Celebrating Seasons

Every season inspires love of a different kind writes Sudhamahi Regunathan,referring to evocative Tamil Sangam poetry,Every season evokes some imagery, some tastes and emotions. Building on this idea, the Tolkappiyam, an ancient work of Tamil grammar — part of what is known as Sangam literature — sets down poetic conventions. Most Sangam poetry can be divided into two categories of aham and puram. Puram deals with subjects such as war, courage, the king, his court and so on; that is, with happenings in the outer world. On the other hand, aham is more personal and deals with emotions in the inner world. Aham poetry is primarily about love. Even though it is about the inner world of the human being, its charm lies in the fact that the poetry has no names and it seeks to relate to its readers through symbols drawn from the local geography and seasons, that is, from nature.Love And RegionsThe Tolkappiyam divides love poetry into seven categories, two of which it dismisses rather shortly, as not eligible for greater discussion because one is unrequited love and the other is abnormal love. The few poems in these two categories add that ethical touch suggesting they are not desirable states to be in.The Tolkappiyam focuses on the other five. It identifies five regions: kurinji which denotes the hills, mullai which refers to forests, marudam which stands for open fields which are well flooded by many water bodies, neital which represents the sea shores and palai, dealing with the theme of the desert.Every region has a deity attached to it except the region of the palai or the desert. When a poem evokes either that deity or describes the region, the emotion in the hero or heroine’s heart is revealed in greater depth than words themselves, even though at first glance it may seem like an ode to natureThe desert represents summer, like the one that will soon come to an end. Summer and mid day sun represent separation in love poetry of the Tolkappiyam. But separation is always temporary… there is thirst for reunion as there is in a desert, in the summer heat. Visions of the loved one comes to the one pining for the beloved, as mirages of relief. And in that blazing heat imagine cool showers… that is what the poetry belonging to the Mullai region brings. Hope, patient waiting for the lover and associations with the fragrance of the jasmine flower and clouds that have been held as messengers of love — all belong to this category. Just as nature is renewing itself with the rains, so is the nayika or the heroine finding new life with the return of her lover. The poetry is thus full of description of nature, but in actuality it is symbolic of the feelings within the heart of the heroine.Marudam is a land that is fertile and is fed by many water bodies. This has come to symbolise infidelity and the wandering eyes of the lover. Poetry belonging to this category is primarily of such nature while that belonging to Neital is more like that of Mullai poetry except that it is situated along the sea shore. No specific season is attached to this; it may be any part of the year but primarily in the evenings.Elegant, Sensitive EmotionWith these five categories as the basic, the Tolkappiyam and later poetic conventions in Tamil literature have explored the myriad emotions of love. All through the poems one notices that the emotions described are elegant and sensitive and always returning to equilibrium, as is true of nature, too. Even while there are many poetic compositions across India which link seasons and love, the difference here is that it does not link, but symbolises, seeking as it were to draw the similarity between the inner and the outer world.In the oneness of the experience we can observe inner seasons often reflecting the outer