Changing sights and sounds through the eyes of a poet
View(s):
Powerful and disturbing, Buddhadasa Galappatty’s new collection of poems Giri Hisa Sita (From the top of the hill) strikes a reader with a frisson of realisation. There is a scatter of entertaining extravaganzas, but many of his choices indicate a maturity that entitles a man to assess the landscapes he views.
The previous collection, E Asirimath Nonagathaya came as though to hearten the victims of that dismal period, with a muted yet glowing collage of thick chips of paint: Violet, blue, orange, white and a glowing sun. The newest has a striking cover, eloquent in its austerity.
This, as he declares, is the twelfth of his selections since Dolos Mahe Pahana published in 1971, in a triple bond of budding genius – Jayalath Manoratne whose gifts as an actor remain indelibly drawn in our memories and reinforced by statements in Nalan Mendis’ History of Sri Lanka’s Drama Festivals, Sunil Ariyaratne whose haunting magic as a lyricist endures, not to be eclipsed even by the soaring mastery and emotional force of his films. Galappatty’s first fancies as in the deft joyous arrival of the Maname couple in Benares, coupled with “Till the Black Crow turns White” which expresses his views of Lankan sense smothered by tradition, showed both his sense of fun and his critical alertness.
Untitled, the opening poem in Sivpada form, in his new book, reveals the innate beat of the native hearts, the throb that calls for a response from its environment.
The Protest Poems commence with a stark quatrain identifying the “meritorious gentry” “pin aethi mahathhoruni” who robbed him of the right to work to support wife and child and the cry “Why does the sun rise on a lawless land?
This is followed by “Death”:
Surgical probing
Medicines applied
Kept in the IC
Breathed in
Breathed out
Like a sinking balloon
No surgical error
No gangrene
An injection at fault?
No merely out of date.
Galappatty wrote Colombo by Night when he published the first of the series in 1971. It says much about his perceptions.
Colombo by Night
In the fumes of beer or whiskey
The sound of doors being shut
Words of farewell called out
Waken those who lie asleep
In the shadow of a hotel pillar
With a newspaper for a mat
The cement floor serves as a pillow
Having started up his car
And helped his young wife inside
As he drives, does he then see
Those who sleep against the walls
Or within the zinc-roofed bus-stop
Full families with their children
Boys and girls who walk the streets
Palms extended to passers-by
Who collect the coins they gather
To satisfy half their hunger
Sharing out a cup of black tea
To small mouths that know no milk
Snuggling them against her chest
Sleeping on the naked soil
Who would know or care about it?
………………….
By the station in Fort
Stretched out on the cement floor
Just like a ward in a hospital
Huddled in a row
They lie till dawn
………………………
Those who step out of the hotel
Cuddle their wives till daybreak
Drive to office, hold discussions
“Colombo city should be
cleaner”.
How much has changed between 1971 and 2023? Buddhadasa Galappatty’s eye remains alert and his words expressive. The reader responds but with how much hope?
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