21


Our Lane is tortuous, as if, ages ago, she started in quest of her goal,
vacillated right and left, and remained bewildered for ever.

Above in the air, between her buildings, hangs like a ribbon a strip torn
out of space: she calls it her sister of the blue town.

She sees the sun only for a few moments at mid-day, and asks herself in
wise doubt, "Is it real?"

In June rain sometimes shades her band of daylight as with pencil
hatchings. The path grows slippery with mud, and umbrellas collide. Sudden
jets of water from spouts overhead splash on her startled pavement. In her
dismay, she takes it for the jest of an unmannerly scheme of creation.

The spring breeze, gone astray in her coil of contortions, stumbles like a
drunken vagabond against angle and corner, filling the dusty air with
scraps of paper and rag. "What fury of foolishness! Are the Gods gone mad?"
she exclaims in indignation.

But the daily refuse from the houses on both sides--scales of fish mixed
with ashes, vegetable peelings, rotten fruit, and dead rats--never rouse
her to question, "Why should these things be?"

She accepts every stone of her paving. But from between their chinks
sometimes a blade of grass peeps up. That baffles her. How can solid facts
permit such intrusion?

On a morning when at the touch of autumn light her houses wake up into
beauty from their foul dreams, she whispers to herself, "There is a
limitless wonder somewhere beyond these buildings."

But the hours pass on; the households are astir; the maid strolls back from
the market, swinging her right arm and with the left clasping the basket of
provisions to her side; the air grows thick with the smell and smoke of
kitchens. It again becomes clear to our Lane that the real and normal
consist solely of herself, her houses, and their muck-heaps.

22


The house, lingering on after its wealth has vanished, stands by the
wayside like a madman with a patched rag over his back.

Day after day scars it with spiteful scratches, and rainy months leave
their fantastic signatures on its bared bricks.

In a deserted upper room one of a pair of doors has fallen from rusty
hinges; and the other, widowed, bangs day and night to the fitful gusts.

One night the sound of women wailing came from that house. They mourned the
death of the last son of the family, a boy of eighteen, who earned his
living by playing the part of the heroine in a travelling theatre.

A few days more and the house became silent, and all the doors were locked.

Only on the north side in the upper room that desolate door would neither
drop off to its rest nor be shut, but swung to and fro in the wind like a
self-torturing soul.


After a time children's voices echo once more through that house. Over the
balcony-rail women's clothes are hung in the sun, a bird whistles from a
covered cage, and a boy plays with his kite on the terrace.

A tenant has come to occupy a few rooms. He earns little and has many
children. The tired mother beats them and they roll on the floor and
shriek.


A maid-servant of forty drudges through the day, quarrels with her
mistress, threatens to, but never leaves.

Every day some small repairs are done. Paper is pasted in place of missing
panes; gaps in the railings are made good with split bamboo; an empty box
keeps the boltless gate shut; old stains vaguely show through new whitewash
on the walls.

The magnificence of wealth had found a fitting memorial in gaunt
desolation; but, lacking sufficient means, they try to hide this with
dubious devices, and its dignity is outraged.

They have overlooked the deserted room on the north side. And its forlorn
door still bangs in the wind, like Despair beating her breast.

23


In the depths of the forest the ascetic practised penance with fast-closed
eyes; he intended to deserve Paradise.

But the girl who gathered twigs brought him fruits in her skirt, and water
from the stream in cups made of leaves.

The days went on, and his penance grew harsher till the fruits remained
untasted, the water untouched: and the girl who gathered twigs was sad.


The Lord of Paradise heard that a man had dared to aspire to be as the
Gods. Time after time he had fought the Titans, who were his peers, and
kept them out of his kingdom; yet he feared a man whose power was that of
suffering.

But he knew the ways of mortals, and he planned a temptation to decoy this
creature of dust away from his adventure.


A breath from Paradise kissed the limbs of the girl who gathered twigs, and
her youth ached with a sudden rapture of beauty, and her thoughts hummed
like the bees of a rifled hive.

