(Complete Summary)Songs of the Ganga by A. K. Mehrotra

   Ganga is a holy river for the Hindus. It flows right from top of Gangotri in the Himalayas into the northern plains upto and beyond Bangladesh and then mixes with the Bay of Bengal. During its flow it covers many places, cities and states. Many pilgrims have been setup on the banks of the river Ganga. It passes many plains, foothills, carrying with it fertile soil for crops. It washes over the mountains and flows over plain lands.

   In Hindu religion, the river Ganga is said to be the purifier of all sins committed by humans. Every year, millions of people go to take bath in the river to purify themselves of all sins. Many people collect and store "Gangajal" at their home to get rid off the impurities. Every 12 years, Maha kumbh and every 6 yrs, Ardh kumbh melas take place in holy pilgrims Haridwar, Allahabad, Nasik and Ujjain in turns. Ardh kumbh takes place only in Haridwar and Allahabad every 6th year alternatively. These are the time periods when maximum crowd from all over the world come to the pilgrims to bath in the waters of the Ganga. The recent Maha Kumbh took place in Allahabad last year i.e. 2013.
 
Summary of the poem:-

Stanza 1-

I am Ganga Snow from the mountains. The keeper of water. 

I am the plains I am the foothills I carry wishes of my streams, to the sea.

I am both man and woman.

I am paper boats for children. I am habits for fishermen. I am a cloud for shaven monks. I reflect all movements.

I am the bridge. I am the fort and the archer taking aim. I am the great dissolver of men 

I give life and I take it back. 

The river ganga is personified here as a being of greater importance and influence on people. It flows from the mountains which are said to be the keepers of water i.e. in the form of snow. It flows over hills and valleys and carries its small streams into the sea. It is depicted as both man and woman, i.e. both forms of nature.

Children play with paperboats by sailing them on the water of the river. Fishermen earn a habitat by selling the fish they catch in the river. Shaven monks come to pray on the banks of the Ganga and are intellectually enlightened by its cloud of influence. It reflects everything going around.

It is said to be the bridge between death and life. It is a fort as in protecting its army as well as an archer defending its country. The water of the river Ganga has very strong currents. If someone drowns in its water, it is almost impossible for them to come back alive. Symbolically it is also said to dissolve all the sins of a man and regenerate him hence giving him a new life when he takes bath in the waters of the Ganga according to Hindu beliefs.

Stanza 2-

I go out into the world, I am the world, I am nations, cities, people I am the pages of an unbound book.

My room is the air around me.

I am dressed in water, I am naked as water, I am clarity.

A friend comes along offers me a flag and says a government has toppled.

I’m going to catch rain, I say and spread out a net .

I am poison.

 The river flows out of the mountains into the world of people. It flows through nations, cities, people of varying diversities. It is like the pages of an unbound book, free of bondage, flowing vigorously on its own free will. The aura around it is like its room.

The water is its dress. As well it is as naked as the transparent water. It defines clarity. By clarity it means that it can give you the answer to all questions. This is religious symbolism considering all travellers in search for enlightenment visit the Ganga River at least once in their lives.

Many people come to bath in the river and wash off their impurities in the water leaving the water unclean. Even after the downfall of the British Government and the independence of India, Ganga was never made pure. It wasn't independent of the job of purifying others deeds. But Ganga is forever flowing and burgeoning. When it rains, it will rise and flood and flow all over the lands years after years. It will spread all around the country like a net. It will spread slowly just like poison spreads through a person's body after it has been consumed.

Stanza 3-

Billy goats, come down from the mountain. Without finding solitude, camels return from the desert. 

I make two lines in the sand, and say they are unbreakable walls. 

I make the four directions one, I know the secret of walking. 

I am the death of fire.

         Goats come down from the mountains to quench their thirsts and camels return from the desert for the same. Deserts do not have any source of water so all the animals travel long distances to drink water from the Ganga. However, the goats and camel can also be symbolization of men(human beings) who haven't found satisfaction in life and have come to the banks of the Ganga to find sanctuary. 

         A small stream of water can turn into a canyon over years of erosion forming structures similar to huge unbreakable walls. It can also mean the barrier created by the river between two pieces of land which cannot be broken by any means.

       The Ganga washes away four directions and makes it one meaning it flows in all directions and makes the conventional directions uncomprehending. Contrasting this statement the secret of walking states that the Ganga understands all kinds of movements. The arrogance in the last statement is balanced with the humility of this one.

        This line is self-explanatory. Water kills both natural fire and the fire of thirst. Symbolically it also assuages the fire or agony due to guilt after taking bath in the holy waters.

Stanza 4-

From smoke I learn disappearance from the ocean unprejudiced 

From birds How to find a rest-house in the storm 

From the leopard How to cover the sun with spots 

In summer I tend watermelons and in flood I stay near the postman’s house 

I am a beggar I am a clown and I am shadow less.

