On loss, memory, and the beauty of absence
“……But poetry, beauty, romance, love… These are what we stay alive for,” says Keating to a bunch of ardent boys huddled around him.
This oft-quoted line from the movie Dead Poets’ Society highlights the experience of being human. We are able to feel, express and create reflections of our feelings; and this is one of the greatest boons bequeathed to us! Absence imbues all poetry, beauty, romance and love with poignancy. Often associated with grief and loss, absence is perceived negatively, but it has its own colours. Some are temporary, which make changes to the canvas of our life, and some are permanent, whose streaks we carry with us throughout. But absence is a beautiful thing, as The Little Prince (a character from a novella of the same name) says, “…..but this is the very condition of existence. To become spring, means accepting the risk of winter. To become presence, means accepting the risk of absence.” Absence enhances the beauty of the intricacies of human existence and relationships, and isn’t that why it is the best muse for poetry and art?
Temporary absence is a wait, a story paused and waiting to be fulfilled. It gives a person the hope of reunion with their cherished people, lands, or experiences. Distance sweetens the bond, giving a sense of longing and something to look forward to. It reminds me of an excerpt from a story I had read as a child:
“Why is saying goodbye so tough?” asked the rabbit with a sigh. The buttercup smiled a quiet yellow smile and said, “Goodbyes are said with the hope of hellos again. Every time I say bye to you, my mind always thinks of when I’ll be seeing you next, talking to you next, and this gives me something to look forward to, so goodbyes are not that bad.”
The colours of temporary absence are warm and comforting, and it does one good to feel them till the person is back in your life again. These little and multiple absences are the ones that add streaks of love and perseverance to the canvas of one’s life. These colours are splashed in a letter a wife writes to her husband who’s battling on the borders, a father who keeps his daughter’s room spick and span for when she comes back home from college break, a flower that awaits the sunrise, a parched earth that yearns for the rain, a refugee’s longing for their land and countless others. The delicacy of it all is summed up splendidly in a dialogue in the movie Dil Se (1998) when Shah Rukh Khan says to his lady love, “…..aur sabse jyada pasand mujhe ye doori hai…kyunki agar ye doori na ho, toh tumhare kareeb aane ka bahana na mile” (…..and what I like the most is this distance (absence) between us…because if it is not present, there is no excuse for me to come closer to you).
And just as it is said that a journey is more important to appreciate and enjoy than the actual destination, the wait for the absence to cease is more precious and intensely coloured than the actual cessation of absence. Albeit technology has reduced this absence to a wordplay of fingertips or a face on the screen, nothing can replace the deeply visceral happiness of having something’s or someone’s physical presence near us.
Permanent absence comes with the colours of grief, death, loss and memory. These are felt deeply, and their sharpness fades only through acceptance. The permanent absence of a place, person or thing is resurrected through art and memory. Beauty lies in rediscovering the person, preserving them and lessening absence through reminiscent pieces of memories, photos, voice/sounds and poetry musings.
Nostalgia is a powerful comfort cocoon, able to transport you across eras, arresting you in times past. The colours of permanent absence dissolve in a childhood smell, a shared song, a familiar sight, a friendly touch of all things home. And just like that, one day your eyes don’t well up at the thought or memory of the absence; it just brings with itself the warmth of a void, and the absence becomes a part of your life. These colourful splotches change the alchemy of life’s canvas. There’s a red of pain, a black of grief, but there’s also soft pinks and blues of maturity and acceptance. And to have a canvas saturated with different hues is always better than a stark white one.
Experiencing and being the absence, thus, captures the essence of being human and enriches our ability to feel. Not being able to experience these shades of life is possibly the greatest penury of all.
Edited by Amirtha Varshini V C
Article 19 