The time came when the ascetic should leave the forest for a mountain cave,
to complete the rigour of his penance.

When he opened his eyes in order to start on this journey, the girl
appeared to him like a verse familiar, yet forgotten, and which an added
melody made strange. The ascetic rose from his seat and told her that it
was time he left the forest.

"But why rob me of my chance to serve you?" she asked with tears in her
eyes.

He sat down again, thought for long, and remained on where he was.


That night remorse kept the girl awake. She began to dread her power and
hate her triumph, yet her mind tossed on the waves of turbulent delight.

In the morning she came and saluted the ascetic and asked his blessing,
saying she must leave him.

He gazed on her face in silence, then said, "Go, and may your wish be
fulfilled."

For years he sat alone till his penance was complete.

The Lord of the Immortals came down to tell him that he had won Paradise.

"I no longer need it," said he.

The God asked him what greater reward he desired.

"I want the girl who gathers twigs."

24


They said that Kabir, the weaver, was favoured of God, and the crowd
flocked round him for medicine and miracles. But he was troubled; his low
birth had hitherto endowed him with a most precious obscurity to sweeten
with songs and with the presence of his God. He prayed that it might be
restored.

Envious of the repute of this outcast, the priests leagued themselves with
a harlot to disgrace him. Kabir came to the market to sell cloths from his
loom; when the woman grasped his hand, blaming him for being faithless, and
followed him to his house, saying she would not be forsaken, Kabir said to
himself, "God answers prayers in his own way."

Soon the woman felt a shiver of fear and fell on her knees and cried, "Save
me from my sin!" To which he said, "Open your life to God's light!"

Kabir worked at his loom and sang, and his songs washed the stains from
that woman's heart, and by way of return found a home in her sweet voice.

One day the King, in a fit of caprice, sent a message to Kabir to come and
sing before him. The weaver shook his head: but the messenger dared not
leave his door till his master's errand was fulfilled.

The King and his courtiers started at the sight of Kabir when he entered
the hall. For he was not alone, the woman followed him. Some smiled, some
frowned, and the King's face darkened at the beggar's pride and
shamelessness.

Kabir came back to his house disgraced, the woman fell at his feet crying,
"Why accept such dishonour for my sake, master? Suffer me to go back to my
infamy!"

Kabir said, "I dare not turn my God away when he comes branded with
insult."

25

SOMAKA AND RITVIK


SOMAKA AND RITVIK

_The shade of_ KING SOMAKA, _faring to Heaven in a chariot, passes other
shades by the roadside, among them that of_ RITVIK, _his former
high-priest_.


A VOICE

Where would you go, King?


SOMAKA

Whose voice is that? This turbid air is like suffocation to the eyes; I
cannot see.


THE VOICE

Come down, King! Come down from that chariot bound for Heaven.


SOMAKA

Who are you?


THE VOICE

I am Ritvik, who in my earthly life was your preceptor and the chief priest
of your house.


SOMAKA

Master, all the tears of the world seem to have become vapour to create
this realm of vagueness. What make you here?


SHADES

This hell lies hard by the road to Heaven, whence lights glimmer dimly,
only to prove unapproachable. Day and night we listen to the heavenly
chariot rumbling by with travellers for that region of bliss; it drives
sleep from our eyes and forces them to watch in fruitless jealousy. Far
below us earth's old forests rustle and her seas chant the primal hymn of
creation: they sound like the wail of a memory that wanders void space in
vain.


RITVIK

Come down, King!


SHADES

Stop a few moments among us. The earth's tears still cling about you, like
dew on freshly culled flowers. You have brought with you the mingled odours
of meadow and forest; reminiscence of children, women, and comrades;
something too of the ineffable music of the seasons.


SOMAKA

Master, why are you doomed to live in this muffled stagnant world?


RITVIK

I offered up your son in the sacrificial fire: _that_ sin has lodged my
soul in this obscurity.


SHADES

King, tell us the story, we implore you; the recital of crime can still
bring life's fire into our torpor.


