| 10 January 2010
Book Review
Book: The Wind without Rain
Poet: Rashid Afaque
Pages: 152
Cost: Rs. 200/-
Year of Publication: 2009
Reviewed by: Dr. Hamid Naseem Rafiabadi
“The Wind Without Rain” as the title of the book connotes barrenness and spiritual sterility. The destructive aspect of time pervades allover the book right from the beginning. The second poem of the book is “The Mother”. “The Mother” is a symbol that stands for my mother land of the poet. The poem is a lamentation on the separation of the two sons of the mother.
My mother has got two sons
One is living in exile, making piles of profit and fortune.
One is waiting for his prosperity in the shade of blood and blaze.
The poem is followed by the third poem. "An uncared for child". The "An uncared for child" symbolizes the Kashmiri's
I am the most maltreated son of my parents
Born to be torn into pieces
My beauty changed into deformity
Neither of the parents took; care of me.
Scenic beauty of Kashmir has gone under a big transformation due to the callousness of man and the indifference of people at the helm of affairs. The famous beauty spots of Kashmir have now turned unpleasant. The poem “ Wular” is another symbol for how the nations are being buried in the annals of history by the wrongful deeds of their people.
Sindamat Nagar was a city of yore.
Above ground it stands no more!
The poem ends with the tragic note of the cruelty of man inflicted on this world famous lake.
Look down from the Krala sangar
Wular is a land of willow grooves.
Same is the case with the Dal Lake which is the source of our economy as a hub of the tourists
Dal is dwindling day by day.
Boom economy! who can pay
The loss of life of the Lotus Land?
The poem ends with the spiritual bankruptcy of man.
In grace the mosque and the temple excel.
Crumbl'd like the towers of Pari Mahal.
Stands the material minded man.
The deformity of other beauties of Kashmir are described in the poem viz; Jehlum, Pahalgam, Beauty blind, Ningal, Gulmarg and above all in Beauty and the Beast. Beauty and the Beast is another symbol which stands for man against nature. The poem is a lament on the extinction of a bloomy lake Baghu in the heart of the city of Sopore. By invading the native man has become a beast.
The Beauty of Bhugu was- bereft by the beast.
Created by Him alluring and fine.
Man trampled the nature's shine.
Stifled in the North and squeezed in the East.
The head is given to woman and wine.
Who does care for beauty divine!.
History of the world is replete with man's lust for power and money which has been the cause of destructive wars of the world. Here the beauties of nature have not even escaped from the clutches of man. The water of Baghu was extinguished by the fire of the lust of man. Water extinguishes the fire. But Water was extinguished by fire.
Why does a man do so? Answer to this question is furnished in IV canto of the poem.
The lack of beauty and the lack of love
Has deprived us of our aim of life
Beauty of Bhugu is no more seen
How callous a man has been
Our future depends on the present. In the poem, the poet is bewailing not only at the present but at the future of Kashmir also, which is a foregone conclusion.
My present is so waste.
How desolate my future would be!
The word Khasmiriyat means to be real Hindu and a true Muslim. Lalla Ded and Sheikh Noor Ud din Wali in their poetry advise us to detest the religion of institution and follow the religion based on the faith of God and love of mankind. The same lesson is preached in the poem "Where is the Centre"
Eschew the religion of institution.
Cease to be a bat or owl.
Gain perfect knowledge with perfect action.
Embrace the religion of God.
Special mention of the luminaries of our past is made in the book. The visionaries like Lalla Ded, Sheikh Noor ud Din Wali, Haba Khatoon and Dr. Iqbal are treated simply to project the momentous history of our past and our spiritual heritage, which need to be revived in order to seek a solution to the present imbroglio which is more Socio - political than economic .The solution how to go out of the present socio political dilemma of is mentioned in plain words. In the poem ‘God’, “Beauty and the Beast” , “A wish” , “Where is the Centre” “Song of Silence”, “Lalla Ded” and “The Message”.
The corruption of politician and bearcats and commoners is depicted in “Corruption”.
Corruption has crept in the every sphere of life.
It needs a struggle and a lot of strife
To eradicate this venomous, ugly evil.
This snake has bitten military and civil
Departments and private sector, too.
Moral corruption of priests and the hollowness of their faith is exposed in “The Woman in White”.
How to entice her was the dilemma before the
Mullah.
He delivered a sermon on the fundamentals of
pilgrimage: a woman with out her partner or
Muharram is not entitled to Hajj. The widow was
without a partner. He caught her Achilles heel.
Oneness is the weakness of a woman.
