#shantih

[waitf]

"Every day, I walk. Whatever else the day may hold, I walk. Reassuringly, every walk starts the same way: with a single step. And then, the next: one foot in front of the other. It was not long ago that I felt that every step was a burden, rather than a blessing. This attitude, combined with my ongoing health challenges, made even a half-mile seem like a cruel and unnecessary gauntlet, every step promising a fresh jolt of agony. More often than not, I would be overwhelmed before I made it out of bed– much less the house– fully trapped in paralyzing spirals of pain and fear and self-pity. Luckily, I have been blessed with a glorious purpose: a dog, Shantih, who depends upon my twice daily commitment! In rain, sleet, or snow—even sometimes magnificent sunshine— we walked, and lo, the wonders abounded: the very essence of life waiting to be witnessed in every direction. Before my lowered gaze, the bounties of the earth unfolded: the patterns of seasons written in buds and blossoms and bold little saplings, in haphazard heaps of fallen leaves piled high on cubsides, in a lone pair of pawprints across a pristine blanket of undisturbed snow. My gaze often lingers on the treetops, every one a frozen explosion of life seeking light, all surging sunwards in idiosyncratic synchrony, their branches bursting with birdsong— every hour a fresh symphony — before falling fully into the cerulean brilliance that blankets the entire bright sky. There was no crowning moment of metamorphosis. It was, eventually, simply undeniable: step by step, I had been transformed. I still feel awful many mornings, still often find myself intimidated by the path of the day that stretches out before me...but I had realized I had proven something spectacular to myself, even moreso than the quotidian treasures that I had seen were always waiting. I had realized that any walk that I actually started, I always finished. So now, every day, I walk. And whenever I begin to over-stress and second-guess, I just recall that- every walk ends the very same way that every walk begins: with a single step "

#walking #dog #shantih #stepbystep #sebgillen #walkitoff #gratitude #consistency #Youtube

[suncitygirls]

A rat crept softly through the vegetation

Dragging its slimy belly on the bank

While I was fishing in the dull canal

On a winter evening round behind the gashouse

Musing upon the king my brother’s wreck

And on the king my father’s death before him.

#why bother saying anything when THE WASTE LAND already said it #shantih shantih shantih #etc

[asri1zdihl2zrd]

Yasumi la Potra en trio chupada de culo Luxurious blonde girl Karen bends over for rear fuck Big Tits Blonde Teen Step Sister Seduces Nerdy Brother Playing Video Games Bearded polar bear gets his fat dick sucked Cherry Kiss and Summer Rose welcome boyfriend into hardcore threesome محجبة تتناك من طيزها Sinful cutie feels bulky rod entering mouth, vagina, anal hole Curvy Slut Angela White Has Her Pussy Ruined Rocco Comedor socando forte na casada Husband and wife sex massage

#Ikeya-Seki #plumlike #abigailship #hoppestere #cooptation #sprackle #gruelled #catastrophically #dulocracy #monomorphous #refrainer #desiccation #sanctiloquent #subplant #palaeodictyopteron #apteria #fulsamic #shantihs #wrongdoings #medicotopographic

[ramayantika]

On my way to don a new body,

Yet something stops my path; an unknown feeling.

What is it?

Nostalgia of my old garment?

My previous form, such a wonderful companion, you had been.

You are lying on the ground. Serenity glazes over your face. There is peace all around.

Allow me to stare at you for the last time, my faithful companion.

So many memories, friends, family and foes,

A life of learning, love and also woes,

So many stories now to engrave themselves to dust,

For nothing lasts forever.

I do think about your foes. They are not mine. Yours.

Clouded by ego's veil, they were mine too, my foes and my woes.

A glance at your form reminds me of the end of my role,

I have to discard this costume away, also the story.

Foe or friend, all a part of the divine play on stage.

In the end, we are all actors of a great drama on a cosmic scale.

In wealth, riches, fame, jewels, and beauty, I have lived with you,

But the earth distinguishes none.

