The Saga of The Dark Daughter

The Saga of The Dark Daughter

A poem by Indian Poet: Bijay Kant Dubey

The poem is full of mysticism, like the older poems of the poet. The reader of Rabindranath Tagore, William Wordsworth will like the poem. The text of the poem is as follows:

The Saga of The Dark Daughter
The dark daughter smiling
In the dark hamlets
Oblivious of her nondescript fate,
An untold saga 
Of poverty, hunger and underdevelopment,
Misrule, malnutrition, illiteracy and superstition.

         On Seeing A Foreigner Girl
Though I want to view her often,
But find her not,
A foreigner girl,
Looking exquisitely beautiful,
Dwelling far
From across the seas,
She of a different culture and clime,
Sitting by the seashore
And I dreaming from here
Though view I her sometimes
At the airport.

Oh, had I a foreigner girl
As my beloved wife,
How beautiful would it have been!

        Your Smiles
Your smiles....
Want I to sketch, portray,
Your smiles,
Sweet smiles
Cutting deep into
And I going away
With the memories
Of your smiles,
Sweet smiles.

    

    I Know It

The night is heavy upon you
And I know it
They will kill you
Just for the dowry.

The story of a poor nation,
A destiny so obscure,
How to ascertain them?

        

      A Singer of Heart

Am I,
As keep I singing
The songs of heart,
My heart, your heart.

But never betray the heart which
Believes you, trusts you,
Reposes in.

    

     Save The Green Earth

Save the green earth
For our children
From being a barren land,
A waste land

Of atomic summer
Ruffling it all,
Scorching heat and summer
Awaiting us
With nuclear radiation

Acid rain to maraud us
With the falling rain waters,
Cool and sky-drops not,
But acid burning it all

And climate change
Going it worse,
Abnormal in its
Coming and going.

     A Red Rose

A red rose...
Is she a red a rose or a girl,
What is she,
Say you,
A girl so artistic and beautiful,
Beautiful not only,
But exquisitely beautiful?

Mark the hue, the fast colour,
The dream with which it has been
Made and chiselled,
The dew drops floating over
The petals,
Sweet, dreamy and lovely,
So perfumed and redolent.

  

    Only One Thing That Forgot I To Say

Only one thing that forgot I to say,
Julie, I love you, Julie, I love you,
Only one thing that forgot I to say,
Julie, I love you, Julie, I love you.

I saw, saw you and fell,
Fell in love with you,
Now say you,
How to live without you,
Julie, I love you, love you?

     Drunkard...

Drunkard...
What have you made of you yourself
Taking wine?

Go and see your face you yourself
In the mirror and say you
What have you?

Taking liquor,
Foreign and native
At the bar and the ale-shop?

It's not a question of one bottle,
How many bottles
Have you emptied, say you?

You cannot see it you yourself,
That your face has swollen,
The liver showing the trouble.

          Drunkard, Drink You, But Sell You Not Your Humble And Poor Beloved Wife

Drunkard, drink you to full,
Empty the bottle and fall flat
As hear you not anyone,
But sell you not your wife,
Swear you not in her name falsely
As Thomas Hardy proposed to sell
In The Mayor of Casterbridge
And chose for a teenaged younger second wife
When he himself was seventy plus.

Do you all, you may sell the things of the house
As for taking liquor,
But never, never your beloved wife,
The friend of poorer days,
Bearing you,
Bearing it all silently.

          

        While Burning My Father On The River-bed

Under the open skies,
With the moon shining over,
The stars twinkling up above,
I had been,
Had been burning my father
Near the hamlet
By the highland river
Which it dries all through
Barring the rainy days,
Waters gushing downwards,
Remaining for a few days.

First of all, they brought the body
On a makeshift green bamboo bier,
Placed it near the knee deep midstream,
Made him sit,
Oiled him,
Poured a earthen pitcher full of water,
Tore off the banyan
And made him wear
The new clothes as far possible
For the ritual sake
And was placed on the pyre.

The fire was lit
With the dead body over the wooden logs
And it stared burning,
My father burnt to ashes
One by one
The limbs disappeared they
And it came to naught
And there remained it not anything else
To be called as that of father.

         While Burning My Father On The River-bed

Under the open skies,
With the moon shining over,
The stars twinkling up above,
I had been,
Had been burning my father
Near the hamlet
By the highland river
Which it dries all through
Barring the rainy days,
Waters gushing downwards,
Remaining for a few days.

First of all, they brought the body
On a makeshift green bamboo bier,
Placed it near the knee deep midstream,
Made him sit,
Oiled him,
Poured an earthen pitcher full of water,
Tore off the banyan
And made him wear
The new clothes as far possible
For the ritual sake
And was placed on the pyre.

The fire was lit
With the dead body over the wooden logs
And it stared burning,
My father burnt to ashes
One by one
The limbs disappeared they
And it came to naught
And there remained it not anything else
To be called as that of father.

Just with the village folk
I saw him burning,
Smokes bellowing,
Fire flames feeding upon
And licking it all,
The cremators poking
The fire into a blaze,
Pouring in
Clarified butter and kerosene oil.

With fear and suspense,
Hearing the spooky tales
In that dark loneliness,
Away from human haunt and manless area,
I saw,
Saw him burning,
Finishing it all
And it remained not anything
To be called own.

        A Yoga Guru

A yoga guru
Or a yogi not,
But a bhogi.

A teacher of
Yoga not,
But lured towards

Blondes, beauties and belles
Taking lessons in yoga
In the Unites States of America

And the false Indian babas and gurus
Taking their classes
In sex to bliss.

         Burquawalli...

Burquawalli...
Just for a kiss,
A sweet kiss of your face,
The forehead and the cheeks,
The lips and the nose
And the eyes,
Want I to complete
The sketch of yours,
Just for a glimpse of
Your dark image
Go I seeing the moon
Under the clouds.

            The Snake Charmer Coming With The Deadly Cobras

With the bamboo baskets
The snake charmer sat he on the ground
To show the spectacle
And he opening the basket
One by one slowly
And the cobras
Coming out,
Creeping and standing,
Hooded and hissing,
Whitish, blackly and grey,
Swaying and dancing
To the tune of the charmer,
Playing the wooden 'been' instrument
Just like a bagpiper
And the cobras swaying.

First of all, praying to the Naga-devata,
The Cobra God,
Mother Manasha and Shitala goddesses,
Relating to the story of the mythological snake-bite
Of Bihula and Lakhinder,
He stars the show
After bowing to,
A risky show to begin with
A deadly play with the cobras,
Hissing and hooded
And coiled
Dancing at the melodious music.
Of the East, of India, Asia
Tuned by the snake-charmer playing them.

        Do You Love Me? Do You Love Me?

"Do you love me, love me?,"
Asked she tearfully,
"Do you love me, love me?
Won't you betray me?"

I just saw her, saw her,
Did not say anything else to her,
Nor had the intention of,
Had been wanting to part ways from.