Man is the architect of his own destiny, is the message which poet wants to convey through this book. He has hunted at cause of the present day political instability (rather anarchy) in various poems of the book. For instance the following verses from “The wailing woman”.
Vacillating between belief and unbelief
you are living a life in death.
Or
Are we toys in the hands of fate?
fate is all wrought by our deeds:
See the following lines from “The Wind Without Rain”.
Between the hills there runs a
Long line of frustration...........
Skies fall! when greed is the fairest of all.
How rough and wretched life we lead!
In small breaths we count the beads of time.
I stood on the wide bank of Wular outrageous.
The past, present and future are not separate entities. According to Dr. Iqbal, it is an organic whole in which the past is not left behind, but it is moving along with, and operating in the present. And the future is given to it not as lying before, yet to be transversed, it is given only in the sense that it is present in its native as an open possibility. (RRT1-P.49)
Likewise the poet said in “Beauty and the Beast”
Present is traveling fast in future.
"Time is sword" said the scholar.
Make the best use of the time.
You will control the pots and pans of drudgery.
“The Wind Without Rain” symbolizes the hollowness of the materialistic man and the spiritual crises under which he is grooming. The result of the brutalities of man is the mind invaded with worries and anxieties.
Where blood flowed like water of Vyth;
Where men are increasingly nervous;
Where women weep with menacing madness;
Where the young roam with languished mind
Where girls grow slow under depression.
Where the abdomen of a pregnant woman is cut by Caliban I P. 119)
The atrocities inflicted by the ravages of time on the people of Kashmir are pervading allover the poem. The poem also asserts the theory of cause and effect. See the following verses.
Life was wasted on worldly worries
And my flesh was vultured upon by mental crises,
An uncured sickness prevails in the land of Lall and Noor.
Where the wind blows without rain!
Veins of Verinag have been running dry.
Nations are being shot down into the annals of history.
Man has become a beast and is unable to learn a lesson.
Life has become a running grave to endless time.
“Creativity includes the poet's unique quality of thought, imagination, desire, intuition competence and diction. Creativity progresses if it keeps pace with life, age, language and culture of the writer”, the poet writes in the preface of the book, in the poem of this anthology the titles of poems vindicate provinciality but in fact they suggest universality. It is a provincialism of time and not of space. The names of the poems and location are mere symbols; actually the meaning of every poem is outside the poem.”
“The Wind Without Rain” has a double message. One is the spiritual bankruptcy of man and other is the chaotic conditions of landscape of Kashmir.
“The Wind Without Rain” as the title of the book connotes barrenness and spiritual sterility. The destructive aspect of time pervades allover the book right from the beginning. The second poem of the book is “The Mother”. “The Mother” is a symbol that stands for my mother land of the poet. The poem is a lamentation on the separation of the two sons of the mother.
My mother has got two sons
One is living in exile, making piles of profit and fortune.
One is waiting for his prosperity in the shade of blood and blaze.
The poem is followed by the third poem. "An uncared for child". The "An uncared for child" symbolizes the Kashmiri's
I am the most maltreated son of my parents
Born to be torn into pieces
My beauty changed into deformity
Neither of the parents took; care of me.
Scenic beauty of Kashmir has gone under a big transformation due to the callousness of man and the indifference of people at the helm of affairs. The famous beauty spots of Kashmir have now turned unpleasant. The poem “ Wular” is another symbol for how the nations are being buried in the annals of history by the wrongful deeds of their people.
Sindamat Nagar was a city of yore.
Above ground it stands no more!
The poem ends with the tragic note of the cruelty of man inflicted on this world famous lake.
Look down from the Krala sangar
Wular is a land of willow grooves.
Same is the case with the Dal Lake which is the source of our economy as a hub of the tourists
Dal is dwindling day by day.
Boom economy! who can pay
The loss of life of the Lotus Land?
The poem ends with the spiritual bankruptcy of man.
In grace the mosque and the temple excel.
Crumbl'd like the towers of Pari Mahal.
Stands the material minded man.
The deformity of other beauties of Kashmir are described in the poem viz; Jehlum, Pahalgam, Beauty blind, Ningal, Gulmarg and above all in Beauty and the Beast. Beauty and the Beast is another symbol which stands for man against nature. The poem is a lament on the extinction of a bloomy lake Baghu in the heart of the city of Sopore. By invading the native man has become a beast.
The Beauty of Bhugu was- bereft by the beast.
Created by Him alluring and fine.
Man trampled the nature's shine.
Stifled in the North and squeezed in the East.
The head is given to woman and wine.
Who does care for beauty divine!.
