4 verses · ~1 min
मलय का झोंका बुला गया: खेलते से स्पर्श से वो रोम-रोम को कँपा गया- जागो, जागो, जागो सखि, वसन्त आ गया! जागो! पीपल की सूखी डाल स्निग्ध हो चली,
सिरिस ने रेशम से वेणी बाँध ली; नीम के भी बौर में मिठास देख हँस उठी है कचनार की कली! टेसुओं की आरती सजा के बन गयी वधू वनस्थली! स्नेह-भरे बादलों से व्योम छा गया-
जागो, जागो, जागो सखि, वसन्त आ गया! जागो! चेत उठी ढील देह में लहू की धार, बेध गयी मानस को दूर की पुकार गूँज उठा दिग्दिगन्त चीन्ह के दुरन्त यह स्वर बार-बार:
सुनो सखि, सुनो बन्धु! प्यार ही में यौवन है यौवन में प्यार! आज मधु-दूत निज गीत गा गया- जागो, जागो, जागो, सखि, वसन्त आ गया! जागो!
इति
The Poet
अज्ञेय
Sachchidananda Hirananda Vatsyayan 'Agyeya'
1911 · 1987
Sachchidananda Hirananda Vatsyayan, universally known by his pen name Agyeya, completely rewired the circuitry of modern Hindi literature. Born in 1911 in a British archaeological camp in Uttar Pradesh, his life was as fiercely untraditional as his prose. Before he became the architect of the Prayogavaad (Experimentalism) movement, he was an active revolutionary who spent four years in British colonial prisons for attempting to help Bhagat Singh escape. In those prison cells, he began drafting Shekhar: Ek Jivani, a psychological novel that shocked the literary establishment with its unapologetic exploration of the individual ego. He rejected the prevailing romanticism of the era and instead assembled the Tar Saptak series, bringing together a new generation of poets who wrote in free verse about alienation, intellect, and the fractured modern psyche. He won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1964 and the Jnanpith Award in 1978. Agyeya was a novelist, a combatant officer in World War II, a journalist, and a profound existential thinker. He gave Hindi literature the vocabulary to interrogate the inner self without the comfort of traditional morality.
Paired Painting
Sita and the Golden Deer
This evocative scene captures a poignant moment from the Ramayana, the ancient Sanskrit epic that remains a heartbeat of Indian spiritual life. Here, we witness the noble Sita in the forest, her gaze fixed upon the mysterious golden deer, a creature of celestial beauty and deceptive charm. Stephen Reid, working in the early twentieth century, approaches the myth with a refined, romantic sensibility that highlights the vulnerability of the divine queen at the brink of her great trial. The soft, ethereal quality of the landscape mirrors the sacred atmosphere of the Dandaka forest, reminding us of the timeless nature of duty, longing, and the subtle threads of fate that weave through human existence.
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