Shenanigans of Divinity II

This is another feeble attempt to translate a beautiful and brilliant song/poetry by Prof. Madhusoodhanan Nair from the movie Daivathinte Vikrithikal (Gods mischief’s), based on a book of the same title by M. Mukundan. The post title ‘Shenanigans of Divinity’ seemed a suitable alternate expression for the movie name.

From the deep slumbers of darkness you wake me to the colors of life

You gave a sky for my wings, and on a branch in your soul, you gave me a nest.

Wherever but here could you smell so sweet; in every little flower, in the softest breeze?

Where also can I find you as this river; which brims with every drop of my life as I melt in?

Wherever but here can I find this sky that blooms when you spread as a petal of dreams?

When the little nightingale cries; when the narrow stream stops her lullaby

Where mercy is lost, when time trembles,

I bind my heart in yours; and it is in you that I seek refuge

Can’t part from your heart, May paradise call…

Cant part from your soul, let heaven seek...

To melt in the depth of your soul…as I perish,  is my paradise

To remain in you... is eternal truth

The protagonist in the movie, Alphonse (played brilliantly by the versatile and charming actor Raghuvaran), is a French native and a successful magician living in Mayyazhi (French Mahe) in Kerala. The French colonial influence ends and the settlers leave for their homeland.

As the siren for the last ship to France sounds, his wife Maggie (Srividhya) tries to persuade Alphonse to leave for France, where they belong. The siren acts a final call from destiny for all success and prosperity that awaits them in France. However, Alphonse refuses to leave Mayyazhi.

The end of colonial rule also marks a new dawn for an oppressed, unjust and yet vibrant society that burgeons with madness. While Alphonse and his family stay back in Mayyazhi, failure and poverty adorn their life as they try in vain to be part of a reclassified society which disowns them with derision, much to the dismay of Father Alphonse. In his angst he develops a deep sense of resentment towards his self and refuses to accept the reality, which in his case, is that he is no longer the much admired French man in Mayyazhi, but an impecunious vagrant who is no longer required in this society. He seeks refuge in alcohol and leads a secluded life confining himself to his world of magic which he holds dear to life.

The song is about his unrequited love for the beautiful sea cost of Mayyazhi; the love for which he had to forsake every reason, every virtue of happiness and all that he ever was.

Someone with a better understanding of both languages should do a better translation of this song.

Shenanigans of Divinity

Every once in a while a huge tide comes along and washes away his castle of dreams. It leaves him shattered and depressed. In a state of confusion he loses all interest in self and in the reasons of his existence. On times like these one could cling on to divinity to be consoled through those dreary moments. But he did not do this because he knew that unlike divinity, the tides are a reality. Over time, he got back to the shores and builds his dreams in sand all over again. This time it may be a new design but the entities still remained the same. 

But worse still were the waves; ripples of desperation that crashed on his castles nearly destroying them but not entirely. These waves always left him in a swarm of agony and fear as he lost hope in his virtues. When he was a little boy, in vain he used to express his frustration by crushing down what remained of his castles. The anger did not subdue as he kept crushing others hopes. Out of egotistic desperation he trampled on the little girls garden which had tiny blue flowers as he smeared sand on her teary face. 

As he grew older, the wisdom of age reflected on his appreciation of beauty. And now every thing around him, every thing he had, was so beautiful that there was nothing for him to crush or trample. All of them were to him more beautiful than his castle of dreams. And they were so beautiful that it was worth building a castle of dreams around them. Yet there were those times when his selfishness made up for the lack of divinity and ripples of agony crushed his sand castles.

Why does he still build it on the beach where it gets washed away by the tides? Because the sea was beautiful, like his life it was blue and bubbling. It may be dark, dangerous and deep, but the shores are safe and there was solitude in its depth.  And that was reason enough for him to keep building those castles of dream at the beautiful sea shore where it may yet again be washed away by the tides or crushed by a white foamy wave.