History of the world is replete with man's lust for power and money which has been the cause of destructive wars of the world. Here the beauties of nature have not even escaped from the clutches of man. The water of Baghu was extinguished by the fire of the lust of man. Water extinguishes the fire. But Water was extinguished by fire.
Why does a man do so? Answer to this question is furnished in IV canto of the poem.
The lack of beauty and the lack of love
Has deprived us of our aim of life
Beauty of Bhugu is no more seen
How callous a man has been
Our future depends on the present. In the poem, the poet is bewailing not only at the present but at the future of Kashmir also, which is a foregone conclusion.
My present is so waste.
How desolate my future would be!
The word Khasmiriyat means to be real Hindu and a true Muslim. Lalla Ded and Sheikh Noor Ud din Wali in their poetry advise us to detest the religion of institution and follow the religion based on the faith of God and love of mankind. The same lesson is preached in the poem "Where is the Centre"
Eschew the religion of institution.
Cease to be a bat or owl.
Gain perfect knowledge with perfect action.
Embrace the religion of God.
Special mention of the luminaries of our past is made in the book. The visionaries like Lalla Ded, Sheikh Noor ud Din Wali, Haba Khatoon and Dr. Iqbal are treated simply to project the momentous history of our past and our spiritual heritage, which need to be revived in order to seek a solution to the present imbroglio which is more Socio - political than economic .The solution how to go out of the present socio political dilemma of is mentioned in plain words. In the poem ‘God’, “Beauty and the Beast” , “A wish” , “Where is the Centre” “Song of Silence”, “Lalla Ded” and “The Message”.
The corruption of politician and bearcats and commoners is depicted in “Corruption”.
Corruption has crept in the every sphere of life.
It needs a struggle and a lot of strife
To eradicate this venomous, ugly evil.
This snake has bitten military and civil
Departments and private sector, too.
Moral corruption of priests and the hollowness of their faith is exposed in “The Woman in White”.
How to entice her was the dilemma before the
Mullah.
He delivered a sermon on the fundamentals of
pilgrimage: a woman with out her partner or
Muharram is not entitled to Hajj. The widow was
without a partner. He caught her Achilles heel.
Oneness is the weakness of a woman.
Man is the architect of his own destiny, is the message which poet wants to convey through this book. He has hunted at cause of the present day political instability (rather anarchy) in various poems of the book. For instance the following verses from “The wailing woman”.
Vacillating between belief and unbelief
you are living a life in death.
Or
Are we toys in the hands of fate?
fate is all wrought by our deeds:
See the following lines from “The Wind Without Rain”.
Between the hills there runs a
Long line of frustration...........
Skies fall! when greed is the fairest of all.
How rough and wretched life we lead!
In small breaths we count the beads of time.
I stood on the wide bank of Wular outrageous.
The past, present and future are not separate entities. According to Dr. Iqbal, it is an organic whole in which the past is not left behind, but it is moving along with, and operating in the present. And the future is given to it not as lying before, yet to be transversed, it is given only in the sense that it is present in its native as an open possibility. (RRT1-P.49)
Likewise the poet said in “Beauty and the Beast”
Present is traveling fast in future.
"Time is sword" said the scholar.
Make the best use of the time.
You will control the pots and pans of drudgery.
“The Wind Without Rain” symbolizes the hollowness of the materialistic man and the spiritual crises under which he is grooming. The result of the brutalities of man is the mind invaded with worries and anxieties.
Where blood flowed like water of Vyth;
Where men are increasingly nervous;
Where women weep with menacing madness;
Where the young roam with languished mind
Where girls grow slow under depression.
Where the abdomen of a pregnant woman is cut by Caliban I P. 119)
The atrocities inflicted by the ravages of time on the people of Kashmir are pervading allover the poem. The poem also asserts the theory of cause and effect. See the following verses.
Life was wasted on worldly worries
And my flesh was vultured upon by mental crises,
An uncured sickness prevails in the land of Lall and Noor.
Where the wind blows without rain!
Veins of Verinag have been running dry.
Nations are being shot down into the annals of history.
Man has become a beast and is unable to learn a lesson.
Life has become a running grave to endless time.
“Creativity includes the poet's unique quality of thought, imagination, desire, intuition competence and diction. Creativity progresses if it keeps pace with life, age, language and culture of the writer”, the poet writes in the preface of the book, in the poem of this anthology the titles of poems vindicate provinciality but in fact they suggest universality. It is a provincialism of time and not of space. The names of the poems and location are mere symbols; actually the meaning of every poem is outside the poem.”
“The Wind Without Rain” has a double message. One is the spiritual bankruptcy of man and other is the chaotic conditions of landscape of Kashmir.