Threading garlands is my occupation. My father has a flower-garden at the extreme end of Ballygunge. It is the sole source of his income. From the onset of spring until the time when flowers bloom, he plucks flowers and brings them to me and I thread them into garlands. My father then walks the streets of the city selling them. My mother keeps busy with all the household chores. But in’their spare time both my parents lend me a hand in doing my work.
The feel of flowers is very pleasing; it must be a greater pleasure to wear them. They certainly smell delightful. But threading garlands isn’t enough to live on. The tree of hunger has no blossoms. Hence, we are quite poor. We live in a plain, earthen hut in Mirzapur. It is in a corner of this house that I sit with piles of flowers spread out before me, and weave garlands out of them. Once my father leaves the house, I sing: On’this, my favourite morning, there isn’t a bloom to be found.
Oh dear Lord, I still haven’t told you if I am a man or a woman. But—if you haven’t been able to guess that yet, it’s better left unsaid. I shall not tell you now.
Whichever one I am, marriage is a vain fantasy for a blind person. I have not got married yet because I am sightless. Any sensible person with a head on’their shoulders can decide for themselves if that is fortunate or unfortunate. Many a renowned beauty, when’they heard of my obligatory chastity, have said, ‘Oh, I wish I were blind too.’
I had overcome my regrets about never being able to experience marriage. But I had given myself to a husband of my choice nonetheless. One day I was hearing descriptions of Calcutta from my father. I heard that the Monument was a huge and weighty sight. Taller than ever, unmoved, immovable, invincible—a Lord in his own rights. In my heart of hearts, I wedded the Monument. Who was greater than my husband? I was Lady Monument.
But it was not just this once that I found for myself a husband. When I married the Monument, I was fifteen years old. At the age of seventeen, I am ashamed to say, as a still-married woman—another marriage came to pass. Very close to our house lived a gentleman called Kalicharan Basu. He owned a toy shop in China Bazaar. We were of the same caste and hence there was some familiarity between our families. He had a four-year-old son called Bamacharan. This child often came to our house. One day a groom and his band passed by our house, like a slow-moving typhoon. Bamacharan asked, ‘Who’s that?’
I said, ‘That’s a groom.’
Bamacharan wailed, ‘I want to be a groom.’
Trying to stop his tears and failing miserably, I said as a last resort to pacify him, ‘Don’t cry, you can be my groom.’ I handed him a sweet and asked, ‘Will you be my groom, then?’
The child stopped wailing when he got the sweet and said, ‘Yes.’
After some time, when’the sweet was eaten, he asked, ‘Well, what exactly does a groom do?’ Perhaps he believed with all his heart that a groom merely ate sweets. If that were the case, he was ready to start on’the next one. Gauging his thoughts I said, ‘A groom gathers up the flowers for me.’ Bamacharan was quick to understand the duties of a husband and he began’to gather up the flowers and hand them to me. Ever since that day I call him my groom and he gathers and hands the flowers to me.
These are my two marriages. Now my question is to the misses and the ladies of this day and age: am I a chaste woman or not?
2
DELIVERING FLOWERS TO THE BIG HOUSE WAS A TROUBLESOME CHORE. IN the olden days, Malini Aunty used to supply flowers to the palace but then she died. Vidyasundar got the nectar and Hira the flower woman got the blows; all because she supplied flowers to the palace. Sundar got the kingdom of his dreams, but Malini’s, the vanquished, never came back to life.
Father hollered ‘Beli flowers’ and sold them among the music-loving connoisseurs. Mother used to supply flowers daily to a few non-connoisseur households. Of them, Ramsaday Mitra’s house was the most important. Ramsaday Mitra had four and a half horses (four good steeds and a pony for the grandchildren) and one and a half wives. One acting lady of the manor and the other ailing and old. Her name was Bhuvaneshwari, but the wheezing of her croaky voice only brought to mind the name Rammoni.
