Green
Dove in the Shrine:
Ecoconcerns in
Stephen Gill’s Shrine
environment.” ~
Stephen Gill, Shrine 24
Surfeit of critical materials and review articles on
Stephen Gill’s poetic oeuvre calibrate the poet behind the poems as an apostle
of peace, a harbinger of love and a propagandist of universal harmony.
Naturally, Stephen Gill, originating from that part of
An Ecocritical
reading of Gill’s poems suggest that there is an underpinning concern for the
earth, the environment, and the nature.
Stephen Gill is very much prophetic in this regard. What is striking in Glimpses is the passage in which he reveals
he is more of a prophet with a mission.
He envisages: “In order to achieve something meaningful, particularly in
the field of creative arts, including singing, dancing, writing, speaking, one
needs some power behind. To attract that
power, one should depend on one’s own power first. One should not ignore external powers” (81). Gill derives this power by considering him as
an integral part of a holistic nature that is responsible for maintaining
ecological equilibrium. In the following
paragraphs, I would like to render this sense of an internal power backed-up by
external powers as something emanating from a fine ecological vision.
Stephen
Gill’s keen awareness of the environment can be noted even in his Songs Before Shrine. In
the poem, “When I See,” the poet sharply points out the disruption between
nature and man-made environment. He
writes:
When I see
the blades of grass growing
trees leafing
birds awaking us
I think of
the mounting
cries. (55)
The poet sees growth as an organic
process, whereas, in sharp contrast to natural growth that is progressive, he
finds human beings subsumed by woes taking regressive steps. Environmental pollution is the major culprit
in his subsequent observation:
When I see
people jogging at ease
heading towards the beach
searching clean, fresh air
I think of
polluting smogged sights.
(56)
The
elements of nature are in general well integrated and merge with each other
effortlessly. But, whenever they come in
contact with the disruptive human influence, they too are contaminated. In the poem, “Snowflakes,” Gills uses the
image of snowflakes to exemplify this notion. The same snowflakes when likened
to a dove are soft and gentle but when the comparison is extended to human
beings, they become hard and slippery.
He writes:
As feathers
of a dove
soft and silky
snowflakes fall.
With
nature’s gentle hands
they shroud
the vastness of the evening.
These dews
of indifference
descend to the trees
slanted roofs
deserted roads
and windy paths.
As a human
heart
they would grow
slippery and hard
when men and beasts
stamp on them.
(82)
Functionally, Stephen Gill’s ecoconcerns are
worked out in his poems at two levels.
At the first level, as it is evident from the discussion on
“Snowflakes,” he makes use of figures of speech, particularly similes and
metaphors. At the second level, he makes
direct address to nature. In “Wind,” for
instance, he envies it for its “untamed,” “unbound” freedom. Nonetheless, it reveals to him the
constricted life of humanity. He admires
the wind in the following lines:
You rage
you smile
you hiss
you cry
depending on your moods.
How lucky
you are!
Any shape
you wish
you assume.
Unlike humans
you are free.
(86)
Similarly, Gill’s “A Breeze That is Free” also
associates liberty with the elements of nature.
Yet, the poet wishes to use “breeze” to freshen up the intellectual mind
that is suffocated with contaminating thoughts.
Hence, he desires to act like a breeze:
If I were a
breeze
I should
lull the learned
to bar the door of his thinking
from breeding substances
that pollute our planet
and fill him with a treasure
that is possessed by the fields
filled with trees.
(107)
A replacement of the dry but corrupting
intellect with lush ecosphere would lead to sustainable development that can
enliven human beings and their surroundings.
In similar vein, the poem, “Enigma,” juxtaposes the natural with the
synthetic and leaves the choice to mankind.
The first stanza begins with an Edenic,
idyllic, prelapsarian setting:
I
smell
the delicious odor of pleasing sights
of the lakes of fresh water
plunging spectacular cliffs
and a field
with smiling flowers
and butterflies.
In Peter
Barry’s description of the “outdoor environment,” this picture clearly falls
under the classification of “‘the scenic sublime’ (e.g. forests, lakes,
mountains, cliffs, waterfalls)” (255).
This scenic sublime is contrasted with a postlapsarian,
artificial atmosphere in the following stanza.
