALONE  many behaved  like that  otherwise you will not be sitting on the PM chair  we Wanted an alternative leader who will walk  on the road less travelled by and not behave like a local politician with foreign –NRI orientation alone  supporting MNCs.Even if a Marxist govt had been there they would have done what you are doing now as global finance and poltics shape our destiny .How can we question the rightist Bjp for carrying out the neo liberal policies. But please be right and straight in handling all the states as they are the  UNITED STATES OF INDIA  of a continental size  and god has given one chance to preside over its  destiny  a privilege which many will not get.  Better late than never .in life there is no second chance .but in politics where even one week is a long ..Time in politics you have the chance and power to do something for  THE POOR ,FARMER AND DALITS.

I seek god’s intervention to give you strength and guidance to go by the ru;es of the road  and 2000 year historicity cannot be allowed to be ridiculed and bulldozed by the recalcitrant elements which are not fit to rule the states .

The message is clear All the rivers in the country must be nationalized and it shoud be treated as public good   and every citizen is entitled for the water   please do not bring your economics,  private sector efficiency,  govt’ inability  virtues of privatization  and all kinds of nonsense which will hit the poor.In Australia people drink water from the tap … no aqua guard to filter as the water is good

  we can go  to the extent of closing all soft drink industry as its contribution to health is nil or little.   You may think I am talking like an idealist and sagayam  IAS   will appreciate   me   and many Indians will remember me in the future I am able  to foresee water war like currency war  in the medium run .    

unbridled passion and intimate violence leading to pareto optimum in a world of nothingness

He could not digest the abrupt end of the dream. When he was in the middle of the song there was a beating of retreat. He went to sleep again with the fond hope that she will revisit and make him more hungry. In a matter of minutes his prayers were answered:

The act was re-enacted with all tenderness and also more passion

Followed by intimate violence and she could only say that

That should not stop signaling that a kind of Pareto optimum

Was building up and they experienced a perfect bliss.

Trapped between the pair of shapely plantain trees, tender

But stubbornly strong and robust and still soft and subtle,

He explored the dense forests and deep valleys, and felt

More secure and strong and she felt relieved of  the ancestral pain

Getting emboldened and admiring her perfect features he

Traveled on the still unexplored territory which was now belonging

To him and thanked the Lord for this heavenly bliss on earth.

His attempt to kiss her with a sexuality that he never knew earlier

Made her exude something and said nothing and in a world of

Nothingness they got dissolved; successive dose of unbridled sexual act

Did not tire them out as they were new  to this God’s  way of  communication

In the art and science of love, more nobler and more spiritual

The beach ,the balloon and the child in a teenage girl

The other day  I went to beach to meet a professor from Hyderabad

Who could not spend some with me when I went there some time ago

I was pleasantly surprised to see another professor with his daughter,

Who also happened to be our family friend; walking on the beach

Without eating any junk food but recollecting the old experience

Was itself a pleasing moment and the plan for dinner was cancelled?

They were about to leave by car and the girl studying plus one gave us

The pleasant surprise, “Uncle, I want a balloon” and the vendor overhearing us

Brought one but the girl refused that and demanded the air filled one

And the Hyderabad Professor was quick to fetch and the small girl on the

Verge of early teenage was profusely happy and my thoughts revolved around...

My grand son now on a foreign soil; His Chennai grandfather used to shower on him

Tons of balloons and knows how to keep him in good humor and get his attention

They were well tuned and had a good time; a  few days before he left for Australia

I just taught him how to play with the balloon tossing up, float it for  a while and

Not let it fall down and go on giving gentle push to keep it afloat- the game....

He enacted few days ago from there and asked me to watch…children learn fast

And a teenage girl’s fascination for balloon reveals the innocence of our times in the past

I think and recollect now for the first two daughters I did not do justice

And the youngest one by sheer stubbornness would have got balloons,

As a mother now she has filled the house with variety of toys and  education kids

I am amazed by her evolution as mother and we miss all of them, and wish them

Good health

In the middle of the song the dream came to an abrupt end

 I stopped  the story  when he was hijacked by her infinite variety. When she came closer he was dumb bounded even to utter a single word  His own inherent  shyness and carefully cultivated habits restrained him to explore the territory that did not belong to him .  Quite surprisingly the initiative came from her…and he seized it with all reluctance .

He could not help watch her  and they were now together

He could feel all the five senses of pleasure  .

He told himself: Oh God thank you for all the bliss that was bestowed upon me,

I was starved of this divine love .You made me experience this

Fully ,forcefully and feverishly and endlessly.

In their reciprocal exchange of endless love and intimate mating

The two bodies got electrified and intoxicated and the two  souls

Got fused, they realized God and saw heaven and thanked HIM

When he longed to be within the circle of her arm and

Attempted to experience the smells and sounds of the body

The long dream came to an abrupt end,

but even now he could sense her breath on his shoulder

And gentle warmth On his chest…..

But like flash  flood everything  was gone

Innocent girlish look giving way to matured sexual assault:he was bemused and bewildered and finally hijaccked

Many years passed and the seasons changed and as if a flash of lightning, she came just like that not in a fashion of innocence as was the case once, but  creating thunder storm in his heart now. For long he had been feeling the life needed a shake up and the mind had acquired a great restlessness and the devilish and degrading thoughts were constantly invading and unsettling the mind: It was at that juncture like a gentle breeze she was passing and he was gazing,straight without feeling any sense of shame.

She was slightly grown up but  still in her final days of teenage,

Tender like a creeper, strong like the wind and warm like an evening sun.

Full of love, compassion, life and inexplicable friendship ;fully proportioned

More cultured and harmoniously developed, he could not help watching her

With eager eyes and all inventive imagination running riot in the molecules  of brain

It was not just physical beauty, the half sari triggered chemistry/physics, the body

Almost fully covered but incredibly revealing all nakedness only to his lustful eyes.

He saw intellectual brilliance and energetic intelligence explode in her eyes,

The twinkling eyes, more mischievous, with all sexual appeal like a piercing arrow

To make you go wild and lose your carefully crafted delicate balance,

Just innately beautiful and inherently vibrant, but paradoxically

Lifting your nobler and divine but also the meaner and beastly basic instincts

Simultaneously and successfully; demonstrating thereby

There was continuity and change in her body, mind and outlook…

Even at that time of losing himself totally he remembered Keynes’ Animal Spirit “

In a different context and also  the title of a book with the same label

Dealing with the financial crisis.

Was he in a state of crisis possessed by a different nobler animal spirit neglected by many?

In the digital, hi tech world of power, position, title, craziness for wealth……

Yes in a pleasantest manner abandoning all the so called good manners for good.

He was in a state of shock: bemused and bewildered and virtually hijacked. 

when i saw her first she looked more divine and homely-a sensuous poem Part-1

Long   long ago, when I saw her, she was just an innocent cute little girl

On the threshold of early teenage in the purest and best form

Of brownish silken skin, and lengthy hair radiating scent;,

Structured like a framed picture and  Smelling like a  pleasant  perfume  

She looked more divine and homely without any sexual assault.

She was just walking with an air of casualness and girlish look

Meriting attention from both young and the old and almost

Everyone wanted to cling to her and would not let her go.

As  she was  full of fun and bristling with laughter,and humor

Children loved her and longed to be with her forever.

The irony was the most beautiful women  desired to stare at her

Without any trace of jealousy or hatred- a rare trait to witness.