I, Lalla

by Lal Ded

  25. G: 7 | K: 130

  nātha! nā pān nā par zônum

  Lalla phrases a passionate testament, here, to the recognition of the unity between seeker and goal, self and Self. She castigates herself for having allowed herself to be blinded to this unity by her body-centred consciousness, with its emphasis on the personality, on individual identity; and also by the constant doubt concerning the true nature of the Divine, which she previously nurtured.

  26. G: 89

  lācāri bicāri prawād korum

  The double meaning of this vākh hinges on the alternative meanings carried by three of the key words: nadoru, which means both ‘lotus stalk’ and ‘a thing of no value’; prān, which means both ‘onion’ and the ‘life-breath’; and ruhun, which means ‘garlic’ and puns on ruh or spirit, a word derived from the Arabic. The opening line is a vivid study in the illuminating paradox at which Lalla excels. Describing herself, somewhat disarmingly, as a poor and helpless woman, she makes a proclamation: lācāri bicāri prawād korum. In the first reading, she offers lotus stalks for sale—nadoru, stewed either by itself or with meat, is a favourite Kashmiri dish—following this up with an offer of onion and garlic at a discounted price. The second, more esoteric understanding plays off this sales patter at a deeper level: the ‘nothing’ that Lalla pitches at the prospective buyer in the marketplace gains significance when she follows it up by offering ‘breath and soul’ for the price of one. What is on offer is Yogic instruction, and through it, the resulting insight into the Void, the true nature of reality beyond the world of appearances.

  27. G: 90

  prān ta ruhun kunuy zônum

  This vākh also employs the pun on onion/life-breath and garlic/ spirit. Depending on how it is read, the poem is spoken either by a fastidious yet idiosyncratic gourmand or an enlightened seeker. The gourmand speaks urbanely of how he wouldn’t touch a sliver of fried onion, but that it gave him, nonetheless, a taste for the mystical realisation, ‘sō-’ham’, ‘I am He’. The seeker arrives at the same conclusion by means of the pun that we have seen in play in poem 26: breath and soul form the twin subject of his training; he disdains the worship of the body, but agrees that it gave him a taste for saying ‘sō-’ham’, ‘I am He’. The point of the double meaning appears to be that one may choose many, sometimes surprising and apparently mutually exclusive, ways to reach enlightenment, and the aesthete or epicurean may arrive at that destination just as surely as the ascetic.

  28. K. Pr: 57

  diluku khura-khura mě, Māli, kāstam, manaki kōtar-marē

  In a recognition of the burden of the seeker’s responsibility, Lalla implores the Divine to rid her of the longing for transcendence, and also of the mandate to care for the spiritual well-being of others. Contemplating her own death, she uses the imagery of the Hindu funeral: the procession, attended by crowds of mourning votaries; the body laid on its right side, with its head towards the south, which is the auspicious home of gods and angels, the quarter whose guardian or dik-pāla is Yama, the Lord of Death.

  29. K. Pr: 150

  naphsüy myônu chuy hostuy, ȧmi hȧsti mongunam gari gari bai

  This poem invokes a terrifying vision of the unregenerate self as an insatiably hungry elephant: one that must be fed hourly if it is to be kept out of mischief. The speaker builds on the belief, common to the Hindu, Buddhist and Jaina traditions, that human birth is relatively rare; so that there are comparatively few of these tuskers in existence, or else they would have destroyed the universe with their rampaging desires. Significantly, though, the word that designates ‘soul’ in this poem is the Perso-Arabic naphs, which is also used colloquially and in the Unani medical system to mean pulse, subtle breath or true nature: its use clearly identifies poem 29 as a contribution to the LD corpus from a source oriented towards Sufi practice. In the Koran, the naphs is regarded as the lower or bestial nature, which the higher nature must refine, neutralise and overcome through a process of self-purification involving meditation, prayer, rigorous psychological analysis and a turning away from the gratifications of the material world. In the teachings of Kashmir’s Rishi order, as epitomised in the śruks of Nund Rishi, naphs can mean both ‘self’ and ‘ego’: the aspirant is constantly urged to purify his naphs, to polish it like a mirror so that it can reflect the glory of transcendent knowledge.