The whole and acting lady of the manor was called Labangalata. That’s what everyone called her, but her father had named her Lalitlabangalata and Ramsaday Babu lovingly said, ‘Lalitlabangalata [the pretty creeper vine], darling of the gentle summer breeze.’ Ramsaday Babu was elderly, nearly sixty-three years old. Lalitlabangalata was young, about nineteen years old and she was his second wife—she was the apple of his eye, the jewel in his crown, the feather in his cap, the complete mistress of his heart. She was Ramsaday’s vault-key, his bedcover, the lime paste on his betel leaf, and the water in his glass. She was the quinine to his fever, the ipica to his cough, the flannel to his arthritis and the soup for his convalescence.
I am blind; so I’ve never seen Lalitlabangalata. But I’ve heard that she is beautiful.
But forget beauty, I have heard of her talents. In’truth, she is very talented. She’s flawless in household chores, generous to a fault, simple at heart, but—endowed with a venomous tongue. Amidst the abundant gifts that Labangalata had, one was that she truly loved her husband who was old enough to be her grandfather—loved him perhaps more than a young wife would love her young husband. Since she loved him so, she tried to dress him up as a young man—oh, how can I describe those larks? She dyed his grey hair black every day with her own hands. If ever Ramsaday, out of sheer modesty, donned a plain white dhoti, she would take it off with her own hands and replace it with dhotis that had thick and decorous borders and donate the plain dhoti immediately to the nearest poor widow. At his age, Ramsaday ran a mile at the sight of a bottle of attar—but Labangalata would douse him in it as he was sleeping. Often she would steal his glasses, take out the bit of gold in it and donate it to someone who had a daughter of marriageable age. If he ever snored as he slept, she took out her heavy anklets, wore them on her feet and jangled around all over the room until he woke up.
Labangalata used to buy flowers from us. She took flowers worth four annas and paid us two rupees for it. The reason: I was blind. When she held the garland she always cursed and said, ‘Why have you given me such worthless flowers?’ But when she paid for it, she would always hand some notes with the coins. If I ever went back to return’the extra money, she would shoo me off saying, ‘That’s not my money.’ And if I went back a second time, she’d curse me till I left. Any mention of her generosity would always entail a venomous attack. If truth be known, but for Ramsaday Babu’s household, we would not have had enough to live on. But since one shouldn’t milk the milch cow too hard, mother never took too much from the lady. We were happy if we could make ends meet. Sometimes, Labanga bought piles of flowers from us and decked Ramsaday Babu with them, saying, ‘That’s my Cupid.’ Ramsaday Babu said, ‘That’s your Hanuman.’ Such was the harmony of minds between’two people of different generations. They could read each other as clearly as a mirror. Such was the way of their love—
Ramsaday: Lalitalabangalata, darling of the—
Labanga: Yes, my grandfather, your maid is at your service.
Ramsaday: If I were to die?
Labanga: I’d take your wealth and run.
To herself she’d say, ‘I’d rather die than go on living.’ And Ramsaday knew that very well.
Labanga used to pay me so generously. So then, why was it a bother going to the Big House to give flowers? Hear me out.
One day, Mother had fever. Father, like other male outsiders, was not allowed into the inner chambers. So who else could go and give the flowers to Labangalata but me? I took the flowers for her and set off. Blind I may be, but I knew every corner of the roads of Calcutta. I could go anywhere with my cane in hand and never had I come in front of a motor car or tram. Sometimes though, I have stumbled onto another pedestrian; the reason for that is that some people go mum when’they see a young blind girl. Instead they jostle you and then shout, ‘What’s the matter—can’t you see? Are
you blind or what?’ I’d murmur to myself, ‘It works both ways, doesn’t it?’
I took the flowers to Labanga. She saw me and said, ‘Well, well, blind child, why have you come here again with your ugly flowers?’ The words ‘blind child’ used to set me on fire. I was thinking up a suitable and nasty enough reply when suddenly I heard some footsteps. Someone came in. The one who came in, said, ‘Who is this, Chhoto-ma?’
Chhoto-ma! So then it was one of Ramsaday’s sons. But which one? I had heard his elder son’s voice one day—it wasn’t as sweet as this, neither did it fill the heart with such joy. I guessed that this was the young master.
Chhoto-ma answered, in honeyed tones this time, ‘She is the blind flower girl.’