But on seeing her weeping,
Sobbing and sighing,
I could not hold in myself
And said to, "Yes, I love you, love you".

          After The Death of his First Wife

After the death of his first wife,
Said he that he would not marry,
That would remain a widower,
But as the time fled,
Forgot he his dear wife
And it slipped for his memory
As posed again for a photograph
With his newly found love,
A lady in waiting,
A dramatic persona
To enter into the theatre of life.

Leaving his son and daughter playing
With dust and soil,
He kept pleasing his wife
With new promises
And the small children
Got neglected
Into the hands of the step-mother
And the real father too turned
Into a step-father
Keeping her company,
Scolding and beating them so often.

              Poetic Ingredients
As long as there is emotion in me,
I shall continue to write
As long as I am full of feeling
And the moment exhaust they,
I shall cease to be.

Without being sensitive and sentimental,
One cannot be,
A poet of emotion and feeling,
A persona artistic
Painting in words,
Putting before,
Lying it bare
What it in his heart.,

The eye, mind and heart play a role
In restoring, retrieving and recalling
Ideas and images,
The eyes see,
The heart feels it
And the mind judges the worth of
The words poetical and imagistic,
Thoughtful and of dreamy content.

         You Do Not Know How Bad Am I!

You do not know it,
How bad am I,
I am not a good man
You are looking for,

If you look behind the curtain,
You will come to feel it,
How bad am I,
Not at all a good man,
But a bad man!

How bad am I,
Not a good man,
But a bad man
If you try to see into!

            Contemporary Letters

Contemporary letters and messages, posts and mails
Now consist not
Of telegrams, typescripts, letters and post-cards,
But of SMS texts and message-texting,
Emailing through the Id,
Transmitting digitally,
Talking on the mobile phone handset.

           Poetry Is My Love of Roses

If the poems could be roses,
I would have felt blessed
If the roses into
The lines of my poesy.

Roses,
Red, white and pink,
Fair, fine and fresh,
Roses red, white and pink,
I photographing them.

A dreamer of the rose,
A lover of the rose,
My dream as the rose,
My image
Picturesque of.

         Will You Divorce Her?
After having taken her for your liking and loving,
Abandon and desert her not
To be at the crossroad of life,
Divorce you her not
A girl betrayed and cheated,
Think you,
Where will she go from here?

After having taken her to your liking,
Infatuated with, getting attracted, drawn to,
Feeling the fascination for,
Taking her to be own,
Feeling maya for her,
Desert you not, divorce her not.

In this age of broken relationships, social divorce and desertion, where there is no compromise, peace and harmony at home and in understanding, the poem seeks to patch up, sew, stitch and darn the broken hearts, seeks to plain the surface showing cracks and fissures. Try to love her, enter into a relationship sweetening it all rather than taking to divorce, unnecessary pressure, tension and separation. If had to be separated, why did you take to a liking?

           A Drunkard's Party

A drunkard's party
Full of drunkards,
Drunken capers and  drunken brawls.

You say it,
Where will this love of
Seeking wild pleasure lead to ultimately?

A drunkard's party,
All drunk there,
Full or half.

One drunkard is not,
But many drunkards are there
Celebrating short life to end so soon.

People often talk about late night parties and sweet gatherings, party culture, drinks and modernity, but what does it take place, do you know it? The visitors end up turning into hard drunkards. Take, but not too much.

          The Girl Is Very Beautiful

The girl is very beautiful,
Not less than
The poem I compose.

A flower of innocence is she,
So ignorant of the ways of the world
To step on.

Just like a rose,
A red rose blooming
Is she, the flower of imagination.

With her, dream I,
She is my living dream, my aspiration,
The love to live.

Beauty is truth, truth beauty, is the thing to be felt here. A thing of beauty gives joy forever is the Keatsian dictum and it applies in here. A beautiful girl is the context of penetration. See, but pluck the rose not.

      Jackson, Jackson, Michael Jackson, O Michael, Come Here, Come Here, Jackson!

Jackson, Jackson, Michael Jackson,
O Michael, come here, come here, Michael Jackson,
Said they
Addressing me
And I too hearing the spurious words
Came I,
Hearing the call,
Dressing in a hat,
In the pants and the shirt
With the goggles on the face
And cigar on the lips
To give my dance,
Super dance,
Jackson, Jackson,
Michael Jackson.

Breaking the body and the limbs,
The torso with the thrust separating
And joining thereafter rhythmically,
Shaking the body,
Making my audience dance
And clap
Thorough a wonderful dance performance
Under the impact of the great master,
Just lie in wait
Hearing, Jackson, Jackson, Michael Jackson, come here,
Come here, you Michael Jackson
And I going spontaneously to perform.

The impact of the name as such
That I cannot without dancing,
Upping the hat serially
And setting over,
Sometimes rounding the handkerchief
From my hand,
Shaking the body and the bust,
Cutting the torso
And joining,
I dancing
Which you won't believe
If see you not personally.

The poem is a great tribute to Jackson, Michael Jackson, the great dancer, master of dancing styles, making the world dance, written under the impact of the same musical cadence, beat, incantation and rhythm of speech. Hats off to this great live performer, my salutes to him! I salute you, Michael Jackson! There is none of his stature, to match him so far. Jackson is Jackson, Michael Jackson. A stylist dancer colloquial, slangy and post-modern and contemporary, what was he not, call it modn and pop?

          My English Indian English, A Tongue-twister's English

My English Indian English,
A tongue-twister's English,
Strutting and walking on tip-toe,
Like the one
Trying to be into the footsteps of,
Emulate and copy down.

Taking Indian paan,
A type of a mouth freshner,
I chewing and spitting
And speaking English
So that one may not feel it
That he knows not how to pronounce and read.

My English a tongue-twister's English,
With nothing like English,
But full of Indianness and Indianism
And Indianization,
An English girl
Bearing heat and dust in India,
One from a colder clime.

I trying to copy them,
Writing in imitation,
I a rustic Indian,
A half-read one
Trying to be conversant with
European culture and civilization,
The way of life and living.

Many half-read persons give the pose of knowing English, always trying to find faults with others, with their wording, grammar and composition of sentences have been caricatured herein. Whatever be the perception with regard to our knowledge and learning of English, it is but a world language for us, a library-consulting one, linking the people.

       The World Has Greatest Fears From The Fanatics & Fundamentalists

The world has greatest fears from
The fanatics and fundamentalists
Who are bent upon
Bringing hell on this earth
Thought hey call themselves
Holy, pious, righteous and virtuous,
But are not.

They are not the good men,
But the most bad men,
Blind to logic and reason,
To their faith and belief,
Without anything to confide in
Peaceful co-existence and harmony.

The fanatics and fundamentalists are
But man-haters,
Not the lovers of man,
But the satanic people
Superstitious, conservative and orthodox
Without compromise.

