I recall writing about Spotted Pelicans after a visit to Kokkrebellur, the number of Pelicans here have increased dramatically thanks to the effort of Mysore Naturalist Society. Rosy Pelicans are migrants to North and North West part of the country, can be classified as partly migrant partly resident. They are known to breed in colonies of millions in Burma. Like all other pelicans these too are found around water bodies in great congregations, they are social birds even hunting in groups. Though they have rose tinged plumage the fledglings are black. The long beak gives an impression of stretched chin as if grinning, it looks quite happy to be here swimming and generally having a great time!
Miroslav Holub: when Poet met Scientist
Here too are the dreaming landscapes,
lunar, derelict.
Here too are the masses,
tillers of the soil.
And cells, fighters
who lay down their lives for a song.
Here too are cemeteries,
fame and snow.
And I hear the murmuring,
the revolt of immense estates.
This poem In The Microscope is a rare poem it is a confluence of Science, Poetry and Politics. Miroslav Holub (1923-1998) probably is one of the most translated Czech poets, he was an immunologist by profession and a poet by passion. He
endeavoured to achieve symbiosis of art and science. According to him, art and science should mainly help people to become better, humanize them and give them optimism. “The task of art is to depict the whole of the world”. His poems are unique fusion of the poet's and scientist's perspectives on history, culture, suffering, and folly. Holub survived first Nazism, then Stalinism giving depth to his poetry. He travelled to US during 1960s as a scientist, his impression was not very positive but on his later visits his admiration of Americans particularly in the field of science increased. He writes in his travelogue “A car is something which is taken for granted; something which belongs to the American life that often does not recognise the slightest journey on foot – except walking to the car itself....Department stores are over packed with goods that one gets almost lost in them. But it’s difficult to find the cities inhabitants. They disappear in never-ending queues of bumper to bumper cars, on motorways”. Holub copied graffiti from walls which make part of his poem, he called such poems “found poetry”.
After Velvet revolution marked the end of Communist rule in Czechoslovakia in 1989, he travelled widely.
The rampage
The last time
there was a genuine rampage,
herds stampeding
with the zest of hurricanes,
with the pulsations of a storm,
and the force of destiny,
when the road went up
against the villous ceiling,
when the stronger ones
pushed forward to the cruel
thunder of whips while the zombies
fell back into permanent darkness,
the last time
the cavalry charged
across the whole width of the enemy line
into the gap between life and death,
and not even one single droplet of misery
dripped,
the last time
something really won
and the rest turned into compost
that was when the sperm
made the journey
up the oviduct.
This was 'to be or not to be'.
Since that time we've been tottering round
with the embarrassment of softening skeletons,
with the wistful caution
of mountain gorillas in the rain;
we keep hoping for the time-lapse soul,
secreting
marital problems and
a stationary home metaphysics
against which
the adenosine triphosphate of every fucked-up cell
is like the explosion of a star
in a chicken coop.
Crowd-Walkers
That’s how it goes.
The crowd-walker has arrived,
making his way on the heads of the masses,
his wooden steps echoing on their skulls,
and already the shaking hands
pour out from their sleeves,
from two, seven, thirty sleeves,
broken necks crawl out of collars,
the bacchants grow luminescent,
words are shredded on mute sandpaper,
blood soaks into socks.
He arrives like a bull with ten testes,
like a muscular mighty moleworm
shining with silvery mucus,
and we know no spells
against moleworms.
And in our heads, spermias
of all future crowd-walkers echo.
That’s how it goes.
Because man’s no career.
Moleworms are.
Homer
Seven cities contend to have harboured his cradle:
Smyrna, Chios, Kollophon,
Ithaké, Pylos, Argos,
Athénai.
Like a lamb he strolls
through marine pastures,
unseen, unburied,
unexcavated, casting no
biographical shadow.
Did he never have trouble with the authorities?
Did he never get drunk? Was he never bugged,
not even when singing?
Did he never love fox terriers, cats,
or young boys?
How much better the Iliad would be
if Agamemnon could be proved to bear
his features or if Helen's biology
reflected contemporary facts.
How much better the Odyssey would be
if he had two heads,
one leg,
or shared one woman
with his publisher.
Somehow he neglected all that
in his blindness.
And thus he towers
in literary history
as a cautionary example
of an author so unsuccessful
that maybe he didn't exist at all.
Some scribbles...
Carbon units
Mother’s egg and father’s sperm
Carbon Oxygen Hydrogen and thoughts
laboratory of experiences.
A destination on the map
cannot be reached by train or bus
nor on bullock cart.
Watch each step
also the vanishing last.
(the title Carbon Units is influenced by Star Trek movie I was watching few days back, wherein the aliens referred humans as carbon units !)