In all your riches and beauty, you are going to be one with the soil, your beauteous form fading.

Your tale would be a lovely bedtime story when I come back with a new body as a child.

I will show them dreams about you, hoping I learn from my deeds again,

Perhaps then, I shall merge with the Great Beloved, I belong to.

Shantih shantih shantih...

A heavenly voice speaks to me.

A flash of light blinds me and I am enveloped in blinding light,

I have to move on, act in a new story, don a new garb.

"Dearest, time again will bring you back to the one you seek the most. Until then, with faith and dedication, play the part reserved for you."

Shantih shantih shantih

******* ********* ******** ******* ********

This poem was written in 2021 for my poetry collection, The Soul's Poetry. I had to keep the collection halfway after writing down the suitable lessons and visions I so needed then for the present and the future. There are still more that I have learnt in the last two years, experienced some and seen again some marvellous mystic dreams that other wise feel to be straight out of a fantasy book.

As a young girl in first grade too, I would sometimes out of the blue ask myself why am I born as a girl? Why am I here? Why am I alive and what am I to do and other countless questions. Probably that's why from a young age, I had begun reading many hindu texts and stories. My mother jokes sometimes that I will become a saadhvi but I don't have plans to take sanyas like I have my own worldly wishes and goals too.

But... There's also this weird longing I cannot explain. It has been there since I was a child. Sometimes I find many answers and may aspects to myself through dance. Dance is my meditation and a way to connect to the divine for me.

There is this restlessness that manifests itself from time to time. Maybe I am going to find the answers to my questions soon. I don't know if I make sense to anyone when sometimes I am confused with myself.

These three years, I have lived in almost complete isolation. Books, me and sometimes some phone calls with relatives and friends from school. Probably these feelings these questions intensified themselves a lot more and that's why I no longer can relate to people from my previous schools.

I shall write more about it some other time. Idk if I have ever written something like this before here but yeah tumblr is a place to write and talk stuff I would not do with anyone until I find someone with whom I could anyway my mind is brrrrrr so I will take leave

#samridhi writes #poetry #indian poetry #desiblr

[estherdedlock]

I was reading this article in The New Yorker about the 100th anniversary of the publication of T.S. Eliot’s poem, “The Waste Land,” and there’s so much Secret History in here. Of course, Donna Tartt quotes the poem directly in the “Elizabeth and Leicester” scene on the lake at Francis’s country house. But this article made me see Eliot’s influence in less conspicuous ways.

Eliot:

“Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood,” he wrote, in an essay on Dante. “It is better to be spurred to acquire scholarship because you enjoy the poetry, than to suppose that you enjoy the poetry because you have acquired the scholarship.”

The Secret History:

“In very great poetry, the music often comes through even when one doesn’t know the language. I loved Dante passionately before I knew a word of Italian.”

Eliot:

I have heard the key Turn in the door once and turn once only

The Secret History:

Gloomily, I thought of Monmouth House: empty corridors, old gas-jets, the key turning in the lock of my room.

Eliot:

“You gave me hyacinths first a year ago; They called me the hyacinth girl.”

The Secret History:

She was still a girl...a slight lovely girl whose hair smelled like hyacinth...

Especially significant when it comes to the death of one slow-witted college boy who couldn’t keep his mouth shut, the famous opening line from “The Waste Land”:

April is the cruellest month

And the poem’s very last words:

Shantih   shantih   shantih

Eliot says in his own “Notes on The Waste Land” that these are “a formal ending to an Upanishad.” Which of course reminds me of Henry’s choice of reading matter at Bunny’s funeral:

  “I was reading,” he said.   “What is it? Something good?”   “The Upanishads.”

I’m sure there are hundreds of references and influences in The Secret History that I will never catch, but of one thing I’m certain: nothing in this book, not even the most random-seeming detail, is here by chance. That’s how you know you’re in the presence of genius.

