Raji, Madhushala and the toys of "kolu"

We have done some twenty verses of the Madhushala, and I have received some wonderful feedback via personal email from friends, acquaintances and strangers. I thank all of you. However, my cousin Raji, who lives in Bangalore, India, has been sending me (and in our family's e-group), her own take and comments on the Madhushala; I wanted to hit the pause button and talk about that today.

She enjoys the Madhushala very much, and yesterday, when I read her comments, I thought that she had brought a dimension to the understanding of the Madhushala that I was missing in my commentary. So I thought of writing a special post in the blog, and dedicating to her, a great fellow-lover of the immortal poem.

What Raji reminded me was that while it is important to understand the poem, to uncover the message, to decipher the metaphor of the madhushala, it is also important to remember that it is a poem, and to miss out on its lyrical quality is to lose a significant part of its essence.

During navratri, in many Southern Indian homes, especially ones where there were girls, they would do something we call "kolu" or "golu". It consists of creating a stepped platform on which would be kept various dolls, small and large idols and decorative trinkets. Besides, around this platform, would be constructed toy playgrounds and such, and populated with dolls as well.

A key component of this was the time the girls would take in determining which doll or trinket or idol to place where, so that each piece was just right, so that not only was the overall appearance very aesthetic, but that no piece was in the wrong place.

Raji compared the madhushala by Bachchan to these "golu bommais" or golu toys. Each word, she said, was placed so exactly, so correctly, that it reminded her of a very well done golu.

What a beautiful analogy!! Yes, it is important to understand the underlying philosophy of each rubaiya, but it is equally important to let the lyrcial quality of the poem seep into your heart. Otherwise, we'd miss out on the pain, the effort and the hard work that goes into the creation of the poetry or of the golu....and forget that "patthar pe ghisne ke baad hee, rang laati hai hina".

And we if just praised the result without acknowledging the effort that went into the creation of the madhushala, Bachchan's spirit would scold me:

"payal ke gamon ka ilm nahin...jhankaar kee baatein karte ho...."

Thank you, Raji. Yeh din, yeh post, tumhare naam.