Contemplation
The bust of Buddha meditate on the
far end of my study table
Contentment is the only expression
at my fluctuating gay and gloom.
I like to think
Buddha keeps his Eightfold path aside
care my destiny, correct my steps
keep vigil
act as my saviour
everyday or at least on weekends.
Miroslav Holub: when Poet met Scientist
Here too are the dreaming landscapes,
lunar, derelict.
Here too are the masses,
tillers of the soil.
And cells, fighters
who lay down their lives for a song.
Here too are cemeteries,
fame and snow.
And I hear the murmuring,
the revolt of immense estates.
This poem In The Microscope is a rare poem it is a confluence of Science, Poetry and Politics. Miroslav Holub (1923-1998) probably is one of the most translated Czech poets, he was an immunologist by profession and a poet by passion. He
endeavoured to achieve symbiosis of art and science. According to him, art and science should mainly help people to become better, humanize them and give them optimism. “The task of art is to depict the whole of the world”. His poems are unique fusion of the poet's and scientist's perspectives on history, culture, suffering, and folly. Holub survived first Nazism, then Stalinism giving depth to his poetry. He travelled to US during 1960s as a scientist, his impression was not very positive but on his later visits his admiration of Americans particularly in the field of science increased. He writes in his travelogue “A car is something which is taken for granted; something which belongs to the American life that often does not recognise the slightest journey on foot – except walking to the car itself....Department stores are over packed with goods that one gets almost lost in them. But it’s difficult to find the cities inhabitants. They disappear in never-ending queues of bumper to bumper cars, on motorways”. Holub copied graffiti from walls which make part of his poem, he called such poems “found poetry”.After Velvet revolution marked the end of Communist rule in Czechoslovakia in 1989, he travelled widely.
The rampage
The last time
there was a genuine rampage,
herds stampeding
with the zest of hurricanes,
with the pulsations of a storm,
and the force of destiny,
when the road went up
against the villous ceiling,
when the stronger ones
pushed forward to the cruel
thunder of whips while the zombies
fell back into permanent darkness,
the last time
the cavalry charged
across the whole width of the enemy line
into the gap between life and death,
and not even one single droplet of misery
dripped,
the last time
something really won
and the rest turned into compost
that was when the sperm
made the journey
up the oviduct.
This was 'to be or not to be'.
Since that time we've been tottering round
with the embarrassment of softening skeletons,
with the wistful caution
of mountain gorillas in the rain;
we keep hoping for the time-lapse soul,
secreting
marital problems and
a stationary home metaphysics
against which
the adenosine triphosphate of every fucked-up cell
is like the explosion of a star
in a chicken coop.
Crowd-Walkers
That’s how it goes.
The crowd-walker has arrived,
making his way on the heads of the masses,
his wooden steps echoing on their skulls,
and already the shaking hands
pour out from their sleeves,
from two, seven, thirty sleeves,
broken necks crawl out of collars,
the bacchants grow luminescent,
words are shredded on mute sandpaper,
blood soaks into socks.
He arrives like a bull with ten testes,
like a muscular mighty moleworm
shining with silvery mucus,
and we know no spells
against moleworms.
And in our heads, spermias
of all future crowd-walkers echo.
That’s how it goes.
Because man’s no career.
Moleworms are.
Homer
Seven cities contend to have harboured his cradle:
Smyrna, Chios, Kollophon,
Ithaké, Pylos, Argos,
Athénai.
Like a lamb he strolls
through marine pastures,
unseen, unburied,
unexcavated, casting no
biographical shadow.
Did he never have trouble with the authorities?
Did he never get drunk? Was he never bugged,
not even when singing?
Did he never love fox terriers, cats,
or young boys?
How much better the Iliad would be
if Agamemnon could be proved to bear
his features or if Helen's biology
reflected contemporary facts.
How much better the Odyssey would be
if he had two heads,
one leg,
or shared one woman
with his publisher.
Somehow he neglected all that
in his blindness.
And thus he towers
in literary history
as a cautionary example
of an author so unsuccessful
that maybe he didn't exist at all.
Some scribbles...
Carbon units
Mother’s egg and father’s sperm
Carbon Oxygen Hydrogen and thoughts
laboratory of experiences.
A destination on the map
cannot be reached by train or bus
nor on bullock cart.
Watch each step
also the vanishing last.
(the title Carbon Units is influenced by Star Trek movie I was watching few days back, wherein the aliens referred humans as carbon units !)
Contemplation
The bust of Buddha meditate on the
far end of my study table
Contentment is the only expression
at my fluctuating gay and gloom.
I like to think
Buddha keeps his Eightfold path aside
care my destiny, correct my steps
keep vigil
act as my saviour
everyday or at least on weekends.
