A Couplet on Garbage

எனதரிதலால் யானறிதல் - கோவிறை

குப்பையைப்பெருக்கிக்கூட்டும் மக்கு

மறுவேறுமீள்பயனிக் குறைமறுமக்கு

Translation

Through cutting (what’s) mine, knowing (who am) I - Kovirai (Pen name translated from Rajesh)

(You), the fool who multiplies and adds/accumulates (also glossed as: sweeps and collects) garbage

reuse, repurpose, recycle, reduce, refuse, compost

Commentary

This couplet was inspired by my cousin Shri. Hariharan/Kannan who said: “all this is kuppai (garbage).” The context was a philosophical and scholarly discussion which ultimately would not lead to true wisdom.

The title, the pun, and provocation suggest that the couplet may pack multiple intents. So, what is kuppai here?

• Kuppai is garbage, items no longer considered as mine, which must be swept, collected, and discarded
  • Composting and the five Rs (C+5R) are familiar injunctions
  • A message of eco-friendly minimalism
• Kuppai is all the things and wealth considered as mine, multiplied and accumulated, which must be swept, collected, and discarded
  • Reduce consumption and waste of material, money, and time; also donate money, give away things, and volunteer your time
  • Likewise for the other C+5R injunctions
  • A message of yogic non-possessiveness (aparigraha yama) intertwined with donation (dana) and service (seva)
• Kuppai is impurity in thought, speech, and action, multiplied and accumulated, which must be swept, collected, and discarded
  • Refuse physical and virtual consumption that multiplies and adds; also refuse harmful ideas, words, and habits
  • Likewise for the other C+5R injunctions
  • A message of yogic cleanliness (saucha niyama), both external and internal
• Kuppai is the sumtotal of things, emotions, concepts, identities, memories, and relationships that we mistake as I or mine
  • Composting and the five Rs are merely witnessed once this is understood
  • You witness samskaras that cause thoughts based on false identifications to be recycled, reused, and repurposed. You witness Saucha reducing the thoughts. You witness Vicara refusing them with neti-neti. You witness that the kleshas and karmas decay eventually.
  • A message of renunciation (tyaga) and wisdom (jnana)

Aesthetic elements of the couplet

The English translation and commentary do scant justice to the elegance, economy, and versatility of the Tamil language. I will explain some of the poetic devices (metaphor, words used with multiple-intent, words repeated with different meanings, rhyme). Although my primary intent was ethics, other interpretive readings of the Tamil verse are possible.

I have explained some of the metaphorical readings of குப்பை (garbage), which is at the heart of the couplet.

Likewise I have explained how the C+5R injunctions (the second line) have metaphorical readings.

Earlier I explained பெருக்கிக்கூட்டும் in two senses: it mean growth by multiplying and adding/accumulating, or it could mean sweeping and collecting (garbage). The multiple intents of பெருக்கிக்கூட்டும் support the multiple metaphorical readings of the verse. As a third possibility, multiplication and addition/accumulation can be read as computational operations. Other than the play of கூட்டு (add / accumulate) with பெருக்கு (multiply), operations which signal different rates of increase (and for the mathematically inclined, exponentiation, tetration, pentation, and the like follow multiplication), I also use the word குறை which can mean reduce as well as the operation of subtraction. Computer scientists familiar with Garbage-in-Garbage-out can relate to the multiplications and additions or accumulations performed on garbage data.

The word மக்கு is used twice in different senses: vocatively and provocatively as fool, and in the second sense of the injunction to compost. If the first usage hurts your sensibilities, feel free to read the first line as குப்பையைப்பெருக்கிக்கூட்டுமுமக்கு: the மக்கு (fool) is replaced with உமக்கு (to you), which is phonologically very close to the original.

The word மறு is also used twice in different senses. It is used in the sense of repetition, specifically, to denote reuse (மறுபயன்); it is also used in the sense of refuse.

The மறுவேறுமீள்பயனி is one place where I take artistic license to coin a term. I first take the word பயன் (use/purpose/benefit) and make it into a non-standard imperative பயனி (make use of); the attested modern form is பயன்படுத்து. Then I combine the words மறுபயன் (reuse), வேறுபயன் (other-purpose/repurpose), and மீள்பயன் (used in some contexts to mean recycle) that mean reuse, repurpose, and recycle into a compact compound மறுவேறுமீள்பயனி.

For rhyme, the twice-repeated consonant ikku/ikki (க்கு/க்கி) appears in the middle and ends of both lines.

The title has some interesting elements too. First it uses யான் and எனது which are classical terms for I and mine (for example, in Kambar’s Ramayanam, யான் எனது என்பாரைக் கூத்தாட்டுவான் – He who makes those who say I and mine dance); the intent is to signal to the reader to read the verse philosophically. There is a rhyming word play in the use of அரிதல் (cut) with எனது (mine) and the phonologically close அறிதல் (knowing) with யான் (I); both words are transcribed as arithal in English, but the two r sounds are the alveolar tap and alveolar trill sounds respectively in Tamil. The title is intended to put the reader immediately in the Vedantic mindset of knowing who I truly am by cutting away the unproductive possessiveness of mine, and eventually letting go of the false identification of ephemeral things with the true I.

The pen name கோவிறை (kovirai), another unattested coinage to map the author’s name to Tamil, is intended to signal the use of words largely of Dravidian origin, which is no longer the norm in modern Tamil.

On the other hand, it is amazing that this verse may be somewhat intellgible to Tamil poets from over 2000 years ago who walked the earth before Jesus; to understand the significance of what I just said, try reading Caedmon’s Hymn, dated to 658-680 CE.

A caveat is that my verse may not follow grammar rules for Tamil poetry (யாப்பிலக்கணம்) and may not be a standard form; and as I said earlier my coinage and non-standard usage could raise eyebrows.

Concluding thought

So what kuppai are you dealing with now, other than this blog, that is?