O Singer Of The Epic War Poem by Aniruddha Pathak

O Singer of epic war history,
Of brazen battlefields long desolate,
O Saint of life and liberties hoary,
Bhagavad-Gita is thine ageless glory.

Outlived hast thine song an endless story,
Its dead heroes surviving still in state,
Frustrated of ill fate but scarce sorry,
O Singer of epic war history.

Yudhishthir's dharma, Arjun's archery,
Bheeshma's oath and Bheemsen's brute bravery,
Confined can scarce be to the Pearly Gate,
O thou hast sung Gita's ageless glory.

And ye O bard, two roles in one carry:
Poet laureate, progenitor on date,
Born wert thou on mother's river ferry,
O Singer of epic war history.

Ye sang thine song in such a swell flurry,
E'en god of wit1, though more than adequate,
Lost was in deep thought oft feeling weary,
O Bard of an ancient ageless glory.

For mortal pens a task ‘tis so dreary,
Oh even no more than to just translate2,
O Singer of epic war history,
O Singer of ancient ageless glory.
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1. Vyasa, the creator of Mahabharata approached Lord Ganesha, a great scribe who could write with great speed, to pen down the epic as sung by him. He agreed but warned the poet: With great speed I write. See that you do not make me wait. ‘Okay, but don't write anything down without understanding it, the poet put a counter condition. And so was created an epic of about hundred thousand verses, or four hundred thousand poetic lines.

2. I have done a poetic translation from the original Sanskrit (Volume I published)and I know how formidable a task it is.

This is a Villanelle— a bit way out. The tersest, that normally becomes a quatrain only in the last stanza, becomes so in all. Also, the first and the third lines of the first stanza are repeated here with some modifications.
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Villanelle | 02.10.11 |