SOMAKA

I was named Somaka, the King of Videha. After sacrificing at innumerable
shrines weary year on year, a son was born to my house in my old age, love
for whom, like a sudden untimely flood, swept consideration for everything
else from my life. He hid me completely, as a lotus hides its stem. The
neglected duties of a king piled up in shame before my throne. One day, in
my audience hall, I heard my child cry from his mother's room, and
instantly rushed away, vacating my throne.


RITVIK

Just then, it chanced, I entered the hall to give him my daily benediction;
in blind haste he brushed me aside and enkindled my anger. When later he
came back, shame-faced, I asked him: "King, what desperate alarm could draw
you at the busiest hour of the day to the women's apartments, so as to
desert your dignity and duty--ambassadors come from friendly courts, the
aggrieved who ask for justice, your ministers waiting to discuss matters of
grave import? and even lead you to slight a Brahmin's blessing?"


SOMAKA

At first my heart flamed with anger; the next moment I trampled it down
like the raised head of a snake and meekly replied: "Having only one child,

I have lost my peace of mind. Forgive me this once, and I promise that in
future the father's infatuation shall never usurp the King."


RITVIK

But my heart was bitter with resentment, and I said, "If you must be
delivered from the curse of having only one child, I can show you the way.
But so hard is it that I feel certain you will fail to follow it." This
galled the King's pride and he stood up and exclaimed, "I swear, by all
that is sacred, as a Kshatriya and a King, I will not shrink, but perform
whatever you may ask, however hard." "Then listen," said I. "Light a
sacrificial fire, offer up your son: the smoke that rises will bring you
progeny, as the clouds bring rain." The King bowed his head upon his breast
and remained silent: the courtiers shouted their horror, the Brahmins
clapped their hands over their ears, crying, "Sin it is both to utter and
listen to such words." After some moments of bewildered dismay the King
calmly said, "I will abide by my promise." The day came, the fire was lit,
the town was emptied of its people, the child was called for; but the
attendants refused to obey, the soldiers rebelliously went off duty,
throwing down their arms. Then I, who in my wisdom had soared far above all
weakness of heart and to whom emotions were illusory, went myself to the
apartment where, with their arms, women fenced the child like a flower
surrounded by the menacing branches of a tree. He saw me and stretched out
eager hands and struggled to come to me, for he longed to be free from the
love that imprisoned him. Crying, "I am come to give you true deliverance,"
I snatched him by force from his fainting mother and his nurses wailing in
despair. With quivering tongues the fire licked the sky and the King stood
beside it, still and silent, like a tree struck dead by lightning.
Fascinated by the godlike splendour of the blaze, the child babbled in glee
and danced in my arms, impatient to seek an unknown nurse in the free glory
of those flames.


SOMAKA

Stop, no more, I pray!


SHADES

Ritvik, your presence is a disgrace to hell itself!


THE CHARIOTEER

This is no place for you, King! nor have you deserved to be forced to
listen to this recital of a deed which makes hell shudder in pity.


SOMAKA

Drive off in your chariot!--Brahmin, my place is by you in this hell. The
Gods may forget my sin, but can I forget the last look of agonised surprise
on my child's face when, for one terrible moment, he realised that his own
father had betrayed his trust?


_Enter_ DHARMA, _the Judge of Departed Spirits_


DHARMA

King, Heaven waits for you.


SOMAKA

No, not for me. I killed my own child.


DHARMA

Your sin has been swept away in the fury of pain it caused you.


RITVIK


No, King, you must never go to Heaven alone, and thus create a second hell
for me, to burn both with fire and with hatred of you! Stay here!


SOMAKA

I will stay.


SHADES

And crown the despair and inglorious suffering of hell with the triumph of
a soul!

26


The man had no useful work, only vagaries of various kinds.

Therefore it surprised him to find himself in Paradise after a life spent
perfecting trifles.

Now the guide had taken him by mistake to the wrong Paradise--one meant
only for good, busy souls.


In this Paradise, our man saunters along the road only to obstruct the rush
of business.

