5 verses · ~1 min
भाई, छेड़ो नहीं, मुझे खुलकर रोने दो यह पत्थर का हृदय आँसुओं से धोने दो, रहो प्रेम से तुम्हीं मौज से मंजु महल में, मुझे दुखों की इसी झोपड़ी में सोने दो।
कुछ भी मेरा हृदय न तुमसे कह पायेगा, किन्तु फटेगा; फटे- बिना क्यों रह पायेगा; सिसक-सिसक सानंद आज होगी श्री-पूजा, बहे कुटिल यह सुख दु:ख क्यों बह पायेगा।
वारूँ सौ-सौ श्वास एक प्यारी उसाँस पर, हारूँ, अपने प्राण, दैव तेरे विलास पर, चलो, सखे तुम चलो तुम्हारा कार्य चलाओ लगे दुखों की झड़ी आज अपने निराश पर!
हरि खोया है? नहीं, हृदय का धन खोया है, और, न जाने वहीं दुरात्मा मन खोया है किन्तु आज तक नहीं हाय इस तन को खोया, अरे बचा क्या शेष, पूर्ण जीवन खोया है।
पूजा के ये पुष्प- गिरे जाते हैं नीचें, यह आँसू का स्रोत आज किसके पद सींचे, दिखलाती, क्षण मात्र न आती, प्यारी प्रतिमा यह दुखिया किस भाँति उसे भूतल पर खींचे!
इति
The Poet
माखनलाल चतुर्वेदी
Makhanlal Chaturvedi
1889 · 1968
There is a poem that lives at the absolute center of the Indian literary imagination of sacrifice a poem in which a flower, offered for worship, instead asks to be pressed into the wreath of a martyr, to fall upon a brave man's chest as he marches into the cannon's mouth. That poem is Pushp Ki Abhilasha The Flower's Longing and its author, Makhanlal Chaturvedi, composed it with the hand of a man who had already offered himself in exactly the same spirit. He was imprisoned multiple times by British colonial authorities for his journalism and his poetry. He was the editor of Prabha, one of the luminous literary political journals of the independence era. He was awarded the Sahitya Akademi's very first prize in 1955, and the Padma Bhushan followed. But what no institutional recognition can fully capture is the texture of his moral life the extraordinary combination of burning patriotic fire and absolute personal humility, a man who wrote about martyrdom while quietly being available for it himself. Born in Babai in 1889, he lived to see the independence he had helped dream into existence, and then he wrote on for two decades more, finding in a free India new obligations for the literary conscience. He is the poet of pure sacrifice not sacrifice celebrated from a distance, but sacrifice inhabited, practiced, and offered without expectation of return.
Paired Painting
Sita Bhumipravesh
This profound canvas captures one of the most heartbreaking and poignant moments in the epic Ramayana, when the noble Queen Sita, weary of constant trials and unjust doubts cast upon her purity, appeals to her divine mother, Bhumi, the Earth goddess. Raja Ravi Varma masterfully orchestrates the scene with deep theatrical grace and psychological tension. On the right, King Rama sits upon his royal throne, his posture a mixture of shock, sorrow, and helpless realization as the earth begins to open up beneath his beloved wife. In the center, devoted attendants and sages watch in stunned silence and despair, their faces etched with grief. On the left, Sita gently surrenders to the embrace of the earth, her expression radiating serene detachment and divine dignity as she departs a world that continually tested her unwavering virtue. Through rich chiaroscuro and masterful emotional expression, the artist transforms a legendary mythological tragedy into an intimately human experience of profound loss and ultimate spiritual liberation.
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