Rabindranath Tagore’s Paintings: The Fundamental Dynamics of a Polysemic Descent of Consciousness and the Coplanar States of Being and Existence
Here, I have allowed myself to write the Consciousness-Analogues for a couple of Rabindranath Tagore’s paintings and each of these is like a free-meditative verse that comes as a spontaneous flow without the checkposts of the mind’s logic, not ungrammered but allowing it to take shape and bear its own formation which when true to the art itself may carry the light and the thought of an evolving spirit.
Painting 1- Rabindranath Tagore, Untitled
Consciousness-Analogue
The sea, the sky, fire, air and wood
Constitute the living space of this vast kingdom
Inwards they dwell in me
And in me
As from my mind they appear foreseen
Long ago on the screen of the eye
Projected backwards into space or forwards into time
Till they meet at one eternal conjunctional point
The point that configures the creational order
When self-illumination touches the zenith of the light
Krishna chakre Radha, Radha chakre Krishna
Anante bahe mor pran
Giant wheels of the cosmic force spin on the Will
And on that Will stands the prayer for humanity
Sri Aurobindo has lived beyond his words and deeds
Not intense philosophies can shroud his listening soul
At the heart, he is of That Impersonal Being
That lends vision to the eyes, sound to the ears.
Painting 2: Rabindranath Tagore, Untitled, 1934
Consciousness-Analogue
Poila boishakher phool
Beguni aakash rater tara gulo nistabdha, akaki akhon
Bujhi hriday duyar khole daay
Aar achirei pari day dur gagane
Sayantan sabha aak deshe
Niye othe jajabor matrikar pran
Brishter akulo dharay
E bhabanir mandire mukto ami aaj
Pralay nache banglar naba noton saaj
Chirodin jano ray e prarthoner phool
Samayer gopon mantre dole dodul dul
History creates its own precedents
The sonata of life is now not a dream
It authors the chapter of a paradise bloom
Its mighty visions wrest with time and death
Though the body is battered, or beaten or assailed
Its victory that signals the coming of the gods
Pitri loke maatri puja
Aamar alok sambad
Jharer pradip nebhe nay jwale
Niye ashe suryer amrita pran
The immortal spirit rests in peace
The sun at its crest, the moon at its heart
Music overflowes the blind alleys of death
Awakening every bud like a sweet reprise
With Beethoven, Rabindranath and the rest…
– Regards, Joy Roy Choudhury