  30. K: 3

  talu chuy zyus tay pěṭhu chuk natsān

  In this poem, Lalla satirises those who have devoted themselves to sensual pleasures, to the dance and the feast: but death will put an end to the feast, and the dance of life unfolds above the abyss of extinction.

  31. G: 83 | K: 9

  gāṭulwāh akh wuchum bǒcha-sūty marān

  Lalla expresses, in this poem, her exasperation in the face of the world’s inexplicable cruelty and manifest injustice, the transience of all that was loved and cherished: a wise man may die of hunger; a cook may be brutally mistreated by his whimsical master; the bright leaves of spring will be stripped off the trees in winter. And yet she both hates and loves this world, and hopes that a miraculous surgery of wisdom may sever the umbilical cord that keeps her attached to it.

  32. G: 96 | K: 10

  dȧmiy ḍiṭhüm nad wahawüñüy

  33. G: 97 | K: 11 | K. Pr: 47

  (variant incorporating elements of both 32 and 33) dȧmiy ḍiṭhüm güjü dazawüñüy

  These companion vākhs offer testimony to the transitory character of the world in a manner that is visually arresting: indeed, the poems develop as visual sequences edited at a pace that we would recognise as contemporary, more cinematic than imagistic. In poem 32, the speaker first sees a stream, an impression erased by the image of a deluge, then a flowering bush, quickly replaced by the same bush denuded by winter. In poem 33, the speaker reports a flourishing hearth, then the erasure of the hearth, succeeded by a vision of Kunti, sometime queen of Hastinapur and mother of the royal Pāndava brothers, replaced seamlessly by a humble figure, the aunt of the potter’s wife. The last sequence refers to the episode in the Mahabharata when the five Pāndavas and their mother have been exiled by their cousins, the Kauravas, and spend part of that exile in disguise.

  In the canonical version of the Mahabharata, the princes camouflage themselves as poor Brahmins; in this version, they would appear to have disappeared into an artisanal milieu. It should be noted, in this context, that the reference to the potter’s wife may be a vestigial citation of the Tantric underground, whose nocturnal practices deliberately transgressed the caste lines of daytime society. Indeed, the potter’s wife is a key figure, acting as a liberating sexual partner to the yogi, in one of the forms of the circle sacrifice or chakra-yāga, which features among the secret rituals of the Kaula adepts of Kashmir (Dupuche 2003,128).

  34. K: 20

  ṭyǒṭh mǒdhur tay myūṭh zahr

  Lalla comments on the bewilderments of experience in this poem, and the deceptiveness of sensual impressions: one cannot even trust oneself. Only an adherence to one’s chosen purpose can help one navigate through life, sifting one’s true choices from the plenitude of illusions. At the end of this challenging road lies the city of redemption.

  35. G: 91

  Siddha-Māli! Siddhō! sěda kathan kan thāv

  36. G: 92

  brōṭh-köli āsan tithiy kēran

  In these two poems, Lalla predicts the shape of things to come, and it is not encouraging. She laments the loss of more innocent and serene times, and foresees the coming of disasters: deprivation faces the children to come; changes in the weather pattern will play havoc with the fruiting seasons; mothers and daughters will join each other in consorting with strangers. Semaphoric of social unrest, Lalla’s prognostications in poems 35 and 36 find disturbing fulfilment in the continuing turbulence in contemporary Kashmir, with its lethal combination of insurgency, low-intensity proxy warfare, militant terror and State repression.

  37. G: 22

  děn tshězi ta razan āsē


  Lalla, as a fully realised yogini, testifies here to the expansion of consciousness that she experiences: the conventional distinction between bright day and dark night collapses, and the night finds its own luminosity; the horizon fades away, so that the earth loses its boundaries and merges with the sky. The resplendent new moon, symbolic of the awakened mind, swallows Rahu, the demon of eclipse, instead of being swallowed by him; the finest way of worshipping Shiva is not through rituals and observances, but through the knowledge-radiant mind (Singh 1979c, 103–05).