As Gill mentions,
I
see
an island seduced by technology
where a kite is
trying to fly. (100)
The
wantonness of the sportive butterflies is replaced here with a paper kite that
struggles to fly. The ecoconcern that human beings should express lies
enigmatically “in between” in the form of “a slumbering dove on the steps of a
rusting ladder” (100).
Shrine is subtitled as Poems of Social Concerns; however, the whole collection can be
viewed as “Poems of Ecological Concerns.”
At the outset, the author recalls his past in his preface where he
shudders to remember the partition riots that he witnessed literally from close
quarters. The human violence caused in
mutual ill will between the Hindus and the Muslims is also perceived as an act
against nature. Or, rather, it is nature
that forebodes such violent happenings.
Gill conjectures: “Every time there was a stir caused by the wind, a car
on the street, the bark of a dog, or the mew of a cat, we froze inside our
house” (8). Later he observes that the city,
Even
Gill narrates the whole trauma he underwent in ecological metaphors. During the days of turbulence when he
expected that he being a Christian, the Bishop of New Delhi would send a
vehicle to rescue him and his family, he is disappointed to note, “how easily
shepherds can forget their flock” (13).
By this metaphor, he identifies the innocent victims as “sheep.” Often he associates unpleasant, fearful, and
cruel things with “wolf” (19) and “shark” (25) whereas the fertile things of
life, such as the poetic imagination, are referred to in terms of “plants” and
“crops” (26). Thus he mentions about
fear: “Fear as a wolf of painful emotions kept emerging again and again from
the bushes of helplessness in the wasteland of time” (18). In order to escape from the onslaught of the
religious fanatics, the innocent people hide “themselves in the crops of sugar
cane and cotton” (20). Ultimately, it is
nature that gives them asylum.
Nature is seen as a free being living for its
own sake and expressing its own desires in an unrestrained, unconditional
manner. In “Me,” Gill uses the image of
water to represent this: “I want to express my self / drink my own water / flow
in my own way / live in me” (31). The
poet reiterates this view firmly in the poem, “Who Shall Buy.” The qualities of nature such as “the warmth
of the valleys,” the poet sharply comments, cannot be commodified. He spells out this idea in the following
lines:
No one can
buy
nor sell
the freedom of the winds
the mystery of the oceans
the sobriety of the jungles
and the songs
of the seasons. (32)
He
further points out the symbiotic and homogeneous relationship that exists
between nature, man, and the surrounding universe in these lines:
nor sell
the fragrance of the flowers
which is a friend of the universe;
and the inter-dependence
of all animals, nations and nature
who form a family with humans
and who breathe the same air
under the same canopy. (32-33)
“Image
of Flowers” is a very interesting poem from Shrine as it is brings out
centrally Gill’s ecoconcerns. The poet contradicts the Biblical view of
human genesis that God created man in His image and proceeds to declare:
“Humans were carved / in the image of flowers” (34). Gill indicates here that the theory of human
genesis from God’s own image is anthropomorphic, while his hindsight of human
beings originating from nature (flowers) emphasises
his belief that human beings are part of the ecocycle. However, the technological progress made by
human beings is symbolically represented when the poet says, “Humans made wings
/ to sail above the rainbow clouds” and “created / their own plastic roses and
jasmines / without roots” (34). The
superficiality of their designs is coupled with zestless mechanisation
by use of the figure of “robots.”
Notwithstanding these vacuous expansions, the poet foresees salvation
for humanity only in its willing surrender to nature. He affirms:
and what they think of themselves,
the caring arms of the earth
because they are
flowers. (35)
In “Garden of Eden,” Gill sees the protective power
of “mother earth” as more powerful than the divine law. Because it sympathises
with the exiled human beings and gives them refuge: “When Adam and Eve broke
the sceptre of the divine law, / they were chased out
from there; / only mother earth gave them refuge” (36). But Gill underscores the fact that Earth is
the only planet that can seclude human beings and by spoiling it they will have
nowhere else to go. As he points out—
in the streams of the tree.
It
has poisoned
the arteries of mother.
Her
fall
would be the demise of an age.
Her
children
as their ancestors were.
