Naresh Gulati
Vijay Saraf Meenaghe is known fundamentally as an abstract painter. Trained from the prestigious J J School of Art, Mumbai, his career in painting has spanned almost 45 years wherein he has exhibited his art in scores of his solo and group shows held far and wide transcending the geographical boundaries of Jammu region and earning a name for himself.
At another related level that we know of, he taught art and ended his teaching career as the Principal of the Institute of Music & Fine Arts, Jammu. As earlier noted by me in my short review of his first collection, carried in the present collection, he was destined to diversify from the fine arts to the literary art of letters when his quest with Hindi poetry began around 2015-16 and he started sharing his poems on Facebook while sitting in Britain. That’s when some of us took a certain notice of his continuity with his short poetry in typical short lines and offbeat linguistic usage of what weren’t the traditional stanzas. No trace of conventional rhyming there. These poems came across as prosaic as with the contemporary idiom but conformed more to a reflective countenance and tonality, as they dwelt on doubts and dilemmas of the individual psyche as influenced and shaped by the sensibilities of an individual who was already looking inwards with his abstractions on the canvas; one who listened to and expressed instinctively. One who had manifestly espoused the abstract idiom of expression vouching that there is nothing like a figurative art! On that he goes with Picasso who aired similar views by saying that we start with figurative art eventually to convert it into and move over to abstraction.
Vijay’s trigger for that writing instinct in Hindi was perhaps silently provided by his long-dormant sense of appreciation and awe for Hindi writers whom he occasionally saw visit the then haloed office of Hindi Sahitya Mandal, Jammu located near Chowk Chabutra. Vijay has admitted to that influence of his very young formative years in a short memoir that he wrote on my insistence for the souvenir-cumspecial issue of Madhurima published in January 2021. This tryst with Hindi poetry which started as an abstract expression in keeping with his wont as a painter found a better expression gradually but within the same basic idiom and imagery while the metaphor he coined was and is at times brilliantly speaking. Soon his first collection titled Ehsaas Se Pare appeared in 2018 with some remarkable experiments by way of simultaneous translation of original Hindi poetry into six other languages and transliteration in two additional scripts appearing alongside in the same volume that became a massive 600 plus pages between its covers.
This entire text in these nine languages was presented as a unique mega-edition with great effort and dedication in pursuing translations and then presenting them to all the speakers-readers of the respective languages. That experiment has become a unique historical example of collective exchange and harmony with not only regional languages like Dogri but also with the other languages including English and Sanskrit. Six years later Vijay is back with his second collection of poetry.
Titled Pani ki Poshaken, it comes with the same experiment of putting simultaneous translation of all the 115 original Hindi poems compiled this time, in the same volume; though this has been repeated with only Dogri and English this time. With the cover design being what it is, resembling even the colour scheme and motifs of the first cover of the first book by the writer – which is predominantly black – the second collection looks truly like a sequel of the first collection, firstly from the facade and then followed by the flavor of the content within the covers as you start checking it out. The reflective and spiritual strain remains visibly ensconced between the lines of a significant number of Vijay’s poems.
He creates themes and imagery of existential struggles, a sense of gratitude in survival – the Shukrana of the God and Gurus as we know it in popular psyche demonstrated by a number of friends around; life, death and even life after death in a number of his poems. It’s thus the individual instinct at peace with itself, its environment and all human virtues – even espousing minimalism in some way at some times – that find abundant and recurring expression in many of the 115 poems contained in the present collection. While dwelling at life per se and its existence within the cosmos, the poet expresses his love and appreciation for Nature per se as he narrates the transitory phases of the seasons that bring about discernible changes in the facade and outlook of the nature and all the elements that comprise it. His inclination towards and dialogue with Nature was seen in some untitled poems in his first collection. And this dialogue and concern continues in quite a few poems from the very start of the present collection, namely Poem No 4: Plastic Seat; Poem No 5: Season after Season (Mausam-Mausam); Poem No 6: Silent Lake & Thyself (Khamosh Jheel); Poem No 20: Released is the Sky (Chhoot Chuka hai Aakash); Poem No 23: The Virtue of (the) River (Dariya ke Ehsaas), and so on. Yet, this dialogue with Nature is not a mere dialogue as it becomes a rejuvenating force as poignantly expressed in Poem No 23: The Virtue of the River where the poet seems to talk of spiritual well-being, growth that brings in a certain stoicism and Poem No 32: With New Fresh Seasons which is indicative of newer alliances and newer pursuits in life.
Whats both a remarkable and a bit unremarkable about the collection is that the poetry that we find here is hardly political or socio-political in its outlook or voices. The poet does not steer clear of the politics, the current elevated jargon and political bashing of the one or the other kind of the day by a conscious choice.
This happens for he finds himself treading in the territory of self-analysis, introspection of the human self, inter personal relations between human beings and with the super powers of consciousness that tend to control and guide the former. In its overall appeal it should in my humble opinion be termed as humanist inasmuch as it not only talks of the spiritual welfare and elevation of everyone’s self in general. The title of the Collection namely Pani ki Poshaken is apparently intriguing but does offer an insight into the unique way the poet crystallises his metaphor in his poetic creativity. This particular phrase for the title can literally imply the costume made of water or made for water.
But a careful recall of the colloquial as well as scientific information leads us to infer it’s about how the water can find ways and take shapes to extricate itself on its way forward. On the craft side of the poetry compiled in the collection about 50% of the poems are particularly short but straight and intense in their message and appeal. This trend starts with Poem No 1: Wish Him (which is an invocation of the God suggesting how a believer can change and elevate himself even as he cannot change the world) and continues with No 5: Season after Season; No 7 Honesty; No 8 Faith; No 12 My Own Ugliness; No 13 Everywhere; No 14 Everywhere; No 18 Wrong Notions; No 23 The Virtue of (the) River; No 24 It is a mere Illusion; No 77 With My Own Self; No 86 Artificial Life; No 94 When We come of Age; No 105: The Little You Know; No 109 Gunpowder and No 114: From Any Pocket, all of which are quickly readable whichever language you choose for multiple flavours. While writing this review of the collection, I first read and relied on the Hindi text of Vijay’s poems due to my own conditioning of reading always the original first if available. Then of course the English translations by the worthy translator. That’s the reason that on the other side of the spectrum I shun the Hindi translations of books originally written in English. I did therefore flit between Hindi and English versions of this poetry for the flavour of the original and the translated; and also to get a feel of the task done by the translator S N Pandit, who acquits himself honourably. So far so good! So here is wishing dear Vijay the best for a further diversified creative expression in the next collection.
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