#the secret history #donna tartt #t.s. eliot #the waste land #the new yorker

[bala5]

[daimonclub]

100 very brilliant quotes

100 very brilliant quotes 100 very brilliant quotes, a collection of very famous aphorisms by great authors of all time to give you some deep words of wisdom for your important life. Men are almost as good to the dead as they are wicked to the living. Anonymous When all think alike, then no one is thinking. Walter Lippmann If a man knows more than others, he becomes lonely. Carl Jung A person should not be too honest. Straight trees are cut first and honest people are screwed first. Chanakya Miserable is that love that needs words to express itself. Carl William Brown Education isn't something you can finish. Isaac Asimov Knowing yourself is The best fighterthe beginning of all wisdom. Aristotle People almost invariably arrive at their beliefs not on the basis of proof but on the basis of what they find attractive. Blaise Pascal To tyrannize for the country is to tyrannize over the country. Rabindranath Tagore An empire founded by war has to maintain itself by war. Montesquieu Man conquers the world by conquering himself. Zeno of Citium Politics has no relation to morality. Niccolò Macchiavelli There is no better way of elevating the novel than by making it into a construct which contains ideas. Heinrich Mann No artist tolerates reality. Friedrich Nietzsche In humorous religion, contrary to other cults, one can sometimes also blaspheme, certainly not in public, but only when one is praying in solitude. Carl William Brown A sadist. A paranoid psychopath with a delusion of greatness and overvalued ideas. Pathological liar. Self esteem is inadequate. Intelligence is low. His personality is deteriorating rapidly. Lives in a parallel world, detached from reality, completely out of touch with reality. He doesn’t understand her. Valery Novodvorska He (Paracelsus) was the first man to write scientific books in the language of common people, so that all could read them. Manly P. Hall There are no nations! There is only humanity. And if we don't come to understand that right soon, there will be no nations, because there will be no humanity. Isaac Asimov Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly. Charles Addams Insisting on calling Tsar, the miserable Putrid, clearly highlights the slavish imbecility of many journalists around the world, and certainly makes them more morons than what the great Shakespeare would rightly have called, “a poor capocchia”. Carl William Brown

Carl Jung brilliant quote Better to be that which we destroy than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy. William Shakespeare The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge. Daniel J. Boorstin To write well, express yourself like the common people, but think like a wise man. Aristotle When a man is a prey to his emotions, he is not his own master. Baruch Spinoza However much you deny the truth, the truth goes on existing. Geroge Orwell If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things. Rene Descartes As iron is eaten away by rust, so the envious are consumed by their own passion. Antisthenes To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment. Ralph Waldo Emerson DA Datta, DA Dayadhvam, DA Damyata, shantih, shantih, shantih! (Give, sympathize, control, peace, peace, peace). T.S. Eliot Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made. Immanuel Kant No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money. Quote me as saying I said that, and you may be sure of having the authorship of it. Samuel Johnson Intellect is invisible to the man who has none. Arthur Schopenhauer We think too much and feel too little. Charlie Chaplin Be bad, but at least don't be a liar, a deceiver. Lev Tolstoy Happiness is the meaning and purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence. Aristotle To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all. Oscar Wilde The painful sarcastic bitter parable of life. At the beginning you are born alone and in the end you will die alone, but in the middle you are going to meet an incredible number of blighter! Carl William Brown All truths that are kept silent become poisonous. Friedrich Nietzsche Strongest minds are often those whom the noisy world hears least. William Wordsworth You can also commit injustice, by doing nothing. Marcus Aurelius