‘Flower girl! I thought she was a lady.’
Labanga said, ‘Why, my dear, can’t a flower girl be a lady as well?’
The young master was embarrassed. He said, ‘Why not? She does appear to be of genteel birth. So what made her blind?’
Labanga said, ‘She was born’that way.’
The young master said, ‘Let me see?’
I had heard that he was very proud of his education. Like many other fields in which he had acquired his skill, he had devoted himself to the science of medicine with equal dedication, without any thoughts of gain’to himself. People even said that Sachindra Babu (the young master) was studying medicine only to be able to treat the poor and needy free of cost.
‘Let me see,’ he said to me. ‘Could you please stand up?’
I stood up in a huddle.
He said, ‘Look at me.’
How could I!
‘Turn’towards me.’
With my sightless eyes I shot an arrow in’the dark, aiming at the sound. It didn’t satisfy him. He held my chin and turned me to face him.
I wish I could do something very bad to the field of medicine! That touch alone was my death.
It was gentler than flowers; I smelled the perfumes of all flowers merged into one in’that one touch alone. I felt there were flowers all around me, on my head, at my feet, all over my body and deep in my heart. Oh dear, dear me! Which of the many gods had created this flower-like touch? I have already told you that you wouldn’t understand the joys and sorrows of the blind. Oh my, my—it was as soft as butter, ever-young, perfumed and like a musical note, that touch. How can a person, who isn’t blind, ever understand a touch being like a musical note? Let my joys and sorrows stay buried in my heart. What would you—the proud owner of large, expressive eyes—know of the veena notes that tinkled in my ears every time I thought of that touch?
The young master said, ‘No, this blindness is beyond cure.’
Yes, that was keeping me awake at nights all right!
Labanga said, ‘So what if it is incurable—is it impossible for a blind girl to get married even if enough money is spent?’
The young master said, ‘Why, isn’t she married?’
Labanga said, ‘No. Will money solve the problem?’
He asked her, ‘Would you like to spend money for her marriage?’
Labanga was angry now, ‘I have never seen such a boy! Do I have that kind of money to spare? All I want to know is if it’s possible. I’m a mere woman and there’s so much that I don’t know. Can it happen?’
The young master knew his Chhoto-ma all too well. He laughed, ‘Mother, you keep your money. I’ll fix a groom for her.’
I began’to curse the living daylights out of Labanga in silence as I fled from the room.
Now you know why I said carrying flowers to the Big House was a troublesome chore.
Oh earth, who nurtures us all, what do you look like? What do the varied creations, animate and inanimate, and the immense and abundant strengths that you hold, look like? All things that are perceived as beautiful—how do they look? How do the creatures with varied qualities, that roam your fields, appear to the eye? Tell me, Mother, how does the male species, dwelling in your heart, look? Among them, O Mother, show me the one whose touch feels so sweet? Show me, Mother, how it feels to see. What is sight? How is sight? What pleasure does it bring? Just for an instant, can I not ‘see’ this pleasurable touch? Show me, Mother! Let my corporeal eyes stay closed. Grant me eyes within my heart so that I may conceal myself within myself and just this once, fill my eyes with a sight of him so that I forever remain grateful to be born a woman. Everyone can see—why can’t I? I believe even insects and worms can see—so why can’t I? Just plain seeing—no harm to anyone, no grief caused to anyone, no sins committed, they all take sight for granted—what is my sin’that I shall never be able to see?
No! No! Fate grudges me. I probed my heart—sound, touch and smell were all I came up with.
My heart is rent with a shattering cry, ‘Show me, someone, please show me the beauty.’ But no one understood! No one paid heed to the blind one’s sorrow.
