About the poet:
Arun Kolatkar who was born in Kolhapur in Maharashtra was a famous Indian English poet as well as an artist of repute. He was a bilingual poet as he wrote poems both in English and in Marathi,his mother tongue. His "Jejuri" , a well-known collection of poems, is praised in high term by the poets and critics like Nissim Ezekiel and Salman Rushdie and bagged him the Commonwealth poetry Prize. The poem "Chaitanya" is included in the collection "Jejuri".
The poem "Chaitanya"
come off it
said chaitanya to a stone
in stone language
wipe the red paint off your face
i don't think the colour suits you
i mean what's wrong
with being just a plain stone
i'll still bring you flowers
you like the flowers of zendu
don't you
i like them too.
Summary & Interpretation: Sree Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (Chaitanya) , the Avatar of Bengal in India is the speaker here and he addresses a deity made of stone in a very simple and casual manner but in 'stone language'. It is 'stone language' as it is only understood by the stone image of god, it is ineffective to the ordinary human beings.He requests the deity to be detached from him/her present state of manifestation.
Once again he requests the deity to wipe off the red colour , the vermilion , from his/her face as the red colour does not fit the stone, it is unbecoming to the deity. It would look better if the deity becomes a 'plain stone ', not besmeared with vermilion. No wrong is found by Chaitanya if the stone image becomes a plain stone. A plain stone would rather become appropriate and acceptable universally.
Chaitanya promises the stone deity that he would still bring him/her beautiful flowers, the 'zendu' flower, no matter whether the stone is being besmeared with vermilion or not . He likes 'zendu' flower and god too would like the 'zendu' flower.
The stone is not the ordinary stone, it stands for the deity. The so-called image of a deity which is made glossy with oil and vermilion come to the mind. This stone-deity is worshiped by common people as the living god. Here we find the objection of Chaitanya. The red colour or the vermilion is used as an essential element of worshiping of one or more commu -nity. We find only the touch of religious rites in besmearing of vermilion on the stone deity. All these are paganism.
First Chaitanya requests the stone-image to "wipe the red paint" and then says in interrogative form what is the wrong if the image becomes a plain stone. A plain stone-image would be more becoming , more meaningful and more dignified. We know that Chaitanya was the 'Avtar of Love' (Premabatar) and love (Prem) is the only way to reach to God, as he said. No religious rite and aids are necessary for gaining God's grace. For this, Chaitanya says, it is not wrong with being just a plain stone without vermilion. So far we know vermilion is a worshiping material particularly to Hindu. If the stone-image is thoroughly besmeared with vermilion the people of other religious faith and creed may avoid the image as their own. Chaitanya disliked any caste and creed barrier among people and he embraced everyone irrespective of shape, complexion, caste, creed and race. The way of religion was very simple and straight to him and he preached the same to his followers.
It may be that the stone-image in not merely a stone to Chaitanya because he visualized the living god in image , in all material existence. For this mental state and devotion he utters in this poem : " you like the flowers of zendu / don't you" Actually Chaitanya finds living God in the stone.
