Poetry Reads: Jejuri by Arun Kolatkar

  

Arun Kolatkar (1932-2004) was reclusive (didn't own a telephone: ever), bilingual poet with rare gifts.  A clear demarcation of style and substance is evident in his Marathi and English works.

Apart from wit, satire, and humour, Kolatkar's English poetry has its unique punchlines, dream-scraping, and exaggerated comic imagery. A Sir J.J School of Art pass out who went on to be a professional graphic designer - the copyrighting sprinkle certainly shows in the English poems. Keen observation is another noticeable endowment.    

Barely Published 

The degree of reluctance in publishing his work was such that for years, Jejuri was the only English poetry collection available. Two English poetry collections Kala Ghoda Poems and Sarpasatra were released on July 14, 2004, at an event in Mumbai. Terminally ill with stomach cancer, Arun Kolatkar was in the audience as poets read from the two books.

Posthumously, came the beautifully compiled The Boatride and other Poems, edited by his close friend and fellow poet Arvind Krishna Mehrotra. The latter's introduction duly documents Kolatkar's last days, under the title - Death of a Poet. Kolatkar passed away on September 25, 2004 in Pune.

Thus was Kolatkar - of leonine hair, razor-blade eyes, and drooping moustache. We now delve into Jejuri, first published in 1974.

Destinations, Inspirations

Jejuri is an hour's drive from Pune. Much has changed since the poet visited this small-town nearly four decades ago. This was no pilgrimage that Kolatkar undertook, that much is clear. A leisurely trip with no particular purpose seems more like it.  The first of the 31 poems swings in the surrealism of a bus ride. Another walks into the world of an eager priest. An excerpt:

The bus goes round in a circle. 

Stops inside the bus station and stands 

purring softly in front of the priest. 

A catgrin on its face

and a live, ready to eat pilgrim   

held between its teeth.                                           

We also get a striking description of a temple's ruined state and an unlikely epitaph in another. The extract follows:

No more a place of worship this place

is nothing less than the house of god.    

Kolatkar misses little - be it the haphazard zigzag journey of a conduit pipe, a medieval door or temple legends:

these five hills 

are the five demons 

that khandoba killed 

says the priest's son 

a young boy 

who comes along as your guide 

as the schools have vacations 

do you really believe that story

you ask him 

he doesn't reply 

but merely looks uncomfortable

shrugs and looks away               

The collection flows chronologically. For instance, the priest's son chances his eyes upon a:

look

there's a butterfly 

there   

The Butterfly is the poem that follows. (Click the following link to read The Butterfly in its entirety.)

Some of the most profound lines in the book can be found in the poem, A Scratch. Another excerpt:

what is god 

and what is stone 

the dividing line 

if it exists 

is very thin 

at jejuri    

and every other stone 

is god or his cousin

Kolatkar finishes it with a signature:

scratch a rock 

and a legend springs

Apart from this dry comment on idol worship, Kolatkar cites his indifference to rituals in a quiet smoky rebellion in another. Here's Makarand - the whole poem :

Take my shirt off 

and go in there to do pooja? 

No thanks. 

Not me. 

But you go right ahead

if that's what you want to do. 

Give me the matchbox

before you go

will you? 

I will be out on the courtyard

where no one will mind 

if I smoke. 

A timeless frozen aura of words, spacing, and arrangement, Jejuri is a poetry travelogue worth lingering in. I would go on and call it a classic, not a popular, accepted work yet, but the sheen is unmistakable. As for you poetry lovers, the Wolf suggests you experience it for yourself, devoid of any fixed notion.


(Article by Snehith Kumbla) 

Arun Kolatkar