7 verses · ~1 min
अपाहिज व्यथा को सहन कर रहा हूँ, तुम्हारी कहन थी, कहन कर रहा हूँ ।
ये दरवाज़ा खोलो तो खुलता नहीं है, इसे तोड़ने का जतन कर रहा हूँ ।
अँधेरे में कुछ ज़िन्दगी होम कर दी, उजाले में अब ये हवन कर रहा हूँ ।
वे सम्बन्ध अब तक बहस में टँगे हैं, जिन्हें रात-दिन स्मरण कर रहा हूँ ।
तुम्हारी थकन ने मुझे तोड़ डाला, तुम्हें क्या पता क्या सहन कर रहा हूँ ।
मैं अहसास तक भर गया हूँ लबालब, तेरे आँसुओं को नमन कर रहा हूँ ।
समालोचको की दुआ है कि मैं फिर, सही शाम से आचमन कर रहा हूँ ।
इति
The Poet
दुष्यंत कुमार
Dushyant Kumar
1933 · 1975
Dushyant Kumar did something that required a radical courage most artists never summon. He took a form synonymous with moonlit nights and the ache of unfulfilled romance and dragged it into the burning lanes where injustice stank and the ordinary man had no language for his helplessness. Born in 1931 in Uttar Pradesh, he dismantled the ornamental tradition of the Urdu ghazal and rebuilt it in Hindi as a weapon of the dispossessed. His singular collection Saaye Mein Dhoop became one of the most quietly devastating documents in the entire tradition of modern Hindi literature. The Emergency of 1975 gave his verses a context that proved them prophetic. Unlike mere political poetry, his words outlasted their moment to become permanent fixtures in the vocabulary of Indian dissent. He wrote not with a scholar's distance but with the shaking hands of someone who had looked injustice in the face and refused to flinch. He died at forty four, leaving behind a body of work so concentrated and incandescent that its light has not dimmed in half a century. To read Dushyant Kumar is to understand that poetry's highest function is not consolation but confrontation.
Paired Painting
Gave memorial honours to his dead father
This poignant scene captures a deeply sacred moment of filial piety, depicting a son performing the traditional rites to honor his departed father. M.V. Dhurandhar, a master of the Bombay School of Art, translates the gravity of the ritual through soft, evocative brushwork. The son, seated in humble devotion, is surrounded by the offerings of flowers and food, which are essential components of the Shraddha ceremony intended to provide peace and sustenance to the ancestral soul. The presence of the elder guiding him adds a layer of continuity and tradition, bridging the gap between generations. It is a quiet testament to the enduring bonds of family and the spiritual obligation felt by the living towards those who have transitioned beyond this world.
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