Religious orthodoxy and intolerance under our purview is probably the cause of the deadly wars ever fought in the name of piety and religion, but how pious, holy and faithful are we, this none, but God knows it? Our barbarism, medievalism and crusades are not hidden from. Even in the world of today, the greatest fears lurk in the form of fanaticism and fundamentalism and it is religious bigotry which gives birth to it. Religious orthodoxy is but a type of madness. Can man be so cruel? How can he view with such a callous heart?

        A Statue of Radha And Krishna, Golden, Ancient And Historical
An ancient statue of Radha and Krishna,
Dating back to an age gone by,
Two hundred to three hundred old
Found from the rubble, the debris
Of the dilapidating temples
Made from lime stone powder and small bricks.

Dating back to a bygone time, remaining as a relic
Of the temples, small-small and centuries old,
With the roofs made from wooden logs
And plastered on and floored so,
The statue is cast in shining gold and precious,
Weighing heavily and priceless.

A statue golden and precious, rarer and costly,
Archival, historical and antique,
How to behold, behold it into the hands,
A thing rarer and glorious,
Which the eyes cannot see,
I am seeing into the hands of mine.

From the remains of the temples, centuries old
And dating back to n age gone by
With nothing to state
Who built them and when,
The temples innumerable in number

With the terracotta plates fitted in.

The statue is black, but made of gold,

Pure gold, solid and laden,

Weighing  heavily and priceless,

A statue of Radha and Krishna

Cast in gold, Krishna with a flute

Standing  on a lotus with Radha.

A statue of Radha and Krishna found from the rubble and debris of the dilapidating and fallen temples of Chandrakona is the topic of description; a statue golden and purer, rarer and invaluable, historical and archaeological, archival and sculptural. The small-small temples made from lime stone powder and small baked bricks are a witness to an age gone by; a testament of history and its long-standing tradition. Outwardly, it seems to be a clay statue with a coat of the black paint, but the interior is not so. It is a golden statue, made from pure gold, glittering ad shining in full.

            Scavenger Women Going With A Load of Human Excreta
When a schoolboy, I used to see them perchance
While going to school,
On our way with the hurried steps of ours as for reaching,
Taking to the raw road, the red soiled connect way.

The scavenger women used to meet on the way all of a sudden
With a  foul smell encircling the area,
The stench coming out
And the rotten smell unbearable.

But the labouring women toilsome, working  and sweating
And resting under a shade of the tree
And going with the load overhead
Or pulling the cart with the cans loaded over and set onto.

The wheelbarrow coming and being pushed or dragged
With the cans and containers of iron sheets
But full of human excreta
With the flies, foul smell and stench used to overtake us on the midway.

It was definitely a hard life to describe and penetrate deep,
The scavenger women going to the garbage heap
To empty their containers full of human excreta
In their full stench and foul smell leaking badly to grip it all.

The poem under our perusal deals with the hard life of the scavengers, toilet-cleaners and sweepers whom we come across in day-to-day life of ours. The hard duty they do is beyond any explanation, but we forget it that they too are men, however be the work detestable. Can we do it?

         We Are Robots In Love,  Mechanical And Technical, We The Two Machine Men

We are robots in love and relationship,
Loving each other
Very mechanically,
Technically,
A robot loving a she-robot,
Working in a factory
All daylong,
Day and night,
No respite from,
no relief or leisure
From over duty and work,
We are robots,
Robots in love,
I a machine man,
She a machine woman,

The robot my heart,
My soul,
A robot loving a robot
In the factory of this busy and fast life,
Where there is not time to share with
And talk to,
How unsocial, inhuman and mechanical
Have we grown into,
How selfish and narrow,
Hollow and shallow from within,
Ay, the hollow men are we!

The poem is a description of modern city life and culture, this busy and fast life of ours, where there is no time to talk to and  share with and look back, there is no time to live a living of own, how mechanical and technical have we grown into, the modern machine men are we in essence! If this be the thing, How to call ourselves mod, modernist, ultra-modern, post-modern and post-colonial if the basic things of life remain the same!

            “What Is Love?
"What is love?,"
People ask it so often,
But find not the best answer.

Love is attachment, fascination for,
Love is love,
Maya for somebody else.

Love is feeling, love is emotion,
The feeling of the heart,
The emotion of life.

Love is the passion for living,
Love is aspiration, yearning for,
Love is this life.

Love is the meeting of two hearts, two souls,
Love is a thing of the heart,
Love is love , pastoral and metaphysical.

An attempt to define what it is love; how the feelings, emotions and passions of it. Love is a thing of the heart and has many a colour, love romantic, love metaphysical. First, give your heart then feel it to say what it is love.

                       The Poor Snake Charmers of India
The snake charmers of India none has striven to know them,
Their risky play of life,
A tryst with destiny and the unknown writ  and decree of it,
A friendship with the fatal and deadly cobras,
How dangerous is it to play with the reptiles!

But their wooden 'been' music sell the Indian cinema men
Haunting us not merely, but the cobras too
With their melodies and rhythms of mellifluous sounds,
The charmers playing the been and the cobras swaying to
And dancing, coming out of the holes.

The cobras, they catch them tactically, making them smell a root
Of the grass root or the herb
And the wrath lessens a bit and thereafter the snakes are
Put into the handy portable bamboo basket
To be coiled in.

The cobras, three types of cobras they bring in,
Blackly, whitish and grey
Looking grotesque and bizarre
With the tongue, the hood and the hiss,
Hooded and hissing.

Generally, the cobras are found in straw roofs,
Ant-hills, haystacks or in the fields,
The borders and banks,
Tree holes and woods,
Cobras hissing and hooded.

The snake charmer's life none has tried to peep into, how dangerous and risky is it to play with the cobras, whitish, blackly and grey swaying and dancing to the tune of the haunting and melodious wooden 'been' instrument music. A mere bite of the brute can be fatal and deadly as it may claim life. The Bombayan theatre men steal the been music of the poor snake charmers.

                 What Is Yoga?

What is yoga?
Yoga is the meeting of mind and heart
In unison with,
Rising higher and higher
Through poses and postures
To keep the body fit
As a healthy mind can live in a healthy body,
Yoga is not bhoga,
Just physical exercises,
Is transcendental meditation,
Meditation and contemplation,
The states of mind and matter.

Yoga gives time to make us realize
What it is life,
How the steps of it,
The steps of meditation,
How to control the mind
And its vagaries,
How to be one with
The Consciousness unknown and Unseen,
Yoga is yoga,
Full of submission and obeisance
Every moment you do the yoga.

Yoga is not bhoga
As the fake and false Indian babas and gurus
Are doing in America,
While teaching yoga to girls,
They get tempted towards,
Lured by exercising maidens,
Beautiful blondes, beauties and belles
Which but they cannot resist
And get involved in
Sex and exploitation.