3
SINCE THAT DAY, I WENT NEARLY EVERY DAY TO RAMSADAY MITRA’S HOUSE to sell flowers. But I do not know why. Why this urge in one who had no eyes? I would never see, and could only anticipate a few words from him. Why would Sachindra Babu come and speak to me? He lived in’the main house and I went to the inner chambers. If he was married, he may have come that way sometimes. But a year or so before, his wife had passed away and he had not married again. So that hope too—of his coming to the inner chambers—was gone. Seldom, if ever, some business brought him to his mother’s. What were the chances even’then’that he’d happen’to come by exactly when I took the flowers into the house? Hence, my anticipation of a few words too was in vain. Yet, the blind one took the flowers there every day. With what vain hopes, I do not know. As I came back disappointed, every day, I asked myself why I went there. Every day, I vowed never to go back. And each day that vow put me to shame. Daily I went back, as if someone was dragging me there by the hair. Again’the same disappointment, and the vow, and then breaking it—thus passed my days.
I would often ask myself why I went back there—I’d heard that women fell in love with a man for his good looks. I am blind and that doesn’t hold true for me. So why did I go? To hear him speak? Has anyone ever heard that a woman had lost her heart to someone by just hearing his voice? Is that what had become of me? Was it even possible? If that were true, why didn’t I visit musicians? Was Sachindra’s voice sweeter than’the sitar, violin, sarangi and esraj? That would be a lie.
So then, was it the touch? Was his touch softer than’the piles of flowers that surround me day and night, that I hold in my heart and press to my heart? That’s not true. So, what was it? Who could tell this blind girl what it really was?
You do not know it yourself—so what can you tell me? You have sight and all you see is beauty. I know that beauty is a mere illusion of the beholder—the same as sound. Beauty is not in’the person, but in’the eyes of the beholder—otherwise, why do people perceive it in different degrees in different people? Why don’t we all fall in love with the same person? Similarly, the effect of a sound too is in your mind. Beauty is a mere gratification of the eyes and sound for the ears and touch for the skin. If I was to remain ignorant of the pleasures of beauty, why wouldn’t sound and touch provide me with the same pleasure instead?
When a fallow land gets her first drops of rain, she blossoms. Parched wood blazes into life at the first touch of a spark. When an idle female heart comes into contact with a handsome male, by sight, or touch or smell, love becomes a foregone conclusion. Flowers bloom in’the dark of night as well, the moon roams the sky even if clouds shield it from view, the koel sings in’the woods even if there is no one about, the pearl still grows in’the womb of the ocean where no one man would ever go, and love blossoms in’the heart of the blind girl too; why shouldn’t my heart respond, just because my eyes are sightless? Certainly it should, but merely to torture me. Poetry for the mute, love of music for the deaf, are merely instruments of their own’torture; their own song is denied to them. Love, within my heart, was something like that. I have never set
eyes on my own form, let alone that of my beloved. Beauty, form! How do I look? On’the face of this earth, how does the tiny speck called Rajani appear to the eye? Has anyone ever wanted to take a second look at me? Is there any such, lowly, tiny form that has ever found me beautiful? A woman without her eyes has no beauty to speak of—I am sightless—but then, why does the sculptor sculpt the female form and give her vacant eyes? Am I then as rock-hewn as that? Why then did God grant me this heart full of sorrows and joy and the desire for love? If I received the misery of stone, why didn’t I get its bliss as well? Fate can be so cruel and unfair! Even’the worst of criminals gets to see and I was refused that right even before I was born—for what sins, I wonder. This world is devoid of gods, justice, trophies and penalties for virtue and sin—I wish I were dead.
I have lived for many years and will probably live for many more years; every year has many days, every day has many minutes and every minute has many seconds. Of them, not even for a single second, for an instant, could I not have the gift of sight? If only I could, I’d have taken a look at this world full of sound and touch, seen what I looked like, what Sachindra looked like.
4
I TOOK FLOWERS THERE EVERY DAY; AND MOST OF THE TIME I DIDN’T GET TO hear the voice of the young master. But some days, on rare occasions, I did. That joy which I experienced when I heard him defies description. I felt the same as the rain-laden clouds that thundered, growled and finally gave way to a downpour. I wanted to thunder and rumble as ecstatically as that. Every day I wanted to go and give a select bunch of flowers to him. But I could never do it. For one, I was shy, and then, even if I did, I felt he’d like to pay for them—how would I stop him? Dismal and desolate I’d come back home and try to make his form with my flowers—I do not know what shape it took, I’ve never seen.
Bankimchandra Omnibus: Volume - 1: v. 1 Page 47