ಮಹಾಕಾಲ

My friend Keshav Malagi has suggested that I write a few words for my collection of poems 'Mahakala'. If he hadn't said so, I wouldn't have bothered writing these words. But I cannot dismiss his suggestion, as he has been observing my poetry seriously and lovingly for four decades.

Talking about poems was not easy even before. But today, talking about these poems is more difficult than ever because—I feel—these poems are largely trying to find meanings in the silence beyond words.

Thomas Mann identified the fundamental shift in literary thought in the modern age thus: 'In our age, the human fact is history.' Gradually, as modernity developed, this kind of historical consciousness became intertwined with literary creation and criticism. But many literary movements emerged during this period challenging historical consciousness: symbolism, imagism, critical realism, expressionism, etc.

But even these did not completely free themselves from history. The perspective here merely transferred the canvas of history to psychology. While the beginning, middle, and end of the usual historical narratives are in physical time, the limitations of symbolism, etc., lie in the history of the subconscious. For me, who had been creating works with a partial belief in both these perspectives, during the dark period of Corona,

I had an experience beyond these two frameworks. Perhaps this happened not just to me.

That is: an experience of stasis of space-time beyond both kinds of historicity. A terrible experience where the walls of the house become the world, the rooms become countries, the mechanical cycle of monotony becomes time, and all meanings become meaningless.

What appeared to me as a release from this existential prison beyond darkness was a greater darkness beyond darkness. It had the light of Mahakala Mahakali guarding it.

Most of the poems here were born in those still abysses of solitude where the consciousness of Mahakala began to haunt me. As unearthly hidden lights embedded in that darkness of darkness.

Mahakala and Mahakali are the backdrop and foundation of most of the poems in this collection. Here, Mahakala and Mahakali are not so much gods as they are outer dimensions and possibilities of space-time experiences.

Although this kind of experience and spiritual insight emerged during the dark nights of Corona, I believe it also has a universal significance beyond that. Everyone experiences the randomness of the dynamism of space-time during moments of intense experience. Then the world is infinite, and here is everywhere.