The happiest people We're born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we're not alone. Orson Wells There are people so addicted to exaggeration that they actually can't tell the truth without lying. Josh Billings At the end of the day, we can endure much more than we think. Frida Khalo Books, we know, Are a substantial world, both pure and good; Round these, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood, Our pastime and our happiness will grow. William Wordsworth The nearer a man comes to a calm mind, the closer he is to strength. Marcus Aurelius It is better to die misunderstood than to spend your life explaining yourself. Carl William Brown If this science, which will bring great benefits to man, will not help man to understand himself, it will end up turning against man. Giordano Bruno Better than the strength of men and horses is our wisdom. Xenophanes Religion is the masterpiece of the art of animal training, because it trains people what to think. Arthur Schopenhauer The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge. Daniel J. Boorstin Unfortunately our planet is more and more full of increasingly empty men, to quote Eliot, shapeless figures, colorless shadows, not souls, lost and violent, but only, empty men, stuffed men, created by the taxidermists of stupidity. Carl William Brown To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment. Ralph Waldo Emerson Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made. Immanuel Kant No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money. Quote me as saying I said that, and you may be sure of having the authorship of it. Samuel Johnson Tell me what you know, and I shall know what manner of person you are, or if you do not know. Ralph Waldo Emerson It is safer to be silent than to reveal one’s secret to any one, and telling him not to mention it. Saadi Ci sono delle persone così povere che l'unica cosa che hanno sono i soldi. Madre Teresa di Calcutta The more I think about it, the more I realize there is nothing more artistic than to love others. Vincent Van Gogh There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. Soren Kierkegaard You can kill a man, but you can't kill an idea. Sophocles He who laughs at himself never runs out of things to laugh at. Epictetus Humor is next to Godliness. Sinclair Lewis, Mantrap La tradizione è la componente statica della cultura, ma l'essere umnano è una macchina termodinamica fatta per muoversi. Carl William Brown Every man is a creature of the age in which lives and few are able to raise themselves above the ideas of time. Voltaire Il conflitto tra Russia e Ukraina è una guerra fratricida che non dimostra altro che l'imbecillità delle sue cause e del suo principale fautore, ovvero il penoso presidente Putrid. Carl William Brown

Nietzsche brilliant quote Man conquers the world by conquering himself. Zeno of Citium A person should not be too honest. Straight trees are cut first and honest people are screwed first. Chanakya So you see, the universe is made up by protons, electrons, neutrons and morons. Anonymous All truths that are kept silent become poisonous. Friedrich Nietzsche On the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom. Michel de Montaigne If you can laugh at yourself, then there are few things you couldn't laugh at. Carl William Brown If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need. Marcus Tullius Cicero We are a society of notoriously unhappy people: lonely, anxious, depressed, destructive, dependent - people who are glad when we have killed the time we are trying so hard to save. Erich Fromm How could you rise anew, if you have not first became ashes. Friedrich Nietzsche Many are helpful, none are essential, but most are of little use at all. Carl William Brown But if the radiant light that once shone is now forever removed from my gaze, if nothing can cause the grass to renew its splendor and revive the flower, we will not sleep over the baleful fate, but even more steadfast in chest we will enjoy what is left. William Wordsworth It is a strange desire, to seek power and to lose liberty: or to seek power over others, and to lose power over a man’s self. Francis Bacon When people do not ignore what they should ignore, but ignore what they should not ignore, this is known ignorance. Chuang Tzu I'm not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you. Friedrich Nietzsche Freethinkers are those who are willing to use their minds without prejudice and without fearing to understand things that clash with their own customs, privileges, and beliefs. This state of mind is not common, but it is essential for right thinking. Leo Tolstoy It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain thought without accepting it. Aristotle You meet saints everywhere. They can be anywhere. They are people behaving decently in an indecent society. Kurt Vonnegut The more I live, the more I think that humor is the saving sense. Jacob August Riis Life is such a great teacher that when you don’t learn a lesson, It will repeat it. Anonymous Wealth is the slave of a wise man. The master of a fool. Seneca The challenges you face introduce you to your strengths. Epictetus Respond intelligently even to unintelligent treatment. Sun Tzu A well-educated mind will always have more questions than answers. Helen Keller The first and main erogenous zone is the mind. Richard Alan Miller If everyone is thinking alike, than someone isn't thinking. Gen. Geroge Patton

