Resurrection

20.5x28.5 inches; Pen drawing on handmade paper with watercolour wash (Click on image to enlarge)

‘As a man abandons his worn-out clothes and acquires new ones, so when the body is worn out a new one is acquired by the Self, who lives within.’

- Bhagavat Gita, Hinduism

Lament

28.5x20.5 inches; Pen drawing on handmade paper with watercolour wash (Click on image to enlarge)

‘If you love me,’ you said,
‘You will want me for me!’
‘If I love you,’ I said,
‘You will love me for me!’

What remained unsaid
Were the threads unseen
Which sew the wounds,
Built the bridges,
Webbed the blanket
Shielding me from me,
You from you
Lost on the way
Trying to keep alive
A myth called ‘We’.

‘You are no more,’ you lament
‘The one I knew and loved!’
‘I am no more,’ I admit
‘Me!’

- Rudra Kishore Mandal

The Ventriloquist

20.5x28.5 inches; Pen drawing on handmade paper with watercolour wash (Click on image to enlarge)

Play with me

Come, pull the string…

Speak through me

You can hear me sing.

Limelight’s on me

You put me there.

When I’ll take over

You’ll cease to be here.

You think you’re strong?

The one in control?

The tables will turn,

With the drum on the roll.

You will call me a monster,

I was moulded by you.

You’ll play the victim

And ask, ‘who’s playing who?’

- Rudra Kishore Mandal

Redemption

28.5x20.5 inches; Pen drawing on handmade paper with watercolour wash (Click on image to enlarge)

Wonder, from these thousands of 'me',

which one am I?

Listen to my cry; do not drown my voice

I am completely filled with the thought of you.

Don't lay broken glass on my path

I will crush it into dust.

I am nothing, just a mirror in the palm of your hand,

reflecting your kindness, your sadness, your anger.

If you were a blade of grass or a tiny flower

I will pitch my tent in your shadow.

Only your presence revives my withered heart.

You are the candle that lights the whole world

and I am an empty vessel for your light.

- Rumi, Sufi Mystic

The Awakening

20.5x28.5 inches; Pen drawing on handmade paper with watercolour wash (Click on image to enlarge)

SOLD. In private collection

I am neither formed nor unformed, for I have always been here.

I am neither delusion nor actuality, for I have always been here.

I am neither of light nor of darkness, for I have always been here.

I am the Bliss, I am the Truth, I am the Boundless Sky.

How can I speak of having desires or not having desires?

How can I speak about attachment or non-attachment?

How can I speak about God as being real or unreal?

I am the Bliss, I am the Truth, I am the Boundless Sky.

(…)

It is neither solid nor subtle.

Neither appearing nor disappearing.

It is without beginning, middle, or end.

It is neither above nor below.

This is the secret of the Ultimate Truth.

I am the Bliss, I am the Truth, I am the Boundless Sky.

(…)

Dear one, I am neither unknowable nor hidden.

I am neither imperceivable nor lost.

I am neither near nor far.

I am the Bliss, I am the Truth, I am the Boundless Sky.

(…)

I have no actions that bring regret or misery.

I have no thoughts that bring pain or suffering.

I have no sense of "me" or "mine."

I am the Bliss, I am the Truth, I am the Boundless Sky.

- Avadhuta Gita, Hinduism

Ego

20.5x28.5 inches; Pen drawing on handmade paper with watercolour wash (Click on image to enlarge)

