Blues for Chennai

'thaalaattudhae vaanam'

This is a Tamil phrase that has stuck in my memory from the time a very dear friend of mine first translated it for me more than two years ago. On that day, I knew that I would write a song that drew on it some day. Two years on, it finally came to me.

The literal translation of the original phrase, of course, is `the sky is the cradle', and the actual context is some sort of sappy love song, but I don't let that bother me overmuch - a poet has the license to frill.

The ocean is my parchment
Here all my stories lie
This little boat serves as my quill
Scrawling letters swirling by

Zenith is my blue inkwell
Flecked with little tufts of cloud
The winds of muse and memory
Sing all my thoughts out loud

But there is something curious
In the songs that I can play
My pen will mark my paper only
If either is murky gray

When the shadows of time passing
Brood deep upon the swell
Or somber clouds of sorrow
Tinge the ink in my deep well

Then songs there are a-plenty
Of fortitude and strength
Perchance, of new wisdom found
On winding roads towards the end.

When the ocean, wellspring of action
Is pellucid, calm and clear
When the firmament, deep azure
Reflects a spirit free of fear

I rock my boat to sing quatrains
of Joy and tranquil staves
The words, they have no meaning
They vanish in the shifting waves

When blue meets blue serenity
And irrevocably unites
There is no thought, no word
To speak of that Delight

And that, my friend is the reason
Why my words are oft sad and bland
And songs, the ones that find those words
Walk on lonely beaches in the sand



In twilight
And under starlit skies.