In this episode, we hear healing words rendered to a heart, as depicted in Sangam Literary work, Aganaanooru 87, penned by Madurai Peraalavaayar. Set in the ‘Paalai’ or ‘Drylands landscape’, the verse sketches a journey as it nears its end.
தீம் தயிர் கடைந்த திரள் கால் மத்தம்,
கன்று வாய் சுவைப்ப, முன்றில் தூங்கும்
படலைப் பந்தர்ப் புல் வேய் குரம்பை,
நல்கூர் சீறூர் எல்லித் தங்கி,
குடுமி நெற்றி நெடு மரச் சேவல்
தலைக் குரல் விடியற் போகி, முனாஅது,
கடுங்கண் மறவர் கல் கெழு குறும்பின்
எழுந்த தண்ணுமை இடங் கட் பாணி,
அருஞ் சுரம் செல்வோர் நெஞ்சம் துண்ணென,
குன்று சேர் கவலை, இசைக்கும் அத்தம்,
நனி நீடு உழந்தனை மன்னே! அதனால்
உவ இனி வாழிய, நெஞ்சே! மை அற
வைகு சுடர் விளங்கும் வான் தோய் வியல் நகர்ச்
சுணங்கு அணி வன முலை நலம் பாராட்டி,
தாழ் இருங் கூந்தல் நம் காதலி
நீள் அமை வனப்பின் தோளுமார் அணைந்தே.
In this trip to the drylands, though there’s some suffering, all is not just about pain, and we hear the man say these words to his heart, when he’s returning home after completing his mission to earn wealth:
“After churning sweet curd, letting a calf lick and taste it, the thick-stemmed rod is left in the front yard of a hut, thatched with grass, under a canopy of trees, in this impoverished, little hamlet. Staying here at night, when the tree rooster with a tufted forehead, calls out in the early hours of dawn, let’s leave from here. You have suffered greatly in those paths through the hills of the drylands, resounding with the music of ‘thannummai’ drums, wielded by harsh-eyed robbers from their rocky forts, sounds that make the hearts of those who traverse the region quiver with fear! But you can delight now, O heart, for in that flawless, sky-high, wide home, lit with bright lamps, praising the beauty of her lovely, pallor-spotted bosoms, you will soon embrace the long, bamboo-like arms of our lover, with dark and descending tresses!”
Let’s extract the beat of the man’s heart amidst the drumbeats in the drylands! The man starts by painting a picture of the place, where he is spending the night. This is said to be a poor village, where huts have thatched roofs and are under the thick shade of trees. The man talks about how a curd churning staff has been left leaning in the front yard, and there, a calf was licking up the remnants of the sweet curd on the rod’s surface. Turning to his heart, the man promises that they will leave this place at the moment the rooster on the tree crows aloud and announces the dawn. As he’s sitting there and making plans for the next day, his mind rewinds to the past few days, when his heart has been going through a lot, as it traversed through the harsh drylands in the man’s company, startled every time the drum beats of the highway robbers was heard rippling through the barren paths there. The man concludes by telling his heart all that’s done with, and that it can start feeling happy for soon the heart would be by the side of his beloved in their tall, bright mansion, and praising her beauty, it can lie wrapped up in her bamboo-like arms!
Yet again, this is a case of separating the heart and the man, to put an objective distance between him and his emotions. The verse vividly captures the pain in the past and contrasts it with the hope of joy in the near future. In essence, it’s the last push needed to reach the destination by employing the timeless technique of visualising the delight that awaits one there!