The best fighter Prejudices are what fools use for reason. Voltaire When in doubt tell the truth. It will confound your enemies and astound your friends. Mark Twain The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion. Albert Camus To acquire knowledge, one must study; but to acquire wisdom, one must observe. Marilyn vos Savant What is the difference between a convinced and a deceived? None, if he has been well deceived. Friedrich Nietzsche There are two tragedies in life. One is not to get your hearts desire. The other is to get it. George Bernard Shaw Don't walk in front of me... I may not follow. Don't walk behind me... I may not lead. Walk beside me... just be my friend. Albert Camus Don't worry about siding for or against the majority. Worry about taking up any of their irrational beliefs. Marcus Aurelius What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love. Fyodor Dostoevsky Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility. Sigmund Freud Death comes equally to us all, and makes us all equal when it comes. John Donne No tree, it is said, can grow to heaven, unless its roots reach down to hell. Carl Jung The worst kind of pain do not come from your enemies, but from the people who you trust and love. Anonymous Don't miss these similar articles: 100 best quotes and aphorisms 100 magnificent quotes and aphorisms 100 brilliant quotes and aphorisms 100 famous quotes and aphorisms 100 memorable quotes and aphorisms 100 top great quotes and aphorisms 100 excellent quotes and aphorisms 100 great quotes and aphorisms on Love Great and famous philosophy quotes Quotes by authors Quotes by arguments Thoughts and reflections Read the full article

#aphorisms #Aristotle #artist #belief #brilliant #Brown #Camus #Donne #Dostoevsky #Dr.Johnson #Education #Eliot #Emerson #Freud #inspirational #Jung #Kant #Montaigne #Montesquieu #motivational #philosophy #Politics #quote #quotes #Shakespeare #Shaw #wisdom #Wise #Wordsworth

[litteratured]

TS Eliot :: The Waste Land

"The Waste Land", by T.S. Eliot, is widely regarded as "one of the most important poems of the 20th century" and a central text in Modernist poetry. Published in 1922, the 434-line poem first appeared in the United Kingdom in the October issue of The Criterion and in the United States in the November issue of The Dial. It was published in book form in December 1922. Among its famous phrases are "April is the cruellest month", "I will show you fear in a handful of dust", and the mantra in the Sanskrit language "Shantih shantih shantih" 

Compltete text: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47311/the-waste-land

(via Rob Chapman)

#youtube #ts eliot #the waste land #modernist poetry #1922

[papyrusandpaints]

365 Days, 365 Prayers - Day 17:

*

ॐ सर्वेश्वर स्वस्तिर्भवतु ।

सर्वेषां शान्तिभवतु ।

सर्वेषां पूर्णभवतु ।

सर्वेषां म्गलंभवतु ।

ॐ शांतिः शांतिः शांतिः ॥

*

Sarvesham Svastir-Bhavatu

Sarvesham Shantir-Bhavatu

Sarvesham Poornam-Bhavatu

Sarvesham Mangalam-Bhavatu

Om Shanti Shanti Shantih!

*

May there be an abundance of well-being in all,

May there be an abundance of peace in all,

May there be an abundance of fulfillment in all,

May there be an abundance of auspiciousness in all,

Peace! Peace! Peace!

*

🙏❤️

[beautifulfaceuglysoul]

Dear life,

I am 28 now.

When I was here I was 20 and lost.

Now I am 28 and lost.

Sometimes I feel like when I was 20 I had more balls. More balls to not give a fuck. I was insecure, but there was a certain secureness around the insecurity. I had a certain drive to live, an inner fire.

Now I feel I am stuck in my head sometime.

The fire is burning lower, I am constantly thinking, what would others think of me, I have trouble being completely ME, being completely FREE.

Alcohol used to help me release that wall around. But hey we said goodbye to that friend for this time on the journey. So we have to do it alone with all the pains

So yes dear life.

This is how it can go…

You are a 20 year old business student thinking you would work a corporate job and live a life in a city, studying graduating working, having fun in the weekends and being in a relationship

And yet here she was,

A 28-year old free soul. Roaming around the world. Roaming around India. Having no job, just this body. And this experience.

