Thought provoking creations

Reviewed by Jayashantha JAYAWARDHANA

Candlelight: the Maiden Anthology by Tharindu Weerasinghe

Book: Candlelight

Genre: Poetry

Author: Tharindu Weerasinghe

“......One Science only one Genius will fit;

So vast is Art, so narrow Human Wit......”

Alexander Pope-Essay on Criticism

Maybe Pope, one my favourite satirist poets, is not entirely right. Or it is possible that there are remarkable exceptions. That is the impression I got upon reading Candlelight, the debut anthology by Tharindu Weerasinghe, an Engineering Graduate from University of Peradeniya, an institute that has produced quite a few literary icons.

Because “My way is to begin with the beginning...” as Lord Byron says in his epic poem, Don Juan, I would like to begin with the very first poem of Tharindu`s maiden anthology.

She is the one who converted red into white
She is the one who sustained a world of pain
She is the one who sacrificed her life for us
She is the one who must be worshipped....

Tharindu dedicates this poem to all the sacred mothers in this world, a small gift to Asian, European, African, American, and Australian mothers who face innumerable hardships and endure endless suffering for their children.

I am tempted to quote J.M. Coetzee, The Nobel Laureate South African author in his Nobel banquet speech:

“But of course I missed the point. Dorothy was right. My mother would have been bursting with pride. My son the Nobel Prize winner. And for whom, anyway, do we do the things that lead to Nobel Prizes if not for our mothers?”

‘Mommy, Mommy, I won a prize!’

‘That’s wonderful, my dear. Now eat your carrots before they get cold.’”

Tharindu`s mother herself must have been no less proud of her son’s literary accomplishments. Also, we cannot help agreeing with his wonderful assertion that ‘She is the person who must be worshipped.”

In this poem of five stanzas, titled ‘She is the ONE, who must be worshipped’, Tharindu carefully employs slant rhyme, which lends itself to his theme and helps him argue the point home.

Robert Graves, who found Shelly`s use of ‘s’, the serpent`s letter, in one stanza of the latter`s celebrated poem, ‘Ode to West Wind’ particularly crude would have hardly less displeased with Tharindu`s poem. But, I, as a fan who prefers Shelly to Graves, have little to object to in this case.

‘Father thinks Far’ draws a significant comparison between the young and the old and highlights the different perspectives from which they look at life.

The poet, himself a youth though, shows extraordinary maturity in his poetic depiction of father and his son. It is here, we know, that the clash between the two generations is sparked off. Tharindu, for some reason, chooses to leave it unexplored.

Maybe he wants us, the readers, to continue the exploration from where he has left it.

.....As Science is growing,
Spiritual aspects of human life is falling
down and down.....
 

In, ‘If we could, but see’ where the excerpt above is found, Tharindu laments man`s relentless pursuit of money and other material wealth. With his expression, ‘Money is a disguised demon’, he seems to suggest that money is the root of all evil, a rather pessimistic notion. But he goes on to say that ‘We have to be friendly with him to help us, in our day- to- day life.’ Admittedly, the picture he presents us with is true if bleak.

‘Sacred and Eternal Love’ is a poem about maternal and paternal love that rarely changes or diminishes over time. Particularly in Asian countries like ours, we know family ties are strong and that there is a very close relationship between children and their parents.

This closeness is as much physically experienced as it is emotionally felt. So, often enough, parents are there to save and comfort their children when they are in trouble or distress. It`s this reality that this truthful poem emphasizes. In, A Dead Man, Speaking!, Tharindu writes:

“After having met DEATH, I tell all of them,

“NOT the truth,”
“Please be careful!”
“It is better there, than here...!”

His lines remind me of Shelly in Adonais:

“...Peace, peace! he is not dead, he doth not sleep-

He hath awakened from the dream of life....”

Let me quote him once again from the same poem:

He has out-scored the shadow of our night;

Envy and calumny and hate and pain,

And that unrest which men miscall delight

Can touch him not or torture not again.

Obviously, it is while we live that we need to be careful; therefore, simply, life is infinitely more dangerous than death. But the irony is that death is presumably the end of life. And, once you are dead what remains there for you to take care of? In this poem, Tharindu , in a sense, romanticizes death.

I will not call it right or wrong. But I believe it is easier to die than live and agree wholeheartedly with Tolstoy`s view that the fundamental obligation of man is to be in tune with life and that we should love life in all its forms and manifestations.