He stands aside from the path and is warned that he tramples on sown seed.
Pushed, he starts up: hustled, he moves on.

A very busy girl comes to fetch water from the well. Her feet run on the
pavement like rapid fingers over harp-strings. Hastily she ties a negligent
knot with her hair, and loose locks on her forehead pry into the dark of
her eyes.

The man says to her, "Would you lend me your pitcher?"

"My pitcher?" she asks, "to draw water?"

"No, to paint patterns on."

"I have no time to waste," the girl retorts in contempt.


Now a busy soul has no chance against one who is supremely idle.

Every day she meets him at the well, and every day he repeats the same
request, till at last she yields.

Our man paints the pitcher with curious colours in a mysterious maze of
lines.

The girl takes it up, turns it round and asks, "What does it mean?"

"It has no meaning," he answers.


The girl carries the pitcher home. She holds it up in different lights and
tries to con its mystery.

At night she leaves her bed, lights a lamp, and gazes at it from all points
of view.

This is the first time she has met with something without meaning.


On the next day the man is again near the well.

The girl asks, "What do you want?"

"To do more work for you."

"What work?" she enquires.

"Allow me to weave coloured strands into a ribbon to bind your hair."

"Is there any need?" she asks.

"None whatever," he allows.

The ribbon is made, and thence-forward she spends a great deal of time over
her hair.

The even stretch of well-employed time in that Paradise begins to show
irregular rents.

The elders are troubled; they meet in council.

The guide confesses his blunder, saying that he has brought the wrong man
to the wrong place.

The wrong man is called. His turban, flaming with colour, shows plainly how
great that blunder has been.

The chief of the elders says, "You must go back to the earth."

The man heaves a sigh of relief: "I am ready."

The girl with the ribbon round her hair chimes in: "I also!"

For the first time the chief of the elders is faced with a situation which
has no sense in it.

27


It is said that in the forest, near the meeting of river and lake, certain
fairies live in disguise who are only recognised as fairies after they have
flown away.

A Prince went to this forest, and when he came where river met lake he saw
a village girl sitting on the bank ruffling the water to make the lilies
dance.

He asked her in a whisper, "Tell me, what fairy art thou?"

The girl laughed at the question and the hillsides echoed her mirth.

The Prince thought she was the laughing fairy of the waterfall.


News reached the King that the Prince had married a fairy: he sent horses
and men and brought them to his house.

The Queen saw the bride and turned her face away in disgust, the Prince's
sister flushed red with annoyance, and the maids asked if that was how
fairies dressed.

The Prince whispered, "Hush! my fairy has come to our house in disguise."


On the day of the yearly festival the Queen said to her son, "Ask your
bride not to shame us before our kinsfolk who are coming to see the fairy."

And the Prince said to his bride, "For my love's sake show thy true self to
my people."

Long she sat silent, then nodded her promise while tears ran down her
cheeks.


The full moon shone, the Prince, dressed in a wedding robe, entered his
bride's room.

No one was there, nothing but a streak of moonlight from the window aslant
the bed.

The kinsfolk crowded in with the King and the Queen, the Prince's sister
stood by the door.

All asked, "Where is the fairy bride?"

The Prince answered, "She has vanished for ever to make herself known to
you."

28

KARNA AND KUNTI


KARNA AND KUNTI

_The Pandava Queen Kunti before marriage had a son, Karna, who, in manhood,
became the commander of the Kaurava host. To hide her shame she abandoned
him at birth, and a charioteer, Adhiratha, brought him up as his son._


KARNA

I am Karna, the son of the charioteer, Adhiratha, and I sit here by the
bank of holy Ganges to worship the setting sun. Tell me who you are.


KUNTI

I am the woman who first made you acquainted with that light you are
worshipping.


KARNA

I do not understand: but your eyes melt my heart as the kiss of the morning
sun melts the snow on a mountain-top, and your voice rouses a blind sadness
within me of which the cause may well lie beyond the reach of my earliest
memory. Tell me, strange woman, what mystery binds my birth to you?


