6 verses · ~2 min
छिप-छिप अश्रु बहाने वालों, मोती व्यर्थ बहाने वालों कुछ सपनों के मर जाने से, जीवन नहीं मरा करता है
सपना क्या है, नयन सेज पर सोया हुआ आँख का पानी और टूटना है उसका ज्यों जागे कच्ची नींद जवानी गीली उमर बनाने वालों, डूबे बिना नहाने वालों कुछ पानी के बह जाने से, सावन नहीं मरा करता है
माला बिखर गयी तो क्या है खुद ही हल हो गयी समस्या आँसू गर नीलाम हुए तो समझो पूरी हुई तपस्या रूठे दिवस मनाने वालों, फटी कमीज़ सिलाने वालों कुछ दीपों के बुझ जाने से, आँगन नहीं मरा करता है
खोता कुछ भी नहीं यहाँ पर केवल जिल्द बदलती पोथी जैसे रात उतार चांदनी पहने सुबह धूप की धोती वस्त्र बदलकर आने वालों! चाल बदलकर जाने वालों! चन्द खिलौनों के खोने से बचपन नहीं मरा करता है।
लाखों बार गगरियाँ फूटीं, शिकन न आई पनघट पर, लाखों बार किश्तियाँ डूबीं, चहल-पहल वो ही है तट पर, तम की उमर बढ़ाने वालों! लौ की आयु घटाने वालों! लाख करे पतझर कोशिश पर उपवन नहीं मरा करता है।
लूट लिया माली ने उपवन, लुटी न लेकिन गन्ध फूल की, तूफानों तक ने छेड़ा पर, खिड़की बन्द न हुई धूल की, नफरत गले लगाने वालों! सब पर धूल उड़ाने वालों! कुछ मुखड़ों की नाराज़ी से दर्पन नहीं मरा करता है!
इति
The Poet
गोपालदास "नीरज
Gopaldas 'Neeraj'
1925 · 2018
If Hindi poetry possessed a single voice that could dissolve the boundary between the written word and the sung breath, that voice belonged to Gopaldas Neeraj. He moved with rare and uncanny fluency between the high courts of literary poetry and the golden studios of Hindi cinema. Writing film lyrics in the 1960s and 1970s, he achieved something almost impossible by ensuring his songs carried genuine philosophical weight while remaining luminous with melody. His songs for films like Mera Naam Joker and Nai Umar Ki Nai Fasal did not condescend to their popular medium, but rather elevated it entirely. Neeraj understood with the instinct of a true artist that the deepest questions of human existence, the nature of time, the certainty of loss, and the strange beauty of impermanence are not the exclusive property of the academy. They belong to the weeping widow, the dreaming young man, and the farmer watching rain fall on dry earth. Born in Puravali in 1925, he lived until 2018. Through nine full decades, he carried the gift of making the philosophical feel personal and the personal feel universal. He was that rarest of things, a poet whom both the scholar and the ordinary listener claimed as their own.
Paired Painting
Benares
This evocative painting by the Scottish artist Roderick Dempster Mackenzie captures a luminous, deeply spiritual moment of daily life on the sacred ghats of Benares, now known as Varanasi. Created in 1898 during Mackenzie's extensive travels through India, the work reflects the profound European fascination with the spiritual heart of the subcontinent. Rather than presenting a mere exoticized spectacle, Mackenzie treats the subject with a sensitive, quiet reverence. The soft, golden-grey haze that hangs over the Ganges captures the transition of morning light, a sacred atmosphere where the boundaries between water, air, and stone seem to dissolve. The daring leap of a young diver, suspended mid-air against the pale sky, adds a sudden, joyful energy to the silent, repetitive rhythms of ritual bathing, celebrating the timeless relationship between the people and their sacred river.
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