It's quite alright if you don't get the title, I didn't either. Well, that's what led to this blog entry anyway. If you do get it, well done!!
Have you ever felt like there's a 24*7 jukebox inside your head? Mine has one that obsesses over lyrics too.
A couple of days back, I happened to come across these wonderful Malayalam rap videos by Neeraj Madhav on YouTube. It's a set of three videos called Jungle speaks. Spread over these three songs, there are five animals that rap/sing about their lockdown perspective and give us a piece of their heart.
My favourite is Bobby the snake. Having gone to sleep listening to Bobby's woes one night, my head kept sending in "chakshushravana galasthamam darduram evide" every few minutes the next day. It was indeed part of the song. Hearing me murmur this on and on, my daughter replied "ivide und amma" more than once! (Thanks to this habit of mine, she is familiar with Bella Ciao too). Then my brain started digging up the meaning of this sentence. At first I assumed it means greenery pleasing to the eyes and ears which is not easily seen today and hence the snake questioning it.
Though chakshu means eyes and shravana means ears ( brain did it's duty digging up whatever Sanskrit I learnt in school), the rest of it was guesswork. Sort of like writing an essay for exam without having a clue about the actual question.
By the end of the day, curiosity got the better of me and I turned to google guru for help. After some search, I learnt that this is an excerpt from Thunjathezuthachan's Adhyatma Ramayanam. And it means a frog caught in a snake's throat. Though the blogger had gone on to explain the whole context philosophically, I was still not satisfied. Even if frog was 'darduram', where is the snake mentioned?? 'Galasthamam' must be something to do with throat.
After thinking and thinking, I decided to message my friend for help. She did her share of googling and listening to the songs too. All this happened super late at night. But of course you can count on your new-mommy friend to be up at odd times to help with finding the meaning of tough malayalam words. So the search went on. I started reading Ayodhya Kandam of Ramayanam all the while chanting, "chakshu shravana galasthamam darduram evide??"
Finally my friend laid the last bit of that puzzle. So chakshushravanan is another name for snake! One who hears with his eyes. But of course. What a beautiful way of describing that mighty being! Meanwhile, I found the entire stanza of the poetry and its meaning. Here you go if you are interested, a small summary as I understand it -
The duration of our life is as little as the time taken for a droplet of water that falls on a hot piece of metal to evaporate. Still, our soul searches for material desires like a frog that tries to catch a fly even while it's halfway down the throat of a snake.
Finally, mind at peace, I listened to Bobby's tale once again and went to sleep.
If you would like to know more about the poem, this is part of Lakshamanopadesham in Ayodhyakandam. ( http://rajathathas.blogspot.com/2012/06/aodhya-kandam.html?m=1 )
Do check out Junglespeaks videos on YouTube! Rest of the lyrics are more colloquial. And also 'Panipali' if sleep evades you too.