If the mind, heart and spirit are not pure,
One should not do yoga,
Yoga is yoga,
Not mundane,
But celestial,
While doing yoga,
One is bound to go
Through stages,
Transcendental and metaphysical,
Feeling through mind and matter
And the realization of the self.

Yoga is yoga, not bhoga, as the false, fake and fraud Indian babas and gurus are doing in America, whose activities under the scanner, sometimes getting involved in sex scandals and to be a teacher of yoga is to be a strict disciplinarian, one who can keep oneself in restraint and control. Yoga is not merely exercises physical, but celestial, metaphysical and transcendental, the poses and postures through which one can take to Realization, the realization of the Self and it helps in acquiring self-knowledge. This is just a saintly device to keep oneself fit as the frail body cannot do the tapasya, penance. Take yoga in the right spirit; the right perspective, go not as per the Indian American yoga teachers. Many brokers and middle-men are there in the States selling India and here to in India many sadhus keep ladki (girl) in the ashrama (saintly hut) and smoke in ganja.

            The Daughter of Mr.Fanatic, Miss Purdahwalli (Veiled She)
Burquawalli, the kiss I am going to implant
On the sweet cheeks of yours,
Say you not about it
As the world you live in is very, very conservative
And the people too the slave masters.

Purdahwalli, you do purdah, hang the curtain over
But not from me,
Let me, let me see you in full
As I may not again
If it gets leaked, O Arabic beauty!

Purdahwalli, lift the purdah halfway
And let me have a glimpse of your face
As the beauty lives under the purdah,
Hidden from the world,
Just like a violet blooming unnoticed.

The daughter of Mr. Fanatic love I, like I,
The more fanatical is he,
The more romantic is his daughter
Calling me from her tent,
But fear I the desert people blind to logic and reason.

A veiled mistress is the character I am going to describe and depict; a persona dramatic and interesting; a mouthpiece of mine, my poetry expressive enough and muted too at the same time is going her way whom seek I to portray and paint under the lurking fear and shadow of fundamentalism and moral strictures, the moral codes of the moral police and the local guardians who take the law of the land and of society into their hands and misinterpret them.

          They Are The Buddhas, Buddhas of Peace, You Fire On Them Not! O Talibans!
They are the Buddhas, Buddhas of peace,
Peace Cosmic, Peace Psychic,
The Bamiyan Buddhas of Afghanistan,
Cliff-hewn and chiselled
And the Buddhas carved out,
You fire, fire on them not,
O Talibans, you fire, fire on them not,
Shell, shell them not,
They are the Bamiyan, Buddhas,
Pre-Islamic art and artifacts,
Pre-dating the advent,
You fire, fire them not,
You fire, fire them not,
To disturb them, mind it, to disturb them
Is to be disturbed you yourself,
None but you yourself lose the peace of mind
After being disturbed mentally
And will go aggressive and destructive,
Allowing misfortunes

As for self-destruction
And lo, you running for cover
And the cluster bombs bursting,
Falling upon!

The Buddhas, Bamiyan Buddhas and the Talibans going to attack, fire and shell, break and destroy with mortar fires, shells, axes and hammers are the things of depiction. The bouts of religious madness, fanatic frenzy, how to take to under the cudgels?
Can Buddhas be shelled? Are they the things to fire upon? Is it not a fanatical activity? Are they not sinning against? What it happened in Afghanistan was really very shameful and ludicrous? The fight with the stone Buddha relics was but an instance of a mind gone worse. 

         Murkhamantri As A Biz Guru To Oxford, Harvard & Cambridge For A Lecture Tour
Murkhamantri as a business guru,
I mean as a management guru
Going to Oxford, Harvard and Cambridge
For a lecture tour,
A minister from India,
A joker minister,
One from the countryside,
I mean a foolish minister
Giving the shrill call like a cock.

A third class man he is calling himself
A first class in foreign,
Telling of labour schools,
Rural reforms and development
Just on paper,
Actually looted he the national treasury,
Drew from
Showing false vouchers, bills and payments.

Unable to speak in Hindi too,
Spoke he in Bhojpuri
As a blunt boy speaks,
Using the rough and tough dialect
Of the rough and tough people,
A rustic fellow
Smiled he
On seeing the English men and women
Hearing his lectures on rural development.

A villager, a countryside man,
He told of the beauty of a mud-house man
Fanning with the hand fan,
Passing the night under the oil lamp light,
Taking of milk and curd,
Sherbet and lassi,
The local home-made drinks of a native stock
Rather than harmful cold drinks.

As a management man, he talked of packaging pickles
Made from mangoes, tamarind and guavas,
Jams and Jellies
And selling them in America,
Opening of Bihari food restaurants
Selling sattu and litti in America,
Talked about taking earthen bowl made tea
To get a smell of the soil.

Abandoning his kurta and pyjamas,
Put he on pants, shirt, tie and coat,
The goggles
To look like an American professor,
A management faculty man,
Smiling and waving in his way
To send the message home
That a village boy
even without being educated
Could rise such a  position
And the village abuzz in his praise.

A comic fellow, but a media manager
And a threat master,
An advertisement-man,
He could manouevre and manipulate
As such had been the guts of his
And he reigned for so long
Eliminating his foes,
Letting the good men not come
In higher positions,
A small family man
He remained a third grade man unto the last.

The rustic minister one who is from the countryside, appears to be simple but is eliminating is hereunder our scanner of scrutiny and observation. He talks big, but does nothing else in reality. His plans are on paper, but not in existence. Those who do not deserve can also be placed, this is the strategy of his. But in the foreign, he is known for his humour, caricature and fun-making. Actually, he is a jail-bird, a criminal, a looter.
The bufflalo man as a villager minister cannot be the thing that will suit us. No work is inferior and has got the dignity of own, but as a man he is also from a very small family as his manners show it and this pains us.
Murkhamantri means--Foolish minister

           Let Me First Do M.A. Then B.A. Then I.A. Then Matric, Said He The Country Comedian

A country comedian, came he and sat down
On the guard wall of the mud house
Entering the courtyard,
A uncouth and poor fellow he,
Took we for a simple one,
But the countryside people smiled they
On seeing him

And outwitted he with his first words,
O friend, where do you live,
I have heard that you in a town
And are a townsman,
But I not like you in my dress and manners,
Not so refined
As I a countryman.

Again smiled he to ask,
Which class do you read in
And after getting the answer said he,
Sorry to say, here lie I an uneducated fellow,
But have plans for,
Which I shall,
But if you force me, I shall say it.

People start from and go up to the end systematically,
But I shall in a reverse way
As my parents did not,
Where they end, I shall start from,
So, first I shall do M.A. then B.A.,
Then I.A. and then Matric.

Do you have any objection,
Say you,
Do you have any objection,
Say you now,
Not later on,
But before you go away, say you?

How did you like my idea,
My stock of humour not
Less than a town comedian,
But I lying in the country
Poorly and humbly
And as such my life will spend?

