We are all objects who are in different guises, and take and mistake others, and it is, in final analysis, a comedy of errors.    

Literature is nothing more than an oral virus, and a dustbin of emotions if it fails to elevate our lives with an alchemic touch. 

Literature is nothing but an oral virus and a dustbin of emotions if it does not say anything beyond what is really happening in human society. No piece of writing which does not elevate the reading fraternity can be classed as literature. In essence, literature imitates the stories which the grandmother used to tell to her grandchildren, each story had a monster, and a small child, and it would convey some eternal truth and a moral lesson. Literature’s function even today is the same, though techniques have undergone transformation.

The stories that are told in literature are mostly fiction, and transit from generation to generation. 

Yet we cannot call them falsehoods told to impressionable minds. It is no deception although, in the crudest sense, we are telling exalted untruths.  Poetry, which is considered to be dealing with the truth of human existence, has to create a superstructure of ideas, and emotions, and arrange them in such a way, that we can see truth which was otherwise invisible and beyond our reach.

The true objective of art is not to retell what is happening, but to present it in such a way, by an understatement, or even by an overstatement of fact or fiction, so that the oddity of the situation is highlighted, and the reader is able to see the twist in the matter.  The poet is a journalist appointed by gods to bring to light those angles of existence, from which we are suffering, but without clear understanding and knowledge.

The Mystery

Life is not a simple flow of moments. Although time is so insistent that it can neither be stopped, nor made to procrastinate. But behind this apparent placid flow, is a whole set of waves which are churning away from the human eye. How life is moving, and towards which direction, – these are mysterious things, and cannot be understood in simple language. The picture that cameras take of a human being is a very simplistic image. The fact is that no camera can capture the image of a man. Only an artist can capture him in his myriad and minute variations. That is what makes poetry abstract. The more we believe in clarity of vision and thought, the farther we are from the existential truth of human life.

It is a mystery. And mysteries cannot be put across with words which have nothing to hide. The Prophets speak in a language which is not easy to decipher. What was that golden deer that deceived Sita Mata in Ramayana? It was ‘chhal’ [deception]. The deficit of the seeming and the real. The mystery has behind it words and emotions which do not convey things in easy language. Rather, what we get are gestures which are often more confusing than giving any clear signals.

The Killer Passion

The gods are the greatest artists. Can we understand their creations? Can we understand man? What art can be more abstract than the creation of mankind? A man himself does not know what he is, what he wants, what he will do, and what will finally happen. What can be more abstract? And what can be more poetic too?  This is the reason life attracts us like a killer passion. We are pulled as if we are under a spell towards things which cause a fascination to us. Fascination has no other meaning than being attracted. And we are attracted towards things which are beyond our reach. Life is beyond our reach. Death is beyond our reach. Happiness is beyond our reach. What we are doing with treat accuracy and precision, applying all our Mathematics and Physics, is trying to understand this life, which is beyond our perceptive powers. If we want to say all in one word, it is a mystery, it is poetry, it is literature, and we are all objects who are in different guises, and take and mistake others, and it is, in final analysis, a comedy of errors.

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Published under International Cooperation with "Sindh Courier"