A Man's Tribute To Womanhood!

Most Gracious ILites,

When my moods are down or when I am very busy not knowing what to do and what not to, I sit down calmly to count my blessings. This has always had a therapeutic effect on me.

I did that a few days back as I was furiously replying the ILites who had kindly responded to my post in Wednesdays With Varalotti. At the middle of my work I started counting my blessings. To have the love affection of about 1700 women spread throughout the world is a rare blessing.


And in this 1700 are included many mothers, daughters, sisters, grandmothers and granddaughters.

Then I started to think of the blessings I received from women in my life, or to put it more aptly, the blessings I received in the form of women in my life.

I was born of a wonderful woman who taught me a sound value system and gave me the freedom to do whatever I wanted to, within the boundaries of that value system. I was born with another wonderful woman, my only sister, who has inspired me, encouraged me and at times has even admired me. Even now when I am down I call her up to just chat with her. Invariably I end up the call as a far more enthusiastic man than when I started it.

Above all I am married to the most wonderful woman God could have ever given me, I mean my one and only wife. I have always believed that God acts on mercy and compassion and not on justice and righteousness. For if He had acted strictly according to the canons of justice he would not have given such a wonderful woman for my wife. Anytime my life ends I would have discharged all my obligations to all the people around but not to my wife. My prayer to God is to be born her wife in my next birth and discharge at least a part of my obligations to her.

And then a wonderful woman came into my life as my one and only daughter. If people had listened to many of our conversations without seeing us, and if our voices do not betray our age, they would have thought that a mother and son are talking. On many instances my daughter has corrected me, has advised me on the right path to follow. I have hurt her many times; but she has not even hurt me once either by her words or actions.


And my innumerable women friends who offer words of wisdom when I want them and shoulders to cry on when I need them!


And last, not to be the least, the women in IL. And their overwhelming love and affection. Their admiration and adoration.

To partially express my gratitude towards the Almighty for these blessings conferred on me in the form of women, I am dedicating this thread to womanhood. I am paying a tribute to womahood.

But I am after all a professional accountant and a prosaic writer. I do not have that kind of words to pay tribute to the very embodiment of Sakthi, the women. And recently my dear friend in IL, Chitra, suggested a book to me, collections of poems by Kavikko Abdul Rahman entitled, Aalapanai.

The very first kavithai in that book is a glorious tribute to Women. With tears of gratitude filling up my eyes I am posting the poem to express my overflowing feelings of thankfulness.

With Love,
Varalotti

You are a rare person who has the grace to acknowldge the blessings you receive from the women in your life. Every man has a mother, very often a wife, quite often a daughter and perhaps a sister as well. But how many men are “man” enough to thank them for the influence they have had, in making him what he is, today ? This is the first time, I hear a man saying about his wife that he should be born a wife to her in his next birth ! Last but not least, you have acknowledged my suggesting this book to you to read. This is where you stand apart, my dear friend !

Let us frankly accept that the world revolves on the “ardhanareeswara" tatvam or principle. Science explains the principle of matter(man) and energy (woman). Our Hindu scriptures call, energy as “ shakti”. This only proves man and woman are interdependent for our very existence.
There is a man in every woman and vice versa.
The man, in general, uses his head and the woman, her heart more often. But that is how, God has willed one gender to balance the other in our relationships and life.

I cannot help quoting, again, Abdul Rahman,

நாம் அவள் வழியாகவே பிரவேசிக்கிறோம்
அவள் வழியாகத் தான் வெளியேறவும் வேண்டும்

நாம் காணாமல் போவதும் அவளிடமே
நம்மைக் கண்டெடுப்பதும் அவளிடமே

I am becoming a great fan of A R ( ofcourse, Sridhar, to me, he comes next only to you, honestly !). His tamil " gazals" are simply superb.

Ladies, let us applaud the only man in our forum for praising womanhood.
Kudos to you, my dear Sridhar ! I am proud to call you, my friend !

Love & regards,
Chithra.

Dear Sridhar,

AS MS C says, you are indeed a rare one to be so gracious to cherish and laud the women in your life as well as the whole womenkind. Thank you for all your beautiful words. And your wife and daughter are extememly luck to have you.

