Weeping Wisdom (2021) is the second poetic collection of a Kashmiri writer, Nazir Ahmad Shawl, published by Dost Publications. The collection has 184 short lyrics which are the poet’s reflections on multiple issues that have disturbed him.
The lyrics written in simple but lucid diction are varied in themes ranging from the loss that the poet is feeling by living away from his homeland to his hope that the “Bruised Humanity” (16, numerals refer to page Nos) would survive:
O Gardener my hope will always remain alive
And the bruised humanity will finally survive. (op. cit.).
They are written in the couplet form as one finds in the Urdu ghazal except that there is no RADEEF in them—in the couplet quoted above the rhyming words are ‘alive” and “survive”, respectively. The entire collection is a potpourri of nostalgic lyrical notes lamenting the bruised Kashmir.
When does “Wisdom” weep? The answer isn’t difficult to find if the reader delves deep into what Nazir means when he cries:
Towards you I sent my paper boat
All my words boarded in it to float
These words jumped in the water and committed suicide
On this tragedy my soul cried
The corpses of words scattered on water
Even the vultures are saddened by this Slaughter
With excellent imagery, the poet is saying that words of wisdom get lost when they don’t get the desired response. The image of paper boats might be a children’s play but for the poet, it is the vehicle of sending their messages across.
The terrific images of words jumping into the water, committing suicide and even the vultures feeling sad about the tragic slaughter of them shows how the poet feels about his message not being understood the way they should have been: “At times wisdom weeps when you are smart/I know not love nor its art” (‘Weeping Wisdom, 10; I find it strange that the same poem is included as ‘Paper Boat’ at page 75). Shawl wails for humanity, his birthplace, Kashmir, and the entire humanity that have suffered greatly over the years:
When my heart is heavy my eyes go wet
Sorrows and anxieties who has not met
Uncertainties sometimes make me cry
Why people are ready to do and die (‘Bruised Humanity’, 16).
In ‘Our Woes and Moon’ (25), Shawl compares the life on earth with the life of the Moon that is surrounded by “innumerable shining stars”. However, the life on the earth with its “inequities make me writhe in pain”. He finds the moon very happy and without any fear:
You have no sorrows and you have no fear
I am much scared as I am sheltered here (25)
The desire to be free and enjoy equality seems to have died as there is chaos around him: “Orphaned desires are swimming around/We have to stand up to hold some ground” (‘Orphaned Desires’, 46). Kashmir is at the centre of most of the lyrics that lament the loss that Kashmir has suffered over the years. In ‘Unmarked Graves’ (85), he is talking about those innocent Kashmiris who had been killed and dumped somewhere to be later on discovered as mass graves:
All the perpetrators? Who shoulder this guilt
An inhuman act
Killing innocent people
And dumping them
In these unmarked graves
Despite his sorrows and pain that surround Shawl in his life, he isn’t a pessimist. He hopes for the best and is quite optimistic about future. While referring to “beautiful garden” that has lost its charm, he advises the reader to “[t]hink positive and always be bold/Vouch for a spring and resist winters [sic] cold” (‘Glorious Day’, 15). He is upbeat that things are going to change and therefore advises the people to “[w]ait for the pleasant upcoming glorious day”. The same message is reflected on in ‘Smiling Morning’ (19) wherein he advises the people to “[c]leanse your soul, nourish your thought” which would enable them to enjoy a smiling morning. This is possible when they fight together against inequality and injustice. Shawl’s ‘New Morning’ (70) and ‘Newborn Sun’ (84) are his wish and hope that something new will surely come in his (or his people’s) way that would make life better. In ‘Awake Awake’ (36), the poet advises people:
Rise and unlock the bondage
With a voice of thunder
To tear wickedness asunder
World conscience you have to shake
My comrades, awake
Shawl certainly has Kashmir and its bruised people in mind while lamenting the chaotic life that they are living, but his message has a universal appeal and is meant for all those people who are suffering for one reason or the other. These nostalgic rumblings are reflective of Shawl’s strong feelings about how he misses Kashmir and its natural surroundings. In ‘Botanical Garden’ (13) and ‘Remembering My Alma Mater (University of Kashmir)’ (86-7), he feels quite nostalgic about his alma mater, Kashmir University, where he graduated. He names his teachers Kachru, Javed and Koul, among whom only the last one is living today and his class fellows, Kundangar, Sarwar, Mira, Nancy etc. Amid nostalgia, he is hopeful that time would come when he would be able to meet his former friends: “Good time will come by stopping the tide/A road to wisdom should be our guide/Flowers of the garden will dance and rise/This I will get my choicest prize” (13.) Remembering his alma mater and the joyful life that he had lived there made him feel “younger” and forget [his] age” (87).
Shawl loves Nature and her beauty. In ‘Smiling Morning’ (29), he feels that Nature instils in us a feeling that “[l]oving all humans is a beautiful art” as:
Birds are chirping in a joyful mode
Inviting us to tread on a[sic] happiest road
One of the facets of Nature is the childhood that one enjoys without bothering about the sorrows around. ‘The Rain’ (64) makes him nostalgic of some past event but makes the peacock dance in glee, forgetting “her ugly feet”. In ‘O, Let Me Go” (74), Shawl enjoys oceans, mountains, rose gardens, moonlit night, desert and stars as all of them make him happy and hopeful of better times.
WEEPING WISDOM is a delightful read, and yet another addition to Kashmiri English poetry from a poet who has a vast knowledge of world affairs and is a keen observer of the happenings in his birthplace.
Professor Muhammad Aslam is Ex HoD English, Kashmir University
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are the personal opinions of the author.
The facts, analysis, assumptions and perspective appearing in the article do not reflect the views of GK.