Mama india taking care of me and messing with me, showing me all my insecurities, all my dark sides, pointing me towards: here, you go here, you hate yourself there, so you can love yourself there, hopefully (still figuring this out).

So.. here we go again.

To this life I am living now.

To a time of breathing through it,

Through my depression

My anxiety

Through my sadness.

Om shantih.

#me

#me

[pharmanormal]

🍉

In every wars, the victims were always the same. It's people who have nothing to do with politics.

Both leaders should be blamed. The conflict is a stalemate ever since it ever happened. But those in power kept making things worse instead of thinking of the innocent lives they sacrifice.

Everyone in power is wrong. They never calculate the consequences of their actions that cost innocent people who just want to live life peacefully. No one wants to be born in a war-torn country.

And it's ironic to see people finally care about what happens to Gaza when it has happened since a long time ago.

And yes, some contries whom you hold so dearly are supporting Israel. Why? It is their national interest. That is how politics works. There never will be a pure humanitarian interest in UN. There is only a country's interest. EU is very vocal about human right but of course, some of the members choose to abstain. Why? They have an interest to protect related to Israel and USA. That's how politics works. I stand with Palestine, but I hate Hamas stupid timing and strategy.

Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu.

Aum Shantih Shantih Shantih Aum.

#🍉 #palestine #genocide

[shininglightofthehorizon]

Have You Ever Pondered on Celebrating the Dashami or Dussehra with Dante, Tagore and Botticelli?

Perhaps the Mother Goddess, while she leaves for her Abode in Mt. Kailash, leaves behind her blessings….her Grace opens up many portals for transport of pure divine energy (double q-loop) ….we could start a new movement – an idea , a seed that blossoms into a lotus 🪷 a pure emblem of love and peace….shantih shantih shantih Dante- Tagore -Botticelli

View On WordPress

#beauty #divinecomedy #sandrobotticelli #Art #Awareness #Brahman #Dante #Tagore

[sebgillen]

Every day, I walk. Whatever else the day may hold, I walk. Reassuringly, every walk starts the same way: with a single step. And then, the next: one foot in front of the other. It was not long ago that I felt that every step was a burden, rather than a blessing. This attitude, combined with my ongoing health challenges, made even a half-mile seem like a cruel and unnecessary gauntlet, every step promising a fresh jolt of agony. More often than not, I would be overwhelmed before I made it out of bed– much less the house– fully trapped in paralyzing spirals of pain and fear and self-pity. Luckily, I have been blessed with a glorious purpose: a dog, Shantih, who depends upon my twice daily commitment! In rain, sleet, or snow—even sometimes magnificent sunshine— we walked, and lo, the wonders abounded: the very essence of life waiting to be witnessed in every direction. Before my lowered gaze, the bounties of the earth unfolded: the patterns of seasons written in buds and blossoms and bold little saplings, in haphazard heaps of fallen leaves piled high on cubsides, in a lone pair of pawprints across a pristine blanket of undisturbed snow. My gaze often lingers on the treetops, every one a frozen explosion of life seeking light, all surging sunwards in idiosyncratic synchrony, their branches bursting with birdsong— every hour a fresh symphony — before falling fully into the cerulean brilliance that blankets the entire bright sky. There was no crowning moment of metamorphosis. It was, eventually, simply undeniable: step by step, I had been transformed. I still feel awful many mornings, still often find myself intimidated by the path of the day that stretches out before me...but I had realized I had proven something spectacular to myself, even moreso than the quotidian treasures that I had seen were always waiting. I had realized that any walk that I actually started, I always finished. So now, every day, I walk. And whenever I begin to over-stress and second-guess, I just recall that- every walk ends the very same way that every walk begins: with a single step "

#Youtube

[denimbex1986]

'In his 1987 Nobel lecture, Joseph Brodsky said, anthropologically speaking, a human being is primarily a creature of aesthetics, and only after, an ethical one.