Where
will they go from here
is a question now. (37)
In “The
Flower of the Universe,” Gill communicates his ecoconcern
in a figurative sense. He pictures a
persona who, overpowered by possessiveness, crushes “the flower”. However, appalled by a bleak vision of “a
chaotic human crowd / under the darkening dust / of war, hatred and illusion,”
inside the stem, the persona attempts to reshape the flower with the realisation that the flower needs “the soft nurse of nature
/ and a mysterious rain” (38-39). In
this way, the poet bespeaks of the redemptive power of nature and entails why
it is all the more important to care for it.
“War
Fever” is another poem that shows how “the demons of pollution” (47) cause
ecological imbalance. In Gill’s words:
“War fever / poisons the air of surroundings / disturbs the calm of sea /
crumbles human relations” (49). In “Year
After Year,” he sarcastically admonishes the incorrigible human tendency to
selfishly consume natural resources for the present and leave its protection
shamelessly to future generation. He
remarks: “Abuse of the earth / ecosystem / legacy of garbage piles / we leave
for posterity” (89). Similarly,
“engulfed by the devils of technology,” the persona of “Twentieth Century
Says,” evinces intense attentiveness to the depletion of the ozone layer owing
to the capitalistic machinations. He
notices: “the hands of commerce / frustrate their attempts / by polluting
surroundings / with the acid rains” (96-97).
Despite this thankless, self-centred, self-gratifying
humankind, the poet is grateful to nature for it indiscriminately continues to
shower human beings with its blessings.
This is touchingly brought out in the poem, “Congratulations.” The poet declares:
I
congratulate
for cheering cheerless hearts.
I
also congratulate
the rain drops
the futility of dryness
from the womb of the earth;
and the young branches
for changing the mantle
of the barren trees;
and also the fire
for strengthening the cowards;
and above all
the forge of friendship
for producing meaning in life. (140)
Stephen Gill continues to express his ecoconcerns even in the recently published Flashes
(2007). Although they are written in the
Japanese condensed Haikuan spirit, they are pithy and
even more effective. Especially, the
poems written under “Social Concerns” carry forward the earlier ecomotifs. The
following poem, for instance, juxtaposes the freshness of nature with the
decomposed culture:
Morning mist
above the city graveyard
noises grow. (37)
But, soon the poet appears to be a bit pessimistic
when he mourns because mankind that should serve and safeguard nature has gone
against it and contributes to its annihilation.
The anguish is felt when he speculates:
who will feed birds
future ravaged. (37)
Ironically, the gardeners who are supposed to look after flowers
endanger them. This is a clear warning
of ecological disorder, as birds could not be fed by nature, which would
subsequently devastate future livelihood.
Gill also laments for the
world lost in commodified images that are enhanced by
media and influenced by capitalist maneuvers.
He bemoans: “Wasteland / charm / tv shows”
(37). On the one hand, people are not
interested in deriving pleasure out of watching greenery. On the other hand, they have already lost
their abilities to derive pleasure by experiencing nature directly and their
senses are so numbed that even televised pictures of wasteland charm them. Nevertheless, when the poet has lost hope of
redeeming mankind, he trusts that nature will resort to its own methods of
survival. In this respect, he is
inclined to believe that the plants and other objects of ecosphere have a
unified breathing consciousness, which to a large extent subscribes to Gaia
hypothesis. As augmented by James
Lovelock, Gaia hypothesis entails that “the entire range of living matter on
Earth, from whales to viruses, and from oaks to algae, could be regarded as
constituting a single living entity, capable of manipulating the Earth’s
atmosphere to suit its overall needs and endowed with faculties and powers far
beyond of those of its constituent parts” (9). Thus, the following lines from Flashes are to be understood purely
from the perspective of Gaia:
A tree in
blossom
says something
breathes.
Only then, the green dove would soar
towards eternity! And as Gill fittingly points out in “My
Dove,” “The leaf that she carries / is from the evergreen tree / of never
ending hope” (Shrine 160).
References
Barry, Peter. Beginning
Theory: An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory.
Gill, Stephen.
Flashes: Trilliums in
Haiku Spirit.
_____. Glimpses: A Selection of Published Articles About
Stephen Gill and His Works.
_____. Shrine: Poems
of Social Concerns.
_____. Songs
Before Shrine.
Lovelock, James.
Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth.
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