Onam and Coir

?anand bose Coir and Onam


There's fun in the air and joy is the festive mood of the
spirit. Roadsides as well as houses are decorated with the most
ravishing floral designs.


Shops are selling flowers of all hues, red ones, golden ones,
violets dahlias jasmine etc. Over the years, the flowers have dried to
a scarcity and there's a huge trail of lorries moving flowers to
satisfy the occasion. Walking past shops, there are impressions of
every canvas being the gift of Monet. The flowers are so well arranged
that there's hardly any impression on them.


The frontal view of each house bequeaths a spectacular
(athapuvu) or the art of floral decoration. The poet's soul will be
inebriated with care of composition; thus tiny petals, little leafs,
fragments of grass, find their way as conscientious care, nurtured by
all irrespective of age. Each work of art is an intricate design by
itself, different as patterns embracing the way of seeing form, yet
unique as individual entities. A feast for the eye is the wedding
banquet of triangles, crescents, semicircles, and so on flowing with
veins of Onam.


River Pampa is agog with excitement. There's a flurry of
emotions wild with joy, drunken with excitement about who will win or
loose? Serpent boats have lined up for the grand prix. Long, narrow,
and agile, they are cut from a single bark, tempered by craftsmen who
have learned the art of tradition from generation to
generation.


Their inspiration is (Perunthachan) a spirit craft'sman who
finds music in wood and stone being gifted with the spirit of touch.
(Perunthachan) taps wood and stone and differentiates them into male
and female by listening to their tones. For (Perunthachan), Music is
('diassonace') of wood or stone where the clairaudient ear of his
discerns the raging storm and the soothing sleep and crafts both to a
melody of pure art.
The women are sensuous in white (sets), saris fringed with golden
borders and crimson blouses, laden in jasmine, now flowing into the
whirl-wind of rhythm, moving around in circles, breaking within the
circle, clapping hands in an off rhythm, now increasing the tempo and
again slowing down. They are one as Virgins, Lovers, Wives as Mothers
and Grandmothers.


It's easy to identify a tiger and a human. To see both, as
one in stripes of yellow and black is to see they are boozed to
mirth.


As the day light leaves its leafs to the rays around the
earth, there's a flurry of activity around the (pindi). The (pindi)
trunk of the banana tree is cut into half; a small incision is made on
the top and little coconut shells are placed in it, lit with oil
wicks.


Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai, the famous author of 'Coir' is
reciting the story of Onam to his grand children who have been
abroad.


Dear (Muthus) Pearls,


--Once upon a time there was king called Mahabali (great
sacrifice) who lived here. No woes, no faults characterize his
reign.


Thakkazhi goes inward, breaks over into a philosophic
musing-the ruler of story, peaceful, prosperous and
lovable!


The children nudge him to go on.


--Now where was I? Well (maha) is great and (bali) is
sacrifice. As the days went by the God (Valmiki) grew jealous. The folk
saying about it is: "there's no medicine for jealousy and baldness".
Baldness can be cured but jealousy! Now (Valmiki), growing jealous and
already bald decided to trick (Mahabali)


--He came down to earth in mortal guise as a dwarf and on to
the palace he went.


--Oh king (Mahabali), see how miserable your subject is? And
you are a king who assures the welfare of all!


--What ails you? What can I do for you?


-- Can you grant me an area of land equal to three measures
of my foot?


-- Mahabali burst out laughing! What? You preposterous dwarf!
Three measures of your foot! You ought to be growing your feet! Go on
take it now!


-- At that instant, Valmiki grew into a leviathan. With one
thundering step, he covered the earth, with another the Heaven's. And
he demanded for the third!


-- Mahabali knelt down and offered his head. He said, I am
unable to satisfy your wish. Here's my head for the third but grant me
a wish.


--What could that be boomed Valmiki?


--I love my people, my subjects of God's Own country. I would
like to visit them at a particular time every year.


--May it be granted! With that Mahabali became the dust of
the earth.


-- That was a sad story (Mutthachan) Grandfather. Shall we go
on for (Atharam) supper?


Thakazhi went deeper and deeper into a reflective mood. He
took the areca nuts and pan leaf and cut dried tobacco with a sharp
knife, broke the areca nut and mashed them under the stone. Then he
applied mashed ingredients on to the pan leaf and mused!



-- Is the measure of the foot equal to the dignity of the
heart? Measures - Measures- measures. Remember that Nair (Hindu Caste)
who puts all the hearts under his foot! And that (Nazarene) is funny.
He keeps them all under his ass. Why? That (Hamukh) Muslim keeps them
away from his body as though they are a sin! There's a strange language
in (Nadan) Country Poker. Those who play it wear a special type of
underwear, the long cotton ones, coloured and similar to the Bermudas
of today. With a flip of the (lunkey), the hand goes into the
bell-bottom underwear's and out, flip flop flip goes on the game of
(Nadan-Poker) also called (Karakku). Thus an odd bystander can hear
gregarious shouts:


Oru Karraku : One spin
Oru Kurruku: One Maze
Oru Kutthu : One Poke
Oru Katthu: One letter!



Glow worms buzzing light, danced around; flashes, flickers of
infatuation in green, hovering helicopters, drifting, flirting,
painting arcane rituals of the psyche in the medium of flight. They
become bards, instantly chanting small is beautiful as if green and
ebullient as the coming to life of a vignette in the novel.



The last thing he remembered was drifting into sleep. The
image of Mahabali appeared to him speaking through the silence of
consciousness of Hearts of images, of sounds of tenderness, of love, of
realm of sharing where the mind could not understand the nature of
silence.


The Mathrubhumi, Manorama, and Kaumadi are running full-page
obituaries of the most famous novelist of Kerala, Thakhazhi.
Sivashnakra Pillai. A single epitaph touches the worth of Thakazhi as:
' Coir has slept forever. Coir is living as the only book of its
kind'.