KUNTI

Patience, my son. I will answer when the lids of darkness come down over
the prying eyes of day. In the meanwhile, know that I am Kunti.


KARNA

Kunti! The mother of Arjuna?


KUNTI

Yes, indeed, the mother of Arjuna, your antagonist. But do not, therefore,
hate me. I still remember the day of the trial of arms in Hastina when you,
an unknown boy, boldly stepped into the arena, like the first ray of dawn
among the stars of night. Ah! who was that unhappy woman whose eyes kissed
your bare, slim body through tears that blessed you, where she sat among
the women of the royal household behind the arras? Why, the mother of
Arjuna! Then the Brahmin, master of arms, stepped forth and said, "No youth
of mean birth may challenge Arjuna to a trial of strength." You stood
speechless, like a thunder-cloud at sunset flashing with an agony of
suppressed light. But who was the woman whose heart caught fire from your
shame and anger, and flared up in silence? The mother of Arjuna! Praised be
Duryodhana, who perceived your worth, and then and there crowned you King
of Anga, thus winning the Kauravas a champion. Overwhelmed at this good
fortune, Adhiratha, the charioteer, broke through the crowd; you instantly
rushed to him and laid your crown at his feet amid the jeering laughter of
the Pandavas and their friends. But there was one woman of the Pandava
house whose heart glowed with joy at the heroic pride of such
humility;--even the mother of Arjuna!


KARNA

But what brings you here alone, Mother of kings?


KUNTI

I have a boon to crave.


KARNA

Command me, and whatever manhood and my honour as a Kshatriya permit shall
be offered at your feet.


KUNTI

I have come to take you.


KARNA

Where?


KUNTI

To my breast thirsting for your love, my son.


KARNA

Fortunate mother of five brave kings, where can you find place for me, a
small chieftain of lowly descent?


KUNTI

Your place is before all my other sons.


KARNA

But what right have I to take it?


KUNTI

Your own God-given right to your mother's love.


KARNA

The gloom of evening spreads over the earth, silence rests on the water,
and your voice leads me back to some primal world of infancy lost in twilit
consciousness. However, whether this be dream, or fragment of forgotten
reality, come near and place your right hand on my forehead. Rumour runs
that I was deserted by my mother. Many a night she has come to me in my
slumber, but when I cried: "Open your veil, show me your face!" her figure
always vanished. Has this same dream come this evening while I wake? See,
yonder the lamps are lighted in your son's tents across the river; and on
this side behold the tent-domes of my Kauravas, like the suspended waves of
a spell-arrested storm at sea. Before the din of tomorrow's battle, in the
awful hush of this field where it must be fought, why should the voice of
the mother of my opponent, Arjuna, bring me a message of forgotten
motherhood? and why should my name take such music from her tongue as to
draw my heart out to him and his brothers?


KUNTI

Then delay not, my son, come with me!


KARNA

Yes, I will come and never ask question, never doubt. My soul responds to
your call; and the struggle for victory and fame and the rage of hatred
have suddenly become untrue to me, as the delirious dream of a night in the
serenity of the dawn. Tell me whither you mean to lead?


KUNTI

To the other bank of the river, where those lamps burn across the ghastly
pallor of the sands.


KARNA

Am I there to find my lost mother for ever?


KUNTI

O my son!


KARNA

Then why did you banish me--a castaway uprooted from my ancestral soil,
adrift in a homeless current of indignity? Why set a bottomless chasm
between Arjuna and myself, turning the natural attachment of kinship to the
dread attraction of hate? You remain speechless. Your shame permeates the
vast darkness and sends invisible shivers through my limbs. Leave my
question unanswered! Never explain to me what made you rob your son of his
mother's love! Only tell me why you have come to-day to call me back to the
ruins of a heaven wrecked by your own hands?


