Chhanda or measured poetry: 7

|| shriihariH ||

Recap

The previous posts discussed counting syllables, parsing sentences in sanskrit into syllables, making regular or irregular patterns of syllables to form various types of poetry, and highlighted examples. This post will discuss some exceptions to the rules and other advanced issues.

yati: Pause

yati is a place in a charaNa where recitation should be paused (momentarily). This requires the word preceding yati to end at its location. There are certain chhanda which exclusively place restriction on pause-location. However, some philosophers and poets have ignored yati and thus following this notion is optional. Some poets don't agree to this notion while others do. First, a chhanda with a yati will be exemplified. Then an exception to yati will be presented.

Example of yati:

The chhanda maalinii has the following syllable pattern in each charaNa with a pause, termination of word, at the hyphen

1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 - 1 2 2 1 2 2 1 2 2.

An example of maalinii chhanda is as follows. For convenience yati has been marked with a hyphen:

atulitabaladhaamaM - haimashailaabhadehaM |
danujavanakRRishaanuM - GYaaninaamagragaNyaM ||
sakalaguNanidhaanaM - vaanaraaNaamadhiishaM |
raghupatipriyabhaktaM - vaatajaataM namaami ||

Goswami Tulsidas, ``Ramcharitmanas''

A counterexample to observing pause at the end of a charaNa, for example, is from saMkaShTanaashanaM stotraM:

bhuja~ngeshatalpeshayaayaarkachandra-
dvinetraaya tasmai nataaH smo nataaH smaH |

There should have been a termination of word at the hyphen but the rule has not been observed. There are more examples of non-observance of yati which this post will not exemplify.

Allowed exceptions

Consider the charaNa from bhavaanyaShTakaM which is in the bhuja~ngaprayaata chhanda:

gatistvaM gatistvaM tvamekaa bhavaani |

According to the chhanda-rule, the charaNa should parse as {1 2 2} X 4. However, the charaNa parses as 1 2 2 1 2 2 1 2 2 1 2 1. That is, the last syllable is short instead of long. Recall that whole motivation behind chhanda-poetry was to make poems tunable. A short syllable in the end can be stressed while singing and hence it can act as long even though it was short. Thus, the following exception is allowed

The last syllable of any charaNa is flexible to be short or long

Creating personal exceptions

As the motivation discussed, the intention of chhanda-poetry is to make the songs tunable. Once you fix the syllable pattern, there can be tough to pronounce charaNa in proper pattern and there can be a tunable charaNa with one error in the metric structure. For example, the following perfect poetry pattern is a tongue teaser:

kadaMbakumkumadravata praliptadigvadhumukhe |,

Ravan, ``Shivatandavastotra''

while the following syllable wise imperfect poetry can be sung just as nicely as any paMchachaamara chhanda:

nikaama *shyaama sundaraM |
bhavaaMbunaatha mandaraM |

Tulsidas, ``Sriramcharitmanas''

The location of the syllable error has been starred. Based on personal discussions, the author recommends to deviate from rules, not more than once in each pada, if it does not impedes the recitation or if it enhances recitation. Impediment is personal opinion, however, to make poetry timeless, it is very important that this subjective personal opinion be true for the avid readers.

maatrik chhanda

The curious reader must have noticed the omission of maatrika chhanda, the chhanda with constant number of syllables in each charaNa. The concepts remain the same, except that the syllable lengths are omitted from consideration. It is, in some sense, weaker form of poetry.

Moric chhanda

There are many chhanda which allow for a long syllable to be replaced by two short syllables. These chhanda are many. However, one should take extreme precaution in treating a chhanda as a moric-chhanda. For example, a paMchachaamara chhanda should not be used as a moric chhanda. Some classic examples from chhanda having this flexibility in syllable weights are:

shriiraamachandra kRRipaalu bhaja -
mana harana bhava-bhaya-daaruNaM |
navakanjalochana kanjamukha -
karakanja padakanjaaruNaM ||

Tulsidas, ``Vinaypatrika''

satyaM GYaanamanantaM -
nityamanaakaashaM paramaakaashaM |
goShThapraa~ngaNari~ngaNalola-
manaayaasaM paramaayaasaM ||
maayaakalpitanaanaakarama-
naakaaraM bhuvanaakaaraM |
kshmaayaanaathamanaathaM pranamat.h-
govindaM paramaanandaM ||

Adi Shankaracharya, ``Govindashtakam''

In Retrospect

It was great to emphasize and illustrate various types of chhanda, in slight depth, to my blog readers. The author is thankful to all the readers, and especially the ones who provided feedback. Hope to hear more from you in future.

|| shriihariH ||