In The Shadow of the Saints

I got acquainted with the name of Vir Sanghvi when I started reading the magazine entitled Sunday back in 1993. He was the editor of the magazine then, and once wrote an article about the rights of smokers. In it, he clearly mentioned that though himself a non-smoker, he stood for the rights of the smokers and felt that the smokers had a right to smoke if they chose so. I was so impressed with his fairness and balanced view that, for quite a few years after that, I suggested my friends to read his writings.

I never heard the name of Allen Ginsberg until Time magazine carried his obituary in 1997. After that I read his Howl, came to know about his activism during the civil rights movement, have seen his pictire with a young Bob Dylan in Alabama after the burning of 3 black girls in a church there, and read a beautiful tribute by Johnny Depp about Ginsberg and other "bastards" of the beat generation.

Since 1993, Vir Snaghvi has gone a long way: leaving Sunday and shifting to Delhi, talking like a businessman on behanlf of the Hindustan Times group, writing columns praising Amitabh Bachchan and then writing about recipes.

Ginsberg, on the other hand, has got not much chance to change, being dead all the while.

However, since 1993, I have witnessed many saints, who are extremely judgemental of others and who thinks all other people are sinners because those people do things that the saints do not!

This reminds me of Ginsberg's poem, Footnote to Howl, reproduced below.

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Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy!
Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy!
The world is holy! The soul is holy! The skin is holy!
The nose is holy! The tongue and cock and hand and asshole holy!
Everything is holy! everybody's holy! everywhere is
holy! everyday is in eternity! Everyman's an angel!
The bum's as holy as the seraphim! the madman is
holy as you my soul are holy!
The typewriter is holy the poem is holy the voice is
holy the hearers are holy the ecstasy is holy!
Holy Peter holy Allen holy Solomon holy Lucien holy
Kerouac holy Huncke holy Burroughs holy Cas-
sady holy the unknown buggered and suffering
beggars holy the hideous human angels!
Holy my mother in the insane asylum! Holy the cocks
of the grandfathers of Kansas!
Holy the groaning saxophone! Holy the bop
apocalypse! Holy the jazzbands marijuana
hipsters peace & junk & drums!
Holy the solitudes of skyscrapers and pavements! Holy
the cafeterias filled with the millions! Holy the
mysterious rivers of tears under the streets!
Holy the lone juggernaut! Holy the vast lamb of the
middle class! Holy the crazy shepherds of rebell-
ion! Who digs Los Angeles IS Los Angeles!
Holy New York Holy San Francisco Holy Peoria &
Seattle Holy Paris Holy Tangiers Holy Moscow
Holy Istanbul!
Holy time in eternity holy eternity in time holy the
clocks in space holy the fourth dimension holy
the fifth International holy the Angel in Moloch!
Holy the sea holy the desert holy the railroad holy the
locomotive holy the visions holy the hallucina-
tions holy the miracles holy the eyeball holy the abyss!
Holy forgiveness! mercy! charity! faith! Holy! Ours!
bodies! suffering! magnanimity!
Holy the supernatural extra brilliant intelligent
kindness of the soul!
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Sources: http://www.poemhunter.com