              The first line talks about the evaporation of sea water and romanticizes with the subject. The ocean is             unprejudiced as it does not distinguish between the waters from a river or a sea or a stream. All the water           gets mixed and flows as one.

                 

The second line describes how the river water flows in currents when there are storms.(You can further refer to geographical aspects of water bodies during storm).

                 

**This third line is somehow not clear as to what aspect of the river the poet is actually talking about.(If you find an explanation to this please provide it to me in the comments. I will be grateful for your contribution)

                In summer watermelons which grow in the waters of the Ganga are eaten by us, hinting us that in one way or other the Ganga has given water to us all. The postman’s house is usually located in the most suitable location which is easily accessible. This usually means that Ganga flows everywhere even through the most accessible of places.

                The fifth line. Here beggar, and clown are used in a very random sense suggesting that the Ganga can be anything and is everything. I am shadow less means that, the Ganga does not have an end nor do people know where it properly starts.

Incase of more clarification required please comment below or email me to - sohini.mukherjee95@yahoo.com

Hunger by Jayanta Mahapatra

          The poem 'Hunger' by Jayanta Mahapatra, a well-known poet from Orissa,India, depicts two kinds of hunger. One is the hunger of food and another is the hunger for sexual gratification.

Note from the summary author:-
          It is usually seen that men who are not satisfied with their married life or are not married or are divorced, go to brothels and give money for their own pleasure. It has become a business now, especially in India. Saying India a poor country will be an understatement. India now is not just poor by money, but poor by morals. The basic moral of a human being to realize that women are responsible for the creation of a new generation is wiped off our minds. Instead we see women being housewives, or maid servants, or further low standard jobs I find shameful to discuss about. It is a shame that we have forgotten women are not toys meant for sexual gratification or satisfaction of men. They are the creator of the entire human race. Rapes, prostitution,  household tortures, are these the only aspects women are meant to go through now?

Jayanta Mahapatra's poetry not only explores the influence of local realities in creating the depth of one's feeling and sensitivity but also stretches the possibilities of language to represent them.

Summary:-

"It was hard to believe the flesh was heavy on my back.
The fisherman said: Will you have her, carelessly,
trailing his nets and his nerves, as though his words
sanctified the purpose with which he faced himself.
I saw his white bone thrash his eyes."

The first few lines of the poem tell us about a man and a fisherman. The fisherman is volunteering the man to his place for a deal. The man feels the flesh on his back is too heavy. It seems like he is holding a huge burden of something inexplicable and its better to drop off the load. The fisherman is talking about some girl. He asks the man to 'have' her. He says it very carelessly as if he has no concern for the girl. As if the girl is some toy to play with. But his words very well explain his purpose. He is hungry and he needs money to buy food. He is dragging his nets behind him. He glares his white teeth but his eyes reflect his misery. 

"I followed him across the sprawling sands,
my mind thumping in the flesh's sling.
Hope lay perhaps in burning the house I lived in.
Silence gripped my sleeves; his body clawed at the froth
his old nets had only dragged up from the seas."

The man is continuously faced with a weight upon him, symbolizing the weight of guilt and regret. Though he follows the fisherman across the shore, he feels a thumping tension in his head. He could take this moment to refuse the offer and turn back. Maybe now if he turned back he could escape the trap and guilt he is caught in. But he remained silent. The fisherman's desperation seemed to increase.

"In the flickering dark his lean-to opened like a wound.
The wind was I, and the days and nights before.
Palm fronds scratched my skin. Inside the shack 
an oil lamp splayed the hours bunched to those walls.
Over and over the sticky soot crossed the space of my mind."

When he reaches the fisherman's shack, he sees it is a lean-to(a building sharing one wall with a larger building, and having a roof that leans against that wall) and was dark inside except a lamp with a flickering flame and the walls are covered with soot, collected for a long time, which kept catching the poet's eyes.


"I heard him say: My daughter, she's just turned fifteen...
Feel her. I'll be back soon, your bus leaves at nine.
The sky fell on me, and a father's exhausted wile.
Long and lean, her years were cold as rubber.
She opened her wormy legs wide. I felt the hunger there,
the other one, the fish slithering, turning inside "

  The fisherman then reveals that his daughter has just turned fifteen and the readers realize that the girl he was talking about is his daughter. He asks the poet to 'feel' her. Here 'feel' refers to the fulfillment of his sexual desires. The poet is shocked with the truth and sees through the fisherman's wile. He is a father who is using his daughter's body to earn money for food. The poet looks at the young girl, who is 'long and lean', her age can be easily judged by her cold rubber-like skin and she looked malnourished. When she opened her 'wormy' thin legs wide, as if ready to serve as a sexual slave, the poet felt the hunger, the hunger for food which drove this father-daughter into this business.