SOLD. In private collection

In psychoanalysis, Ego is the division of the psyche that is conscious, most immediately controls thought and behaviour, and is most in touch with external reality. It is custom developed for each one of us individuals, as it feeds on the data it receives form the environment it grows in! All our actions and reactions are triggered by this ego! As Sigmund Freud pointed out ‘Analysis does not set out to make pathological reactions impossible, but to give the patient's ego freedom to decide one way or another.’ Ego is also an identification of the self, especially as distinct from the world and other selves. Ego can also be an appropriate pride in oneself; self-esteem. But, when this understanding of the self or the pride goes out of realistic bounds of human nature and becomes an exaggerated sense of self-importance it turns to conceit. The question is ‘How much is that much?’ When can we judge that the boundaries have been breached between self-esteem and conceit? And isn’t being judgemental a sure sign of the ego? In spirituality, the ego has been always the villain. As the 14th Dalai Lama said “The foundation of the Buddha's teachings lies in compassion, and the reason for practicing the teachings is to wipe out the persistence of ego, the number-one enemy of compassion.” So, Ego stands in the way of love, friendship, kindness and compassion; things that the soul craves. I have seen so many lives being ruined because ego becomes the master of the house. The ego is always hungry and the more you feed it the more the fire burns, until the self is obliterated. There is an ancient proverb, “It is the nature of the ego to take, and the nature of the spirit to share.” So, I guess it will be a good thing for all of us to decide whom to feed, the ego or the soul!

Apocalypse

20.5x28.5 inches; Pen drawing on handmade paper with watercolour wash (Click on image to enlarge)

Apocalypse (Greek: "lifting of the veil" or "revelation") is a term applied to the disclosure to certain privileged persons of something hidden from the majority of humankind. Today the term is often used to refer to Armageddon, also referred to as the end of the world, which may be a shortening of the phrase ‘apokalupsis eschaton’ which literally means "revelation at the end of the æon, or age". In the Christian tradition, 'The Apocalypse' refers in particular to the Book of Revelation, the last book of the Bible.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalypse

Apocalypse (noun)

– Very serious event resulting in great destruction and change

Source: http://dictionary.cambridge.org

Hinduism teaches us that nothing ever ends! It is an unending cycle! When something ends, it does so with the sole purpose to pave the way for a new beginning!

Heavy stuff I know! Yet it is very simple. I looked this word up (It was like a freaky premonition!) while tripping at the state of everything ‘Global’, which our world is supposed to be evolving into, and worked myself up into a state of frenzy, alarmed! Alarmed, at the increasing menace of ‘Global Warming’ and more at the rate at which the so called ‘Globalization’ is eating into independent minded nations like ours, dissolving our value systems while injecting their own, erasing our cultural footprints while imprinting theirs, utilizing our cheap labor and fueling our consumerist greed! That’s not Globalization, that’s getting mind fucked! It is misinterpreting Globalization and making it into a villainous plot for world domination! We are not becoming members of the global village, we are becoming irresponsible zombies, or even better third rate clones! Our Identities are at stake. We are molding ourselves and our needs to ape certain human specimens whom we have ordained as benchmarks of evolved beings, and making ourselves believe in the need to buy a Ferrari which has no real utility on our roads, because either the roads have a hundred potholes and clogged with flood water or eternal traffic jams! Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against evolving or adopting practices from other cultures which can make us better human beings, but I have a problem aping other cultures and trying to prove to the world that, we were born with it! I have a problem compromising our Identity just to fit in! I have a problem with the reckless rape of human values at the hands of demand and supply! Globalization for me is all about living in harmony, helping each other better our living, so that the world becomes a better place for everyone and everything on it and still accepting and respecting each other’s differences! And I don’t see that happening! Is this what apocalypse looks like?

Unsung Lullaby

13.5x20.5 inches; Pen drawing on handmade paper with watercolour wash (Click on image to enlarge)

No one hears them weep, or rather sees their silent tears as they will themselves to sleep, to get lost in their dreams and shut out the chaos and high emotional drama playing outside the safety of their bed room door! The screams and moans become hard rock lullabies playing in a constant loop! Language crosses the barrier of decency! Such are the nights, spent in anxiety and escapism, of the rising number of children belonging to families which are defunct, abusive and riddled with domestic violence! The parents don’t notice anything because they are too busy with their egos, clashing! Their child becomes just another reason to hang on to a failed marriage, more of a curse than a gift. Fuses are running short, tempers are soaring! Compromise has become synonymous to love! I wonder, what kind of adult human beings are these children going to grow up into? Will they be able to love others? Will they grow up to be responsible and tolerant? Will they be able to build lasting bonds of family and friends? Will they ever grow up at all? Will they ever have a childhood, to begin with?