  38. G: 102 | K: 105

  Lal bǒh drāyěs kapasi-pōshěcě sütsüy

  39. G: 103 | K: 106

  dǒbi yěli chövünas dǒbi-kañě-pěṭhạy

  The interpretation of these exquisite and poignant companion vākhs has varied considerably. While Grierson favours an account of ‘various stages towards the attainment of knowledge . . . metaphorically indicated’ (1920, 1 14), Jaishree Kak treats these poems as evidence of Lalla’s ‘trials and tribulations [as] a woman in mediaeval society’, ‘her awareness of the social construction of gender’, ‘the shredding of [her] old identity’, and her transcendence of ‘the socially defined ‘feminine’ self, which she experiences as oppressive’ (2007, 5–7).

  As I read it, Lalla’s hope of blooming like the cotton flower incarnates the wish to attain the state that the mystics call sahaja in Sanskrit, or sahaz in Kashmiri: the awareness of one’s true nature, the reality concealed by the world of appearances. This is not, however, a wish easily granted: before that, her body-centred consciousness, her sense of personality, must be beaten out of her. The imagery of these poems is that of violent, even brutal transformation: the seeker is torn and shredded, spun out into fine filaments, hung on the loom, woven, pounded, washed and cut to measure. The bodied self that she was is taken apart completely and subjected to remaking: it is only by suffering this process that she can ‘find the road to heaven’.

  The various artisans who are the protagonists of these poems—the cleaner, the carder, the spinning woman, the weaver, the washerman and the tailor—are all agents of transcendence. I would see them as guru, master or teacher figures, or as those mysterious ‘helpers’, demigods or guardian angels assigned by God to protect the seeker-hero or -heroine, who populate fables and wisdom stories across the world. Instructively, given my speculations about the trans-caste character of mediaeval Kashmir’s Tantric underground, these pivotal catalyst figures in the process of spiritual evolution are all drawn from the labouring castes.

  40. G: 66 | K: 16

  tsarmun tsaṭith ditith pȧni pānas

  Lalla derides the individual who is attached to the pleasures of the flesh, satirising the body as a mere hide, a dead possession. By contrast, she asks why he has not sown seeds that would bring in a harvest, the blessing of life and prosperity. As a teacher, Lalla often demarcates the limits of instruction, realistically defining the act of dispelling incorrigible folly as wasted effort. Here, as images of wasted effort, she deploys the ball that rebounds when thrown at a gatepost, and the absurd feeding of an ox with jaggery, which is correctly fed to a cow to increase her milk.

  41. K: 59

  mūḍō kriy chay na dārun ta pārun

  In the same vein as poem 40, Lalla rebukes the fool who goes to extremes, believing he can find salvation by praying formulaically or wasting his life in the pursuit of voluptuary enjoyment. ‘Focus on the Self’ is her recommendation.

  42. K: 50

  kavu chukh divān anine batsh

  Lalla remonstrates, in this poem, with the individual who seeks the Divine everywhere, without being able to see that enlightenment lurks in every corner of the universe: such a seeker is effectively blind to illumination, but Lalla proposes to shake him free of delusion.

  43. G: 37 | K: 51

  pawan pūrith yusu ani wagi

  The bridling of the breath or pūraka is a Yogic technique, and an essential element of prāṇāyāma, the discipline of the body’s vital breaths, which is an important step in the journey towards union with the Divine. One who has mastered this technique is liberated from hunger and thirst; he will be born again, only to release himself from the cycle of birth and death.

  44. G: 29 | K: 76

  sahazas shěm ta dam nō gatshi

  In this crisp, no-nonsense poem, Lalla teaches that enlightenment cannot be achieved if the seeker merely practices asceticism as routine rather than as inspired practice. He will accomplish nothing if the fervency of his desire for transcendence is not matched by the strenuous effort of understanding and modulating the body’s latencies, and the mastery of the techniques of right mindfulness. A simulation can never substitute for the reality or desired achievement that it simulates.