Vandhana

Hello Sridhar,

suddenly, I see you've become emotional. I do understand the reason. the poem itself is so intense that it'll make one react that way. Your intro about all the women was wonderful to read & appreciate the special mention of Indhu.

thanks for sharing such a wonderful piece here. I was chatting with Chitra this afternoon about this particular poem - Chitra, you seem to have an eye for ultimate things in life.

the first time I read, I couldn't believe it was written by a man but, after reading it so many times, I'm of the opinion that only a Man can write about women in such a wonderful tone.

While I feel so proud being a woman, I also feel proud to know a man like you, who can applaud womanhood.

Regards,

Dear Sridhar,
You have written so well praising all the women in your life,particularly your wife. She must be one lucky wife too. Looks like you are match made in heaven. I think I will read it several times during this week. I loved it Sridhar.
Love,

Hi Sridhar ,
" A man's tribute to womanhood " shows how genuine u r to ur family , Ilites & the whole womanhood !
I dont find anymore words to praise u except .......
" SUPERB"
with high regards ,
Rajeswary.

The blessings you received in the form of the women members of your family is really giving some pleasure to the readers!
Whenever reading these kind of emotional pieces make my heart reach my family soon!
Every woman is giving the same affection even though they are in the different forms of mother, sister, wife and daughter!
Before you mentioned here, I would think about your wife, certainly she might have given her full support to you to be successful in your life as a writer, an accountant and others!
And the other beautiful relationship is with your daughter, reminds me of my wonderful moments with my father!
(My father's name is also Abdul Rahman).
I love reading poetry, but don't know Tamil. I am eager to know what has written in the poem and sincerely desire if any one has translated a few lines in English.

Shahana.

I am giving you a gist - literally in a nutshell !
Later today, I will post it here, if anyone else does not do it.
It is one of the poems I enjoyed & hence requested Sridhar to read it.
The beauty of tamil, sadly, cannot be conveyed. But I will give you an idea about what is written.
It is such a " meaningful coincidence " that your father's name is A R !
This A R 's poems & articles are, in my opinion, comparable to Khalil Gibran, yes !
How can I not share our pleasure with you, my dearest Seena ?
Ask for, I will do it, Madam !
Love & regards,
Chithra.

Can you please post an english version of the poem, for the benefit of Safa & others who cannot read tamil ?
I am confident, your english version will be as good as A R's tamil version & hence this request.
Love & regards,
Chithra.

Now that Shahana has requested and Chitra has ordered, do I have a choice? But I should say that it was a labour of love translating this poem.
I had been thinking that translation is a dull job. But then learnt from Ambika, that translation requires at least as much skills as writing the original script. She is so much into it that she is planning to do a Ph.D on translation alone.

A few months back I met one of my schoolmates, one Dr.Rajeswari. She had done her Ph.D in translation and is guiding the students of Wisconsin University on translation from English to Tamil and vice versa. In fact one of her students Hanna opted for a project to translate one of my stories from Tamil to English.

Two months back I was assigned the pleasant task of translating a whole book from English to Tamil. It is coming out as a new book under the title, Kalam Kanda Veerarhalin Kadhal Kadaikal.

I took one month to translate the 160 page book. And I was in a state of trance throughout this period.

I also learnt a fundamental truth. Tamil and English both are inherently beautiful languages capable of an infinite variety of expressions. Of course you cannot attempt a word by word translation. But all the expressions are there in both the languages. You have to do some search for words to find out the right one with the correct shade.

The best example that comes to my mind is the experience I had when I went with my wife to shop for a blouse for her saree. That was a huge matching centre very close to the temple. If you say green there are about 150 shades of green. The shelves on the one side of the large showroom contain only green blouse bits; likewise there was a shelf for red, blue yellow and all the colours in between. My wife would pick up a piece and say, this is so hard, and another to say, too soft, another, very light, another, very dark. She would finally select a piece which would perfectly jell with her saree. And when she wears it, it would be very difficult to say where her saree ends and where her blouse begins.

Translation is also a similar exercise where you go for a word-shopping. But in the case of poems like this because of the emotional attachment you have for the subject in hand, words come of their own from the depths of your mind. It is like looking for a matching blouse for a white saree or a black saree.

Even I was keying in the Tamil poem the possible English translation was going on in the back of my mind. Because of this I had to violently rob a dear friend of mine of her pleasure of translating this poem. I hope you would understand, my dear friend.

Now move on to the next post for the English translation of the poem.

regards,
Varalotti