Countryside humour, fun and joke forms the crux of this poem. A simple comedian regales the household with his tickling words, sometimes lightly, sometimes laughingly, but a light-hearted fellow.

     "How Long Will You Keep Reading Books? When Will You Have Time to Love?," Asked She Curiously, The Village Girl Wife

"How long will you keep reading books,
Lost in studies,
Into the readings of your own,
With no time to talk,
chat and gossip,
Laugh and smile?,"
Said she with a curiosity of her own,
The simple country girl,
Foolish, but lovable and working,
A bit quarrelsome and obdurate.

The scholar lost into the studies of his
Heard her just by the way,
Kept mum,
Looked to, but said it not
Unmindful of that,
What she said,
What she wanted from,
A simple but villager girl
Of a teen age
Which but the serious scholar took to not.

Having burnt the earthen oven
Came she to ask
And say,
"If keep you reading and writing as thus,
When will you take me to liking,
If had to read,
Why did you marry me,
Go and read you
And cook you food too,
Who will for you?"

She quarrelled and wept,
Sobbed and sighed
For being neglected,
Might be it that he would go to foreign
And would fall in love
With a  White maiden
And would never return to India.

Again threatened she with a note of caution,
she would throw the notes and writings
Of his into the earthen over
And after burning them,
She would finish it all,
The things of his madness,
Being lost into studies
And being unworldly
And flung the pots and dishes first
Then the notes and papers too.

The scholar and his foolish, but simple and ignorant country wife take the canvas here away from us, demanding love from the lover which he spends in reading books and again suspecting him for as he may depart for foreign after the research work is complete. If he keeps reading, when will love? The problem is, do the research, but love her too. The scholar too is unable to understand her feelings and emotions.

         Three Friends, Bootleggers, Peddlers And Traffickers Walking Hand-in-hand And Singing Ooh La La

Three friends, bosom friends,
I mean the bootleggers, drug peddlers and girl traffickers
Walking hand-in-hand,
Shoulder over shoulder,
Flanked by each other,
One an expert in illegal and illicit brewery and transportation,
Another dealing in heroin, brown sugar and other drugs,
Another a girl trafficker trafficking girls
Selling and buying, tempting and luring.

Three friends, three bosom friends,
I mean the bootlegger, the drug peddler and the trafficker
With a cigar on the lips,
Walking hand-in-hand, shoulder over shoulder,
Singing a song and going,
Ooh, la, la,
Meaning it, oh dear, oh, my, oh no,
Literally, oh there there
Over a business deal
Struck out,
A hand shake done
In warm friendship.

Gangsterism is the thing of discussion, how they are having a business, the bootleggers selling illicit liquor, the peddlers drugs and the traffickers dealing in inhuman girl trafficking, bringing them from across the borders and selling them to bars and restaurants, hotels and lodges. Drug abuse, illicit liquor and sex and slavery are taking the sleeps away from us. How have we advanced? Can this be called the whiffs of modernity? The ganjaraja keeps selling ganja, smoking in public, in lonely and deserted places; the bhangeri is loitering after taking bhang as has become abnormal for hemp-taking.

       Om, AUM, Closing The Eyes, Meditate You, Contemplate You

Om, AUM,
Closing the eyes,
Meditate you,
Om,
Closing the eyes,
Concentrating upon
Om,
The mind rising higher and higher
In unison,
The heart, the mind and the soul
Corresponding
To a calm composure,
The mind transcending the barriers,
Transporting, transmigrating
Into other domains of life and the world
Of bliss, peace and rest.

Yoga and meditation is the caption, category to range over, cover the  span. Closing the eyes, one may meditate, exhaling and inhaling slowly to free from tensions and pressures. While fixing on Om, one may find oneself released from corporeal denominations and bindings and it gives immense joys.

             Iraqi Daughter, They Will Not Let You Read

Iraqi daughter, they will not let you read
In schools,
I mean the conservatives and the orthodox,
The militia and the fundamentalists
As they are bent upon taking blood
And can never allow you
The moral police with the moral code of their own.

Iraqi daughter, what it is that I can do, what you too can,
Your suppression and repression,
How to describe them,
The atrocities committed in the name of religion,
They subjecting you to such a torture
And we saying not anything,
Marking as silent and mute spectators?

My daughter, I can understand the pains of yours,
But they will not
As they do not have any compassion or sympathy for,
Nothing as that can make them wet
Or melt,
They are fundamentalists, fanatics, zealots,
The rugged men, the patriarchal men,
Not the sons of the womanly mothers.

The present situation of Iraq and human rights violations baffle us to hear about the ongoing atrocities on women and daughters, living under stricter moral code. Their heart-ending cries and wails it is difficult to bear with. It is also the result of the misdeeds of the nations who work for their selfish ends and nuclear stockpiles and arms sale. The crisis in Iraq is the cause of our anxiety.

       O, Call You Not Them the Ukrainian Prostitutes, They too Are women!
O, call you not them Ukrainian prostitutes,
They too are women,
They too have a heart within,
A soul to converse!

They are women, womankind,
Not Ukrainian harlots
And those who call them
Are themselves the most degraded fellows
Rather than being good.

O Indian diplomats, assess them not so,
They too are women,
They too have a heart within,
They too are a soul,
Misled and misguided!

Ukrain, you do not know is a beautiful country,
But they will not let it have
As they are bent upon bringing hell to you,
Destroying it, encroaching Crimea,
Its solidarity and sovereignty.

So are the Ukrainian women,
Domestic and homely,
But the problems
Let them not freely,
Alcoholism too claims over.

Ukrainian girls is the category under which the present poem falls in, one dealing with the country and its people, more specially the prostitutes in the news. Once the Indian diplomats and policy-makers have objected to their entry which was demonstrated by them too in protest to it.
The other thing is this, O, Do not Destroy It, Beautiful Ukrain after encroaching into, making inroads into, instigating rebellions.

        Kali The Mother (O, Come And Go, Seeing The Face, Face of The Dark Divine!)

O, come, do come,
O, come, do come and go seeing
The face,
The face of the Dark Divine,
The Mother Goddess
As dark the Night of Creation,
Dark as the night!

A strange statue, making of the artist,
A vision envisaged,
Of the Mother Goddess,
Kali the Mother,
Magnificent and high,
Radiant and beautiful,
An image excellent!

With the tongue hanging out
In shame
As for trampling Saintly Siva
Lying under
Or the steps taken over His body
Who has in order to quell
Her Anger Divine
Or She has killed, destroyed
And sucked blood in anger.

She in a posture of Her own.
As for having annihilated the sinners
And satanic forces on earth,
The neglect and shame
Brought on womankind
And the sins aggravated on earth.

The tongue out of the lips,
With a dribble of blood,
The four arms
With the traditional weapons,
The heads of the demons cut off and beheaded,
One or two heads in Her hands,
A wreath of human heads
Has She worn,

The crescent is on the forehead
Where there lies the third eye power
The eyes with a strange glitter
In them,
The hair waist long
And she in a mood of annihilation,
Balancing the good and the bad
On this earth.

