Home : Literature : World Literature : Book Reviews : Book Review: Showers To The Bowers print Print version | PDF Version | Add your comment Comments (0) Book Review: Showers To The Bowers By dr laxmi sharma on October 25,2008 N. Karthikeyan OSHO is an engineer by professor and he had received the "International Poet of Merit Award 2002" of Poetry Society, Maryland, USA. Before this he has one more poetry volume 'Mystic Melody' which was published from The Home of Letters (India), Orissa in the year 2005. Showers to The Bowers Contains 54 poems on diverse topics. N. Karthikeyan osho has more than thousand poems on the web. In the preface of this volume the poet asserts "Poetry is the infinite flow of energy from the unknown domain through the words. Poetry is an art. Poetry is the immense inspiration which kindles the readers' heart. Some solacing serene rhyming poetry remains in our memory, surprises, surpasses stands long, echoes long, reflects, and repeats. And grows, glow more to become an incantation to save the heart from irksome where the reader imbibes, immerses, immerses into those sonorous solacing verses." Sri Aurobindo writes in his essay "The Essence of Poetry" "This power makes the rhythmic word of the poet the highest form of speech available to man for the expression whether of his self-vision or of his world-vision. It is noticeable that even the highest experience, the pure spiritual which enters into the things that can never be wholly expressed, still, when it does try to express them and not merely to explain them intellectually, tends instinctively to use, often the rhythmic forms, almost always the manner of speech characteristic of poetry." In the first poem entitled " Prayer of the Heart", the poet prays— "Let the words come from the heart,Where pure thoughts above at rest,And adore to lore the divine,With fecund and abundance of jocund,Galore, glows heart sheen to shine." The poet request immortal mother to carry him to the Holy Land in the poem entitled "Immortal Mother." N. KarthiKeyan Osho presents mysticism through his verses and this mysticism is at his beat in these poems entitled "Accord with Accolade, Alfa of Alma, Back at Dark, Divine Ravine, Eternal Elixir etc. "Eternal ..... natural journey!Explores ...... for true soul ....Ebbing, loitering mind,Cease - communes spontaneous sereneWhere rhythm -- divine sweet profuse honey."(Eternal Elixir) Sri Aurobindo writes in his essay "The Overhead Aesthesis "This is perfect poetry with the most exquisite melody and beauty of wording and an unsurpassable poignancy of pathos, but there is no touch or note of the Overhead inspiration, it is the mind and the heart, the vital emotion, working at their highest pitch under the stress of a psychic inspiration". The above statement is absolutely Osho. Osho presents Wordsworthian clarion call to Nature in such poems as "Attune with Nature, Beach I Reach, Lily in Thy Valley, Livery River, Ode to Nature, Ode to Rose. "Fairy feathers, fortune petals to plume ...Preen in those green gardens to relume,And waves of the incense spread from rose, Avast! All agony, Holy holds me to repose!" (Ode to Rose) Osho takes us to the garden of Eden in his poem 'Eden Shaken and Broken'. "Among those sweet life with honey,Loving soul, sharing the bee's comp,Ambush, pervades the holy castle,Amid those rosy bush -- bees bustle."(Eden Shaken and Broken) The poet also remembers great persons like Lord Buddha, Lord Krishna and Gurudev in his poems entitled "Extol to Tagore, Greet to Geeta, and Bliss Buddha. "Divine thine Eternal radiance - face...Aye - thy bliss o full of fragrance -Mystic Magic, thine articulate words flowO'erture of miracle music - surround!"(Bliss Buddha) The poet remembers the Almighty and thanks Him for his blessings in such poems as "Lord of Love, Magic Magnet, High on Heaven etc. "Lo! thy lightLove and brightMay our night,Merry and mercy, Mirth, relumes our sight." (High On Heaven) Osho's mysticism sometimes looks like William Blake's and some times like Rabindranath Tagore. The poet dazzles us through his mysticism. The poem 'Zest Zephyr' shows this effect very much. "To cradle thy cozy nature,Thro' subtle soul truth flows pureMyriad paths manifest thee--Myriad rivers imbibe into the Sea!"(Zest Zephyr) V.K. Gokak writes in his essay "Poetic Meaning 'Inter and Outer" "Thought in poetry manifests itself in two ways - as outer and as inner meaning. The inner meaning of poetry is embodied in its suggestive, figurative or imagistic language. Inner meaning is closely related to the expression of the moods and attitudes of the poet." Osho is a poet of divine inspiration and he outpours mysticism and celestial teachings through his poetry volume "Showers to The Bowers." In the last poem of this volume the poet emphasize on the unity of all of us. "Lord of Love,I love thy word,Pure to cure, no swordCan scan of slain the word,The full of fragrance I feel."(We are One) In the end, I can say that poet is quite successful in his efforts to spread divine perching through his verses. The title of this volume "Showers to The Bowers" is also appropriate. The price of this volume is also reasonable. References 1. S.K. Desai & G.N. Devy - Critical Thought (An Anthology of 20th Century Indian English Essays), Sterling Pub. New Delhi, 1987 2. N. KarthiKeyan Osho - Showers to The Bowers, Amrit Prakashan, Gwalior (M.P.), 2006. 2774 Readings Courtesy : Website Links: http://literaryindia.com/Literature/World-Literature/Book-Reviews/775.html