KUNTI

I am dogged by a curse more deadly than your reproaches: for, though
surrounded by five sons, my heart shrivels like that of a woman deprived of
her children. Through the great rent that yawned for my deserted
first-born, all my life's pleasures have run to waste. On that accursed day
when I belied my motherhood you could not utter a word; to-day your
recreant mother implores you for generous words. Let your forgiveness burn
her heart like fire and consume its sin.


KARNA

Mother, accept my tears!


KUNTI

I did not come with the hope of winning you back to my arms, but with that
of restoring your rights to you. Come and receive, as a king's son, your
due among your brothers.


KARNA

I am more truly the son of a charioteer, and do not covet the glory of
greater parentage.


KUNTI

Be that as it may, come and win back the kingdom, which is yours by right!


KARNA

Must you, who once refused me a mother's love, tempt me with a kingdom? The
quick bond of kindred which you severed at its root is dead, and can never
grow again. Shame were mine should I hasten to call the mother of kings
mother, and abandon _my_ mother in the charioteer's house!


KUNTI

You are great, my son! How God's punishment invisibly grows from a tiny
seed to a giant life! The helpless babe disowned by his mother comes back a
man through the dark maze of events to smite his brothers!


KARNA

Mother, have no fear! I know for certain that victory awaits the Pandavas.
Peaceful and still though this night be, my heart is full of the music of a
hopeless venture and baffled end. Ask me not to leave those who are doomed
to defeat. Let the Pandavas win the throne, since they must: I remain with
the desperate and forlorn. On the night of my birth you left me naked and
unnamed to disgrace: leave me once again without pity to the calm
expectation of defeat and death!

29


When like a flaming scimitar the hill stream has been sheathed in gloom by
the evening, suddenly a flock of birds passes overhead, their loud-laughing
wings hurling their flight like an arrow among stars.

It startles a passion for speed in the heart of all motionless things; the
hills seem to feel in their bosom the anguish of storm-clouds, and trees
long to break their rooted shackles.


For me the flight of these birds has rent a veil of stillness, and reveals
an immense flutter in this deep silence.

I see these hills and forests fly across time to the unknown, and darkness
thrill into fire as the stars wing by.

I feel in my own being the rush of the sea-crossing bird, cleaving a way
beyond the limits of life and death, while the migrant world cries with a
myriad voices, "Not here, but somewhere else, in the bosom of the Faraway."

30


The crowd listens in wonder to Kashi, the young singer, whose voice, like a
sword in feats of skill, dances amidst hopeless tangles, cuts them to
pieces, and exults.


Among the hearers sits old Rajah Pratap in weary endurance. For his own
life had been nourished and encircled by Barajlal's songs, like a happy
land which a river laces with beauty. His rainy evenings and the still
hours of autumn days spoke to his heart through Barajlal's voice, and his
festive nights trimmed their lamps and tinkled their bells to those songs.


When Kashi stopped for rest, Pratap smilingly winked at Barajlal and spoke
to him in a whisper, "Master, now let us hear music and not this
new-fangled singing, which mimics frisky kittens hunting paralysed mice."


The old singer with his spotlessly white turban made a deep bow to the
assembly and took his seat. His thin fingers struck the strings of his
instrument, his eyes closed, and in timid hesitation his song began. The
hall was large, his voice feeble, and Pratap shouted "Bravo!" with
ostentation, but whispered in his ear, "Just a little louder, friend!"


The crowd was restless; some yawned, some dozed, some complained of the
heat. The air of the hall hummed with many-toned inattention, and the song,
like a frail boat, tossed upon it in vain till it sank under the hubbub.


Suddenly the old man, stricken at heart, forgot a passage, and his voice
groped in agony, like a blind man at a fair for his lost leader. He tried
to fill the gap with any strain that came. But the gap still yawned: and
the tortured notes refused to serve the need, suddenly changed their tune,
and broke into a sob. The master laid his head on his instrument, and in
place of his forgotten music, there broke from him the first cry of life
that a child brings into the world.


Pratap touched him gently on his shoulder, and said, "Come away, our
meeting is elsewhere. I know, my friend, that truth is widowed without
love, and beauty dwells not with the many, nor in the moment."