To those whose voices are subjected to naught

A Literary Venture Not Meant To Promote War, Terror, God, And Ghost

This site www.thanalonline.com is a realization of a long-cherished dream. I wanted to create this a flawless literary venture, just as anyone else would have wanted. Poets have cooperated abundantly, if I may say so. Poets from South Africa have shown a particular liking for this site and me. Perhaps the feeling of oneness created by centuries of common imperialist subjection and subjugation. Joop Bersee has helped a lot, by asking his friends to write and by calling upon the poets around the globe to cooperate. I don’t express thanku to Joop; it would be an abnormal formality.

It is as difficult to collect matter for publication, as it is difficult to get one’s creations published. I have rejected only two or three poems that were sent to me for publication. I believe that generally there are no bad poems and bad stories. All works published are good, and all works remaining unpublished are bad ones! There could not be more idiotic a conception than this. We have received so many poems and other writings, due to the time and space constraints we can not include all in this issue; you can expect those in forthcoming issues.

In the course of the work for this site I could come in contact with a poet Rati Saxena. For her poems always stand on her shoulders ready to fly on her hints. And they fly to the hearts of men and women who could understand what is love. This time the editor’s choice in English consists of three small poems by Ratiji Her works are given in the general English and Malayalam sections. She is the editor of the site Kritya.in published both in Hindi and English. She is a great Sanskrit Scholar and a great poet in Hindi.

Besides Joop Bersee and Ratiji, Winston Mzikayise, Joneve McCorck, Michael Yuan, Meena Kandasamy, Santharam, Usha Kishore and others also have cooperated with me by sending their poems. Joop Bersee is the editor of the famous South African Web Magazine, www.southernrainpoetry.com. I am very much gratified that I could read his poems, translate hem into Malayalam and publish a book of his poems. I have given a write-up on Bersee poetry in this issue of www.thanalonline.com.

The poet’s choice in Malayalam section is a poem by the well-known Malayalam poet Thirunellur Karunakaran. This poem is a pain, a pang and a beauty that penetrated into my heart some four decades ago. It is the “Sorrow of A Rose”(Oru Panineerpoovinte Dukham”). I had worked with Thirunellur in the Advisory Council to Kerala Cultural Publication Departments. perhaps he does not even remember me. I choose this poem as my choice in this issue. I hope he would not object, as I could not collect his permission to do so.

This site is dedicated To those whose voices are subjected to naught. It is A Literary Venture Not Meant To Promote War, Terror, God, And Ghost. Except a few people like President George Bush, mankind as a whole is against war. Slaughter of men, women and children are a joke to the warmongers of the world. But for us it is not. The terrible slaughter and the unnumbered wounded in the battlefields of various countries lacerate our hearts. The hinterlands of Afghanistan and the streets of Iraq are stained with the innocent blood. And then after killing we tell the world that we would punish the killers, after committing follies we could tell the world that we have committed follies and we would not correct those follies and we would not compensate them. War creates Terror and in its turn terror creates war. Both are mutually contributory and complementary. Therefore we eschew both fully aware that both annihilate human culture and human attainments through millennia. God does not require the help of man. We could have asked God some four-to-five questions on what was happening to this world as Vaikkom Muhammad Basheer had done in his celebrated work, Sandhya Pranamam. But this would not solve the problems of humanity. And, as to the Ghosts, are we not ourselves a few? We need not fear them, praise them or ridicule them; there is no use.

I earnestly request that readers make use of all facilities provided by this site. I should thank many. The history of this site in the present form is very short. One day, after I visited www.harithakam.com, I received a mail from someone querying whether I am interested in creating a site. It must be Sunil Prabhakar. I have not yet met the man. Behind the scenes are Jayadevan and Jayasree, I presume. O! What an editor this is! I know you would ask, but this would suffice, I believe in man; otherwise how could I get cooperation from Africa and America? Just imagine how great it is to get a thing done in this way in a time when not an iota of faith and belief is retained among human beings. I thank Madanan for the beautiful design of a shade for this site.

Nothing more is required in this editorial.

C.P.Aboobacker, Editor