The poem has been written as per the Hindu mythology, but the statue is artistic no doubt. Many interpret the Kali myth in a different way; it is our nightly power of meditation and Kali is a Goddess of death, destruction and re-creation. The darker side is that we fail to comprehend it in a right perspective. Actually, the Womb of Creation is She.

          Flower Petals For You, Mahatma Gandhi!
On the eve of your birthday anniversary,my flower petals,
My flower petals of respect,
tribute and homage
Felt within
For you,
For you, Gandhi,
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi,
The Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhi,
Mahatma, means Great Soul
And really were you,
A great man, a great soul
Giving a muffled and muted in voice to
Peace, world peace,
I mean shantih, the shantih of the world,
Satya, ahimsha and shantih,
Truth, non-violence and peace,
My flowers, flowers of respect and regard,
Homage and tribute to you
With the folded hands
Full of flowers
And the eyes closed before
Your samadhi,
Mausoleum,
M.K.Gandhi!
Take my salute, take salute,
O Father of the Nation!

It is a poem written in homage and memory, in sweet remembrance and reminiscence of the works and activities done and shown by Mahatma Gandhi, the father of the Nation. On the eve of the birthday celebrations, the birthday anniversary, the scattering of the flower petals over his mausoleum is the theme of the poem.

              Dark Is Beautiful

Dark is beautiful,
Have you felt it,
Have you thought about it
What dark, dark is beautiful,
What it is dark, let it be,
As the things darker will remain
Unto the last
What it was dark,
What it is,
The night is dark,
The creation is,
The myths of light and darkness,
The Goddess Kali is dark,
Dark is dark,
Dark is beautiful,
Let it be,
Dark is dark.

What it is dark, let it, as it is it was and it will remain, continue to be dark in future. What it is dark will remain dark, was it in the past. The  night is dark, the Goddess is, how to relate to the myths of darkness mythically and historically?

         Gandhij's, Bapu's Three Monkeys, An Emblem, A Replica
Gandhiji's three monkeys,
A replica, an emblem,
An art work
To make it understand
His philosophy of life
And the basics of Indian culture,
Do not see bad, do not speak bad, do not hear it bad.

One monkey sitting with the hands on the eyes,
Another with hands on the lips,
Another with the hands over the ears.

Gandhi and Gandhism, the Gandhian philosophy of life depicted in art is the context of deliberation herein. An art work and an replica, it describes his blind disciples as the votaries of peace, non-violence and truth.

           Do Not Call Her Fallen And Degraded, A Call Girl, She Is After All A Woman!
Do not call her a call girl,
Unchaste and characterless,
Degraded and fallen,
She is after all a woman,
A mother, a wife, a sister and a daughter,
Try to see them in her.

Only a sinner will call her a harlot, a prostitute, a whore,
Those who are sinful,
Nay chaste from within,
Virtuous and holy,
But themselves corrupt and fallen,
Morally bankrupt,
First, know thyself
Then call her a call girl.

Even she is a call girl, characterless and moralless,
It is none but you who have made her
Turn into a whore
Otherwise she is not
And even if she is, she is
For the hungry stomach,
The situations and circumstances of life
Placing her otherwise
At the crossroad of life. 

A woman's heart, a woman's life we have never laid it bare; the mind, spirit and soul of a woman, who is after all a mother, a daughter, a sister and a wife. She is not a thing to be bought and sold; she is after all a human being. do not call her a call girl at least. Try to understand the compulsions of hers; the situations and circumstances of her life which force her to be there on the road of life.

             Scholar Gipsy, I Search You, Search You
Where are, where are dead and gone,
Gone and gone away from us,
Scholar Gipsy,
A scholar unassessed and unevaluated,
Before the world could know,
You passed away unknown,
A scholar ageless,
Never to come back again,
Where are you, Scholar?

Your medievalism, your pastoralism, your classicism,
Search I, search I in my poetry,
Your love of scholasticism and pedantry
Appreciate I, admire I still,
Your old-time thought and philosophy,
The way of living,
The thoughts and ideals you taught us,
The path you showed,
You be a lamp to us,
Your love of classics and classicism
We could never forget them!

The scholar gipsy and his love of scholarship, classics and classicism; scholasticism,pedantry and medievalism are the things of discussion here in this poem under our perusal. A scholar lives he unknown and dies too unknown.

        Had Not Been A Singer, But The Day I Saw You, Since Then...
Had not been a singer, but the day saw I you,
Since then
Have I turned
Into a singer
And you my love song,
The day I saw you
Since then
Have I turned
Into a singer
Singing the songs of your love,
Your and mine love.

The day I saw you since then have I turned into a singer of yours and your love. A lover of your face, a singer of your heart, lie I in here with a hope of seeing your face, you my love-song and I a singer of yours.

         "Are You Happy With Your Second Wife, Second Love?," Asked She Humbly, A Voice From Far

"Are you happy, happy with your second and new wife,
I mean the second beloved,
My love?
I am your wife," said she humbly.

"Who, who you are,
Who are you speaking?", asked he the husband.

"I am your dead, dead wife speaking,
My love."

"What, what do you want to ask,
Ask me?," said he again.

"Fear, fear me not, I shall revenge upon,
I am., I am your ex-wife."

"There is, there is nothing to fear me,
Fear from, as I am your previous wife."

My husband, may i ask you in all humility,
Why did you eliminate me if you had not to love me,
Why did you take me for a liking?"

Again, came it the voice,
"My love, I shall not say for what you have done,
But may I know it,
Are you happy with your new wife?"

"Does she work for you or you keep doing her jobs,
Even making tea to give to her,
A late riser?"

"It happens, happens in love when one is new,
As the old one tastes not good, appears to be boring,
But the second one more dear than and perhaps the last one."

Generally, the first wives are neglected, dumped or abandoned who fail to understand them, but the second ones prove to be fatal and the husbands turn into their menials. But here an eliminated wife speaks in a third voice. If he had not to love her, why did he kill her? Now the small son and daughter have almost turned into orphans into the hands of the step-mother.

                Who Am I?

Who am I, who am I, I, I, I,
Who am I,
In this vast cosmos,
In this vast universe
Go about searching myself,
But find not he answer,
Who am I,
What am I,
Wherefrom,
Whereto return,
What my life,
What my own?

They say it you are a minute part of the Overmind,
The Oversoul,
You are a particle of that,
The spark is in you,
But believe I not,
Go I asking,
Repeating my questions
Ever voiced, ever put forth,
Who am I, wherefrom, whereto
Have I to go,
Who am I,
What my name, what my identity?

Have I got no name, no identity,
You have no identity of your name
As have not been assigned with,
Where is my home,
You no home at all,
Homeless are you,
Wandering from
Birth to birth,
Who am I,
Ask you not,
You are nothing,
You are a handful of
Dust, clay, ashes and coal,
So will you turn into?

