You and me

You are present in my heart
Through your timeless art

Your thoughts flow in my dreams
Like the fresh river streams

The innocent smile that you always wore
Has spread childlike happiness to my innermost core

Your music became the voice of my soul
When i began to see life as a whole

You felt pain and underwent suffering like an ordinary being
But your saintliness was for me to see in your simple living

I really miss your artistic rendering to the evening raga
This has been brought to a close by the ending of this saga

Why i cannot write any longer, i have no clue
It could be that this art fails in front of you

As the heaven welcomes your coming to immortality
The mother earth beckons my awakening to reality

The sadness in my life after you have gone
Is for you to live and sing an eternal song

My legendary grandmother's celestial abode.

The doyenne of Hindustani Classical music Gangubai Hangal passed away on the 40th anniversary of the moon landing (July 21st 2009). The very next day (July 22nd 2009) was the cremation, which was also a day when the total solar eclipse was observed. As one of her many grandsons, I have the sweetest memories of being with her in my childhood. While I was present during the last rites, I could not stop relating her grand arrival on this beautiful earth with certain celestial occurrences.



In the form of moon she landed on our soil and when the time came she became the moon and left the earth. On the subsequent day, her blaze of glory was for all to see, when the sun was spectacularly eclipsed by the moon.

Her lasting impressions of life and legendary music is going to be there with mankind forever.



- Bharat Barki

A journey that was not the same

* - Grandmother in Kannada

After the days without Ajji*,
When we left Deshpandenagar
For boarding the train to Hyderabad,
Those loving and caring hands
That always waved at us were missing,
‘Ganga Lahari’ wasn’t the same.

When we moved on the road and took the left turn to the main road, and
While beating that path to the station through the Circuit House
Deshpandenagar wasn’t the same.

The journey to Hubli railway station
Through the Desai cross until the railway station, the
Time came to a standstill and we were not moving.
With hearts heavy and eyes swollen
Our life fallen,
The way to railway station wasn’t the same.

After we reached the railway station, where
On the platform we had walked several times
With Ajji and her cherished companionship,
The Hubli railway station wasn’t the same.

Throughout the journey on the railway tracks,
The train was moving but our souls were moving
Back,
As if the world tumbled, and
Toppled.

We were broken.
The journey to Hyderabad for us was never the same.

Then the train reached Begumpet station,
There were women and children, and men walking on the platforms,
We found them lifeless,
Just as the flowers without fragrance,
Like calves without the cows,
Children without their MOTHERS.
The station wasn’t the same.

The road to our home,
That was brought to eternity by Ajji when moved on it,
Wasn’t the same.

Our home wasn’t the same
When we reached,
As the doors and the walls
Were not echoing Sa Re Ga Ma....

Oh! When I reached my office, and I tried
To open my computer, I was scared!
I felt, as though, my computer would crash,
Or, it wouldn’t open at all
I was numbed and trembled
As I typed the password.....
My fingers on the keyboard would shake uncontrollably
The password ‘ganga’ was keyed in
Without ‘GANGA’ in the world!
My computer wasn’t the same.

- Dharmadasa Barki

Work but Rest

GOD (restfulness) is DYING but SATAN(restlessness) is Alive!

They reside within us, LAUGHING and giving each other a High Five!

They have come to an agreement by saying let us mutually Survive.

This is what Nieztsche had said of which i have only come to Revive!