Jayanta Mahaptra’s A Rain Of Rites

A book of poems, as such A Rain of Rites, Brought out by the Univ. of Georgia Press, Athens (USA) , in 1976 Carries it forward The imagistic portals. It’s difficult to say what he takes up and what he means, As it means not what he says, Just goes on viewing, Without any comments. You cannot summarize what he has as the meaning is not And the words turning on, Without anything to reveal, Just the things in a flux. Nothing is concrete, everything in a flux, Floating and passing, So much abstract and condensed, With blank thinking and reflection. Dawn is the first poem to begin with, Later taking on Village, A Missing Person, The Whorehouse in a Calcutta Street, Myth, Dawn at Puri, Hunger. Summer, Silence, Main Temple Street, Puri, Listening to a Prayer, Indian Summer Poem, Samskara, A Rain of Rites, Tell of his poetic escapades. So deep in time, consciousness and flux, They take their own recourse As for reflection and shedding of light, So inner and internal. The lonely countryside dotted with the nondescript villages Shaded by the bunyan and peepul trees, The mother and the daughter sitting in the mango orchard, The missing person and her image haunting. The title poem too likewise where the meaning is not, Just the word-plays and fleeting images Of the things in a constant flux, Always coming, always passing. Most probably rains of the coastal region And the rites performed In the rock-built temples But the mud-built houses the tales of his. They made the grand temples for faith’s sake And to house in the deities, Not for themselves And the masons and architects remaining anonymous. The rock-built temples are splendid and grand, An example of architectural and sculptural excellence, But the beggars still visible At the entrances of the temples. Faith and doubt seem to put him into a conflict, If faith be so strong, Why doubt seems to be lurking in, Leaving the scope for? The benefit of doubt befits him and he goes on revelling, Dwelling and delving with the light, Faith so frail, Darkness enveloping and encompassing it all. The cattle coming back at twilight, drinking water from And returning back, The darkness enveloping the countryside Just lie with the flickers of the oil lamp burning for sometime.