Existential question is the heart of the matter, the questions leading to ever asked, ever voiced questions of life and the world, who am I, wherefrom, whereto go  finally, why is this cyclic coming and going? Who to answer them? Perhaps nothing is the best answer to confide in as there no answers to come up to and give solace to the aggrieved and disconsolate soul.

               The World of Maya
The world you see me round about
Is a world of maya,
Maya and moha,
The jiva in the snares of worldly maya.

There was a time when I used to live
With my father, mother, aunt and brothers,
Now they are not
With me,
Only their memories and reflections.

My wife, my daughter, my son,
All maya,
Maya,
Flimsy, illusory, hallucinatory,
Dwelling in a world of maya.

Today they are with, tomorrow will not be,
What I am with today
May not be with,
As the things temporary and momentary,
For the time being, not forever.

Indian philosophy, especially the concept of maya, illusion and hallucination is the topic of discussion here. The world is maya and all else nothing. The house, wife, children, things, all the things of maya and one comes to feel it when there remains nothing else, but the sweet memory of life.

Party Organisation and Party Literature

 V. I.   Lenin

Party Organisation and Party Literature

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Published: Novaya Zhizn, No. 12, November 13, 1905. Signed: N. Lenin. Published according to the text in Novaya Zhizn.
Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, 1965, Moscow, Volume 10, pages 44-49.
Translated:
Transcription\Markup: R. Cymbala
Public Domain: Lenin Internet Archive (2001). You may freely copy, distribute, display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet Archive” as your source.

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The new conditions for Social-Democratic work in Russia which have arisen since the October revolution have brought the question of party literature to the fore. The distinction between the illegal and the legal press, that melancholy heritage of the epoch of feudal, autocratic Russia, is beginning to disappear. It is not yet dead, by a long way. The hypocritical government of our Prime Minister is still running amuck, so much so that Izvestia Soveta Rabochikh Deputatov^[2] is printed “illegally”; but apart from bringing disgrace on the government, apart from striking further moral blows at it, nothing comes of the stupid attempts to prohibit” that which the government is powerless to thwart.

So long as there was a distinction between the illegal and the legal press, the question of the party and non-party press was decided extremely simply and in an extremely false and abnormal way. The entire illegal press was a party press, being published by organisations and run by groups which in one way or another were linked with groups of practical party workers. The entire legal press was non-party— since parties were banned—but it “gravitated” towards one party or another. Unnatural alliances, strange “bed-fellows” and false cover-devices were inevitable. The forced reserve of those who wished to express party views merged with the immature thinking or mental cowardice of those who had not risen to these views and who were not, in effect, party people.

An accursed period of Aesopian language, literary bondage, slavish speech, and ideological serfdom! The proletariat has put an end to this foul atmosphere which stifled everything   living and fresh in Russia. But so far the proletariat has won only half freedom for Russia.

The revolution is not yet completed. While tsarism is no longer strong enough to defeat the revolution, the revolution is not yet strong enough to defeat tsarism. And we are living in times when everywhere and in everything there operates this unnatural combination of open, forthright, direct and consistent party spirit with an underground, covert, “diplomatic” and dodgy “legality”. This unnatural combination makes itself felt even in our newspaper: for all Mr. Guchkov’s^[3] witticisms about Social-Democratic tyranny forbidding the publication of moderate liberal-bourgeois newspapers, the fact remains that Proletary,^[4] the Central Organ of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, still remains outside the locked doors of autocratic, police-ridden Russia.

Be that as it may, the half-way revolution compels all of us to set to work at once organising the whole thing on new lines. Today literature, even that published “legally”, can be nine-tenths party literature. It must become party literature In contradistinction to bourgeois customs, to the profit-making, commercialised bourgeois press, to bourgeois literary careerism and individualism, “aristocratic anarchism” and drive for profit, the socialist proletariat must put forward the principle of party literature, must develop this principle and put it into practice as fully and completely as possible.

What is this principle of party literature? It is not simply that, for the socialist proletariat, literature cannot be a means of enriching individuals or groups: it cannot, in fact, be an individual undertaking, independent of the common cause of the proletariat. Down with non-partisan writers! Down with literary supermen! Literature must become part of the common cause of the proletariat, “a cog and a screw” of one single great Social-Democratic mechanism set in motion by the entire politically-conscious vanguard of the entire working class. Literature must become a component of organised, planned and integrated Social-Democratic Party work.

“All comparisons are lame,” says a German proverb. So is my comparison of literature with a cog, of a living movement   with a mechanism. And I daresay there will ever be hysterical intellectuals to raise a howl about such a comparison, which degrades, deadens, “bureaucratises” the free battle of ideas, freedom of criticism, freedom of literary creation, etc., etc. Such outcries, in point of fact, would be nothing more than an expression of bourgeois-intellectual individualism. There is no question that literature is least of all subject to· mechanical adjustment or levelling, to the rule of the majority over the minority. There is no question, either, that in this field greater scope must undoubtedly be allowed for personal initiative, individual inclination, thought and fantasy,, form and content. All this is undeniable; but all this simply shows that the literary side of the proletarian party cause cannot be mechanically identified with its other sides. This, however, does not in the least refute the proposition, alien and strange to the bourgeoisie and bourgeois democracy, that literature must by all means and necessarily become an element of Social-Democratic Party work, inseparably bound up with the other elements. Newspapers must become the organs of the various party organisations, and their writers must by all means become members of these organisations. Publishing and distributing centres, bookshops and reading-rooms, libraries and similar establishments—must all be under party control. The organised socialist proletariat must keep an eye on all this work, supervise it in its entirety, and, from beginning to end, without any exception, infuse into it the life-stream of the living proletarian cause, thereby cutting the ground from under the old, semi-Oblomov,[5] semi-shopkeeper Russian principle: the writer does the writing, the reader does the reading..

We are not suggesting, of course, that this transformation of literary work, which has been defiled by the Asiatic censorship and the European bourgeoisie, can be accomplished all at once. Far be it from us to advocate any kind of standardised system, or a solution by means of a few decrees. Cut-and-dried schemes are least of all applicable here. What is needed is that the whole of our Party, and the entire politically-conscious Social-Democratic proletariat throughout Russia, should become aware of this new problem, specify it clearly and everywhere set about solving it. Emerging   from the captivity of the feudal censorship, we have no desire to become, and shall not become, prisoners of bourgeois-shopkeeper literary relations. We want to establish, and we shall establish, a free press, free not simply from the police, but also from capital, from careerism, and what is more, free from bourgeois-anarchist individualism.

These last words may sound paradoxical, or an affront to the reader. What! some intellectual, an ardent champion of liberty, may shout. What, you want to impose collective control on such a delicate, individual matter as literary work! You want workmen to decide questions of science, philosophy, or aesthetics by a majority of votes! You deny the absolute freedom of absolutely individual ideological work!