This assertion sounds true in the case of J. Robert Oppenheimer. The scientific leaps in the field of quantum physics fascinated Oppenheimer. He was driven to follow the path of Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg. Returning from Cambridge to expand his research in Berkeley, he fell into the arms of the American state and became part of the Manhattan Project to develop an atomic bomb.

It is comic irony that Lewis Strauss, who secretly plotted against Oppenheimer, was forced to work as a shoe salesman during the recession, while Oppenheimer achieved the distinction of Edward Teller calling him, “the great salesman of science.” This explains the moral turn in the life of Oppenheimer. Christopher Nolan likened his character to the titan Prometheus, though midway he seemed to metamorphose into Frankenstein. The hamartia of Oppenheimer’s life, Aristotle’s term for the Greek tragic hero’s fatal flaw, turned into a modern horror story.

The poet Joseph Brodsky’s distinction becomes relevant at this point: Oppenheimer abandoned the moral for the aesthetic. My scholar friend (who wishes to remain unnamed) shared the opinion that Oppenheimer, initially lost in the beauty of pure theory, transforms that aesthetic obsession into a monstrous one. She added the sharp insight: “Oppenheimer tells himself a lie. That the bomb has a moral end.” The act of lying to oneself produced a psychic wound within Oppenheimer. He lost sight of the moral aspect within his aesthetic pursuit. The lie made the transformation possible. The sublime beauty of studying quantum physics was ruined the moment Oppenheimer decided to use his expertise for a detrimental cause.

The sale of his scientific skills to the American state for making the bomb had a clear political objective for Oppenheimer: to finish off Hitler. This logic led him to overcome the moral dilemma behind his job. Any force that can destroy evil is legitimate. The destructive power of science was a seductive option to nullify the power of fascism. The Jewish Oppenheimer did not have his revenge over the Nazis (who were already defeated when the bomb was ready). The American state used it against a weakened Japan to declare its omnipotence.

Young Oppenheimer’s interest in T.S. Eliot’s ‘The Wasteland’ and the Gita has a deep connection: Eliot’s poem ends by evoking the Upanishad, “Shantih shantih shantih”, a peace of the grave that fell upon a world torn apart by the end of World War I and the flu epidemic. Oppenheimer’s translation of the line from the Gita, “I am become Death, destroyer of worlds” was what Krishna said about his divinity being time itself that destroys the world at will. It was meant to exhort a weak-kneed Arjuna (who did not want to kill his cousins, seniors and kinsmen), reminding him of his duty as a warrior to prepare him for battle. The figure of divine incarnation and warrior-prince got fused into the scientist who invented a weapon that could kill millions.

Oppenheimer’s interest in the evocative moments in the two texts shows a certain death wish he carried within himself. When you are hell-bent to destroy the enemy, you are also out to kill a part of yourself through the act of retributive justice.

Oppenheimer was not able to distinguish between the ethical difference between annihilating a system of power and annihilating people. This failure, however, is an intimate part of the modern West’s history. It produced ideas of the state – fascism, communism and imperial democracies – where the other within and outside one’s ideological fold was demonised as the absolute enemy and was meant to be exterminated. Making the bomb to be used for war, Oppenheimer not just used science as a tool for destruction, but created an ideology of science as divine power that could kill uncountable numbers of people as much as it could heal the world.

It has been acknowledged that Nolan did not glorify war by not showing the bomb being dropped on the two Japanese cities. Still, as my scholar friend pointed out, Nolan could not prevent himself from indulging in Hollywood’s fetish for spectacle. There was a clear lack of self-restraint. The slow-motion explosion of the bomb that filled the screen numbed the audience, and engulfed it into the terror of its silence.

Contrast it with Abbas Kiarostami, who did not display the earthquakes that rocked Iran in Koker Trilogy in order to portray its psycho-social repercussion on the lives of residents who suffered its impact. Kiarostami’s art of filmmaking is deeply informed by his ethical hesitation.