  45. G: 49 | K: 86

  mal wǒndi zôlum

  While all of Lal Děd’s vākhs are inherently and intensely autobiographical to a considerable degree, dwelling more on the rhythm of the spiritual journey than on the details of personal life, some of her poems can dwell on specific moments of experience: peak experiences during which the distinction between the personal and the spiritual life is dissolved, and when, so to speak, the spiritual becomes the personal for the questor, and no longer a matter of textual learning or abstraction. In poem 45, the vibrancy of her voice edged with violent feeling, Lalla describes how she purified her consciousness, refined her reason, senses and emotions, cultivated patience and humility, and so received the gift of illumination at the door of the Self. Only after going through this transfiguring experience did she become truly known as Lalla, and her reputation spread.

  46. G: 31 | K: 100

  makuras zan mal tsolum manas

  Similar in spirit to poem 45, this poem celebrates the cleaning of the ‘doors of perception’, in William Blake’s memorable phrase. With her mind’s mirror cleansed of all dirt, Lalla became known as a votary of the Divine, a mystic with teachings to communicate. And yet, she became more aware than ever of how her individual personality was as nothing before the sublime majesty of the Divine.

  47. G: 105 | K: 88

  polu zūni wǒthith motu bōlanôwum

  Lalla plays among personae in this poem: she is the madwoman, and she is the one who brings ease to the madwoman with the love of God. She awakens and joins with the Loved One, who is the Self: this process of union marks the falling away of all karmic defilements and the attainment of an indescribable clarity of being.

  48. G: 104 | K: 92

  sütsüsas na sātas pütsüsas na rumas

  Poem 48 is characterised, as many of the vākhs are, by violent imagery. Lalla begins by recalling her own doubts about her poetry, despite which she ‘gulped down the wine’ of her vākhs. These manifestos of illumination gave her the strength to face the demons and monsters haunting her own soul, the ‘darkness inside’ that she confronts and does battle with, in the spirit of Jacob wrestling all night with the Angel in the Old Testament, or Gilgamesh battling Humbaba, or Greek heroes such as Perseus and Jason fighting various dragons to liberate the imprisoned young woman or the hidden treasure symbolising emancipatory wisdom held in reserve. Significantly, Lalla’s choices of verb are physical, visceral, robust and redolent of the hero’s quest: she wrestles with the darkness inside herself, knocks it down, claws at it, rips it to shreds.

  49. G: 25 | K: 93

  shě wan tsaṭith shěshi-kal wuzüm

  50. K: 75

  loluki vǒkhalu wālinj piśim

  I have clustered, as poems 49–56, vākhs in which Lalla elaborates a number of interrelated metaphors that refer closely to Yogic techniques of breath control. In poem 49, the journey through the six forests and the waking up of an inner moon refer to the yogini’s practice of raising her kuṇḍalinī energy through six chakras or centres of energy within the body, charted broadly along the spine, and then further up to the sahasrāra, the nectar moon associated with the brain. Once the six chakras have been mastered, the initiate masters the art of looking at and past the material
universe. And once the inner moon has been activated, the vital breaths within the body modulated into coordination, the body’s energies brought into harmony, and the self impelled by the love of the Divine, the yogini becomes completely absorbed in Shiva, who is invoked here as Shěnkar or Shankara.

  Poem 50 caroms off the closing images of poem 49, with Lalla recounting, in her vigorous way, how she pestled her heart in love’s mortar, then roasted and ate it: overflowing love for the Divine actually achieves a productive restraint over passion, and yet Lalla is assailed by momentary doubt. After this sacrifice of the self at the altar of the Self, will the questor live or die: meaning, will her life continue as before or will it be radically transformed?

  51. G: 82 | K: 94

  ōṁ-kār yěli layě onum

  Poem 51 opens with an account of a Yogic exercise, clearly including an element of pratyāhāra, the stopping-up of sensory inputs and the repetition of the primal syllable Om, until the rhythms of the body’s vital breaths have been harmonised at a pitch of radiant intensity. The six roads in poem 51 refer to the six chakras, previously visualised as six forests in poem 50, while the seventh road is the highest of the chakras, the nectar moon. The experience of arriving at the Field of Light, prakāshě-sthān in Kashmiri, is identical with that of uniting with Shiva described in poem 50: the transcendence of the self and the recognition of unity with the Self.