Tharindu seems to prefer free verse and off-rhyme to rhyme throughout this collection. Also, he, like most amateur poets, if unconsciously, seems to have taken a fancy to the mellifluous sound of ‘l’, perhaps the most musical letter of English alphabet. But, I would like to warn him against overuse of it in order to produce a musical effect in his poems, because Lord Byron himself makes fun at the overuse of soft ‘l’s:

“When amatory poets sing their loves

In liquid lines mellifluously bland.....”

Tharindu`s poem, ‘Story of a Hawk’ seems to have been influenced by a fable.

And there is allegory in it too. Pride, the never failing vice of fools, as Pope says, and its big brother Hubris can rarely escape Nemesis. The proud, in the end, pay a steep price. Literature from ancient times has discussed this all important subject of Pride. Sophocles` Antigone is a fine example where Pride is brutally punished:

There is no happiness where there is no wisdom,

No wisdom but in submission to gods,

Big words are always punished,

And proud men in their old age learn to be wise.

Tharindu, in his youthful wisdom, has written this simple moral poem to argue that one should not be too proud of one`s wealth, education, power or physical strength. The proud, he warns, risk suffering the same fate as his written hawk.

In ‘The MAN of TODAY is busy’, I like the ironic, almost sarcastic last two lines where the poet asks:

Does he have enough room

In his coffin for his golden coins?

Here, in the quoted lines, I have changed the punctuation marks in the original poem to give them a little more sense. I believe it would certainly have enhanced both the literary value and the linguistic value of his poetry, had he paid a little more attention to punctuation in his poems where necessary.

The social ills brought about by the process of development are a recurrent theme in Tharindu`s poetry. It`s commendable because a writer should be alive to the political, economic and social changes in his environment. His poem, ‘Money versus Humanity’, calls for a trade off between economic prosperity and spiritual development.

‘I am in the Race’ is about a kid torn between the necessity to study and his love for play and nature. And we know Tharindu is not exaggerating. Our children today have little time for play or to revel in the nature`s wonders-flowers, trees, birds, butterflies, brooks and so on and so forth.

Maybe these kids will run the race and win it, but as Tharindu suggests, they miss out on life in the meantime.

Sometimes, we feel attracted to people who really do not love us or care for us. Because love is a choice and not an obligation, we really cannot blame anyone for not loving us. The famous proverb also has a point:

All is fair in the love and war. However, for some strange reason, sometimes, we are tempted to choose a person whom we love but who does not love us in return over a person who loves us but whom we do not love.

We know this is downright stupid and completely irrational. Still, we have been doing it from time immemorial and will continue to do the same, perhaps, to the end of time itself. This is what Tharindu intends to tell us in his poem, ‘Is She or She?’

Good poetry, above all, is about images that stimulate the senses. Tharindu must have had this basic rule at work in his mind as he wrote ‘Sweetest Love’, a poem that brought him international reputation.

The vivid images he employs in it, create a wonderful setting for it and highlight its meaning. I need not elaborate upon it because it speaks for itself. I am particularly fascinated by the lines, “....A couple of doves, on a bole of a lone tree-Having a lovely evening.....”, in which I find the interlocked sounds producing a musical effect that lends itself to the poem.

We must certainly excuse him for his bias towards ‘l’.

‘A Hidden Truth’ is a beautiful allegory, where a rose bud symbolizes a little girl while the poem Victim Beauty is about a prostitute. We can draw numerous parallels between it and the song ‘Landune...’, sung by famous Sri Lankan vocalist, Mr. Amarasiri Pieris. Maybe, Tharindu was inspired by this song to write it. In ‘I`m still waiting for her’, a lover seems to bemoan his departed fiancee. But the last line, ‘Severely punished for a genuine love’ does prevent us from reaching a definite conclusion. ‘Am I a Person with TWO Births?’ must be Tharindu`s own love story.

Religious influence is a prominent feature in Tharindu`s poetry. For example, in Journey around the Strange Garden, he upholds the religious values. ‘Sacred May’ is itself dedicated to Lord Buddha. ‘Candlelight’ calls for spiritual development in people while ‘I wandered in the Garden of Life’ and ‘Reality of Beauty’ both talk about life`s only reality-impermanence.

His scientific religious poem, ‘How can Gravity Exist?’ also about impermanence. TRUTH We DO accept but DO NOT remind emphasizes the importance of detachment as preached by Lord Buddha.

Candlelight, Tharindu`s maiden anthology discusses themes ranging from love to society to religion to war. The slim volume with fifty odd pages is simply written and beautifully presented. The anthology, making Tharindu a versatile personality among his contemporaries, also makes a wonderful reading for those who are really interested in writings by amateur poets.

Tharindu is a literary sprout with great talent. Candlelight itself is enough evidence to his talent. I wish to congratulate him on his literary success and look forward to reading even better works by him in the future.