Nolan had more reasons to hold back from depicting the technological grandeur of an instrument of death. The temptation to recreate the spectacle is not simply an aesthetic flaw.

The euphoria of the scientific feat was viscerally exhibited by bodies of people stomping the floor of the hall celebrating Oppenheimer. It announced the coming of a new crowd in world history that took nationalist pride in mass destruction of other people. Oppenheimer looked conflicted, remorseful and eaten by guilt. But there were no indications to suggest he completely regretted his success. Truman, embodying the masculine pragmatism of the American state, lampooned Oppenheimer as “crybaby”. No one cared about the real babies in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Such is the moral indifference of war. It causes deafness of the soul.'

#Abbas Kiarostami #Koker Trilogy #Christopher Nolan #J. Robert Oppenheimer #T.S Eliot #The Waste Land #Bhagavad Gita #Niels Bohr #Lewis Strauss #Werner Heisenberg #The Manhattan Project #Hiroshima #Nagasaki

[iamsanjivk]

The heart has been completely ignored; society does not need it. It is the need of the individual and society does not need even individuals, it needs only personalities. It needs bogus people, obedient, always ready to follow the order, always ready to be enslaved.

A man of heart is a man in revolt - revolt against anything that is ugly, revolt against anything that is simply mechanical. Society does not want individuals because they will create trouble. So from very childhood, it starts destroying individuality, and the best way to destroy the individuality is to let them pass around the heart, not through the heart. All our educational systems are managed in such a way so that you can move without ever being aware that you have a heart.

I am using the word 'compassion' because 'love' has become mechanical. Everybody is "loving" - it has lost its depth.

A woman said to her husband when the hero in the movie kissed the heroine very lovingly, very romantically... She said to the husband, "Look, you never do that to me."

The man said, "That is only a film, it is not reality. And moreover, who knows whether that man is married to somebody else or that woman is married to somebody else. About these actors nobody is certain - and anyway, it is all acting. Do you want me to act?"

The woman said, "I know the woman personally. She is married to the hero in actual life."

The man said, "My God, then the hero is really an actor. To be so loving and so romantic to your own wife... I cannot do it. It is too difficult..."

The moment you remember that it is your own wife and what are you doing... it looks as if you are doing something nasty.

The movies, the films, television, the poets and literature have all reduced and contaminated the word 'love' - polluted it and destroyed its beauty. That's why I am saying the heart has compassion.

Compassion is the purest love which gives and asks nothing in return. You don't have to renounce it. You have to go deeper into it. You have to become it. Because by becoming it, you will come closer to your being.

Osho: Om Shantih Shantih Shantih 🌸💙

#Osho.. naman

[versey21]

18th April

Waste Land Limericks by Wendy Cope

Eliot may be one of the titans of English literature but his opaque and pretentious verse is easily lampooned. Wendy Cope amusingly pokes fun at The Waste Land’s classical references and depressing urban imagery in a series of entertaining “limericks”, four of which follow below.

Source: Boston Area and Small Press Scene website

Waste Land Limericks

I

In April one seldom feels cheerful;

Dry stones, sun and dust make me fearful;

Clairvoyantes distress me,

Commuters depress me -

Met Stetson and gave him an earful.

II

She sat on an almighty fine chair

Sparks flew as she tidied her hair;

She asks many questions

I make few suggestions -

Bad as Albert and Lil - what a pair!

III

The Thames runs, bones rattle, rats creep;

Tiresias fancies a peep -

A typist laid,

A record is played -

Wei la la. After that it gets deep.

V

No water. Dry rocks and dry throats,

Then thunder, a shower of quotes

From the Sanskrit and Dante.

Da. Damyata. Shantih.

I hope you’ll make sense of the notes.

Cope’s mention of “the notes” at the end of her final limerick references Eliot’s Notes to The Waste Land which are famously indecipherable.

#poetry #wendy cope #ts eliot #the waste land #limericks