Calm yourselves, gentlemen! First of all, we are discussing party literature and its subordination to party control. Everyone is free to write and say whatever he likes, without any restrictions. But every voluntary association (including the party) is also free to expel members who use the name of the party to advocate anti-party views. Freedom of speech and the press must be complete. But then freedom of association must be complete too. I am bound to accord you, in the name of free speech, the full right to shout, lie and write to your heart’s content. But you are bound to grant me, in the name of freedom of association, the right to enter into, or withdraw from, association with people advocating this or that view. The party is a voluntary association, which would inevitably break up, first ideologically and then physically, if it did not cleanse itself of people advocating anti-party views. And to define the border-line between party and anti-party there is the party programme, the party’s resolutions on tactics and its rules and, lastly, the entire experience of international Social-Democracy, the voluntary international associations of the proletariat, which has constantly brought into its parties individual elements and trends not fully consistent, not completely Marxist and not altogether correct and which, on the other hand, has constantly conducted periodical “cleansings” of its ranks. So it will be with us too, supporters of bourgeois “freedom of criticism”, within the Party. We are now becoming a mass party all at once, changing abruptly   to an open organisation, and it is inevitable that we shall be joined by many who are inconsistent (from the Marxist standpoint), perhaps we shall be joined even by some Christian elements, and even by some mystics. We have sound stomachs and we are rock-like Marxists. We shall digest those inconsistent elements. Freedom of thought and freedom of criticism within the Party will never make us forget about the freedom of organising people into those voluntary associations known as parties.

Secondly, we must say to you bourgeois individualists that your talk about absolute freedom is sheer hypocrisy. There can be no real and effective “freedom” in a society based on the power of money, in a society in which the masses of working people live in poverty and the handful of rich live like parasites. Are you free in relation to your bourgeois publisher, Mr. Writer, in relation to your bourgeois public, which demands that you provide it with pornography in frames^[1] and paintings, and prostitution as a “supplement” to “sacred” scenic art? This absolute freedom is a bourgeois or an anarchist phrase (since, as a world outlook, anarchism is bourgeois philosophy turned inside out). One cannot live in society and be free from society. The freedom of the bourgeois writer, artist or actress is simply masked (or hypocritically masked) dependence on the money-bag, on corruption, on prostitution.

And we socialists expose this hypocrisy and rip off the false labels, not in order to arrive at a non-class literature and art (that will be possible only in a socialist extra-class society), but to contrast this hypocritically free literature, which is in reality linked to the bourgeoisie, with a really free one that will be openly linked to the pro let an at.

It will be a free literature, because the idea of socialism and sympathy with the working people, and not greed or careerism, will bring ever new forces to its ranks. It will be a free literature, because it will serve, not some satiated heroine, not the bored “upper ten thousand” suffering from fatty degeneration, but the millions and tens of   millions of working people—the flower of the country, its strength and its future. It will be a free literature, enriching the last word in the revolutionary thought of man kind with the experience and living work of the socialist proletariat, bringing about permanent interaction between the experience of the past (scientific socialism, the completion of the development of socialism from its primitive, utopian forms) and the experience of the present (the present struggle of the worker comrades).

To work, then, comrades! We are faced with a new and difficult task. But it is a noble and grateful one—to organise a broad, multiform and varied literature inseparably linked with the Social-Democratic working-class movement. All Social-Democratic literature must become Party literature. Every newspaper, journal, publishing house, etc., must immediately set about reorganising its work, leading up to a situation in which it will, in one form or another, be integrated into one Party organisation or another. Only then will “Social-Democratic” literature really become worthy of that name, only then will it be able to fulfil its duty and, even within the framework of bourgeois society, break out of bourgeois slavery and merge with the movement of the really advanced and thoroughly revolutionary class.

Notes

[1] There must be a misprint in the source, which says ramkakh (frames), while the context suggests romanakh (novels).—Ed.

[2] Izvestia Soveta Rabochikh Deputatov (Bulletin of the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies)—an official newspaper of the St. Petersburg Soviet of Workers’ Deputies. It appeared from October 17(30)to December 14(27), 1905. Being in effect an information bulletin, it had no permanent staff and was printed by the workers themselves in the printing-works of various bourgeois papers. Altogether ten issues were brought out. Issue No. 11 was seized by the police while being printed.

[3] Guchkov, A. I. (1862-1936)—a monarchist representative of the big commercial and industrial bourgeoisie.

[4] Proletary (The Proletarian)—an Illegal Bolshevik weekly, Central Organ of the R.S.D.L.P., founded by decision of the Third Party Congress. On April 27 (May 10), 1905, a plenary meeting of the Central Committee of the Party appointed Lenin editor-in-chief of Proletary. The weekly appeared in Geneva from May 14 (27)   to November 12(25), 1905. Twenty-six issues were published In all. The weekly continued the line of the old, Leninist Iskra, and of the Bolshevik paperVperyod.

Lenin contributed about 90 articles and short items to Proletary. His articles determined the political line of the weekly, its ideological content and Bolshevik course. Lenin did a tremendous amount of work as the leader and editor of the weekly. He edited the material to be published, lending it the utmost fidelity to principle, a Party spirit, and precision and clarity in discussing important theoretical problems and elucidating questions of the revolutionary movement.

The editorial board was constantly assisted by V. V. Vorovsky, A. V. Lunacharsky and M. S. Olminsky. N. K. Krupskaya V M Velichkina and V. A. Karpinsky had a big share in the editorial work. The weekly was closely linked with the working-class movement in Russia. It carried articles and other items by workers directly engaged in the revolutionary movement. V. D. Bonch Bruyevich, S. I. Gusev and A. I. Ulyanova-Yelizarova arranged for the collection of articles in Russia and their dispatch to Geneva. N. K. Krupskaya and L. A. Fotieva were in charge of the weekly’s correspondence with Party organisations and readers in Russia.

Proletary was prompt to react to all major events in the Russian and international working-class movement. It fought relentlessly against the Mensheviks and other opportunist, revisionist elements.

The weekly did much to propagate the decisions of the Third Party Congress an d played a prominent role in the organisational and ideological unification of the Bolsheviks. It was the only Russian Social-Democratic paper that consistently upheld revolutionary Marxism and dealt with all the principal issues of the revolution developing in Russia. By giving full information on the events of 1905, it roused the broad masses of the working people to fight for the victory of the revolution.

Proletary had great influence over the Social-Democratic organisations in Russia, where some of Lenin’s articles were reprinted from it by Bolshevik papers and circulated in leaflet form.

Proletary ceased to a p pear shortly after Lenin had left for Russia early in November 1905. Its last two issues (Nos. 25 and 26) were published under the editorship of V. V. Vorovsky. The several articles Lenin had written for those issues appeared when he had left Geneva.

[5] Oblomov—a landlord, the chief character in a novel of the same name by the Russian writer I. A. Goncharov. Oblomov was the personification of routine, stagnation, and incapacity for action.