Chitra, a Play in One Act-2

Arjuna

Why, by what danger are you threatened?

Villagers

The robbers are pouring from the northern hills like a mountain

flood to devastate our village.

Arjuna

Have you in this kingdom no warden?

Villagers

Princess Chitra was the terror of all evil doers. While she was

in this happy land we feared natural deaths, but had no other

fears. Now she has gone on a pilgrimage, and none knows where to

find her.

Arjuna

Is the warden of this country a woman?

Villagers

Yes, she is our father and mother in one.

[Exeunt.

Enter CHITRA.

Chitra

Why are you sitting all alone?

Arjuna

I am trying to imagine what kind of woman Princess Chitra may be.

I hear so many stories of her from all sorts of men.

Chitra

Ah, but she is not beautiful. She has no such lovely eyes as

mine, dark as death. She can pierce any target she will, but not

our hero's heart.

Arjuna

They say that in valour she is a man, and a woman in tenderness.

Chitra

That, indeed, is her greatest misfortune. When a woman is merely

a woman; when she winds herself round and round men's hearts with

her smiles and sobs and services and caressing endearments; then

she is happy. Of what use to her are learning and great

achievements? Could you have seen her only yesterday in the

court of the Lord Shiva's temple by the forest path, you would

have passed by without deigning to look at her. But have you

grown so weary of woman's beauty that you seek in her for a man's

strength?

With green leaves wet from the spray of the foaming waterfall, I

have made our noonday bed in a cavern dark as night. There the

cool of the soft green mosses thick on the black and dripping

stone, kisses your eyes to sleep. Let me guide you thither.

Arjuna

Not today, beloved.

Chitra

Why not today?

Arjuna

I have heard that a horde of robbers has neared the plains.

Needs must I go and prepare my weapons to protect the frightened

villagers.

Chitra

You need have no fear for them. Before she started on her

pilgrimage, Princess Chitra had set strong guards at all the

frontier passes.

Arjuna

Yet permit me for a short while to set about a Kshatriya's work.

With new glory will I ennoble this idle arm, and make of it a

pillow more worthy of your head.

Chitra

What if I refuse to let you go, if I keep you entwined in my

arms? Would you rudely snatch yourself free and leave me? Go

then! But you must know that the liana, once broken in two,

never joins again. Go, if your thirst is quenched. But, if not,

then remember that the goddess of pleasure is fickle, and waits

for no man. Sit for a while, my lord! Tell me what uneasy

thoughts tease you. Who occupied your mind today? Is it Chitra?

Arjuna

Yes, it is Chitra. I wonder in fulfilment of what vow she has

gone on her pilgrimage. Of what could she stand in need?

Chitra

Her needs? Why, what has she ever had, the unfortunate creature?

Her very qualities are as prison walls, shutting her woman's

heart in a bare cell. She is obscured, she is unfulfilled. Her

womanly love must content itself dressed in rags; beauty is

denied her. She is like the spirit of a cheerless morning,

sitting upon the stony mountain peak, all her light blotted out

by dark clouds. Do not ask me of her life. It will never sound

sweet to man's ear.

Arjuna

I am eager to learn all about her. I am like a traveller come to

a strange city at midnight. Domes and towers and garden-trees

look vague and shadowy, and the dull moan of the sea comes

fitfully through the silence of sleep. Wistfully he waits for

the morning to reveal to him all the strange wonders. Oh, tell

me her story.

Chitra

What more is there to tell?

Arjuna

I seem to see her, in my mind's eye, riding on a white horse,

proudly holding the reins in her left hand, and in her right a

bow, and like the Goddess of Victory dispensing glad hope all

round her. Like a watchful lioness she protects the litter at

her dugs with a fierce love. Woman's arms, though adorned with

naught but unfettered strength, are beautiful! My heart is

restless, fair one, like a serpent reviving from his long

winter's sleep. Come, let us both race on swift horses side by

side, like twin orbs of light sweeping through space. Out from

this slumbrous prison of green gloom, this dank, dense cover of

perfumed intoxication, choking breath.

Chitra

Arjuna, tell me true, if, now at once, by some magic I could

shake myself free from this voluptuous softness, this timid bloom

of beauty shrinking from the rude and healthy touch of the world,

and fling it from my body like borrowed clothes, would you be

able to bear it? If I stand up straight and strong with the

strength of a daring heart spurning the wiles and arts of twining

weakness, if I hold my head high like a tall young mountain fir,

no longer trailing in the dust like a liana, shall I then appeal

to man's eye? No, no, you could not endure it. It is better

that I should keep spread about me all the dainty playthings of

fugitive youth, and wait for you in patience. When it pleases

you to return, I will smilingly pour out for you the wine of

pleasure in the cup of this beauteous body. When you are tired

and satiated with this wine, you can go to work or play; and when

I grow old I will accept humbly and gratefully whatever corner is

left for me. Would it please your heroic soul if the playmate of

the night aspired to be the helpmeet of the day, if the left arm

learnt to share the burden of the proud right arm?

Arjuna

I never seem to know you aright. You seem to me like a goddess

hidden within a golden image. I cannot touch you, I cannot pay

you my dues in return for your priceless gifts. Thus my love is

incomplete. Sometimes in the enigmatic depth of your sad look,

in your playful words mocking at their own meaning, I gain

glimpses of a being trying to rend asunder the languorous grace

of her body, to emerge in a chaste fire of pain through a

vaporous veil of smiles. Illusion is the first appearance of

Truth. She advances towards her lover in disguise. But a time

comes when she throws off her ornaments and veils and stands

clothed in naked dignity. I grope for that ultimate you, that

bare simplicity of truth.

Why these tears, my love? Why cover your face with your hands?

Have I pained you, my darling? Forget what I said. I will be

content with the present. Let each separate moment of beauty

come to me like a bird of mystery from its unseen nest in the

dark bearing a message of music. Let me for ever sit with

my hope on the brink of its realization, and thus end my days.

SCENE IX

CHITRA and ARJUNA

Chitra [cloaked]

My lord, has the cup been drained to the last drop? Is this,

indeed, the end? No, when all is done something still remains,

and that is my last sacrifice at your feet.

I brought from the garden of heaven flowers of incomparable

beauty with which to worship you, god of my heart. If the rites

are over, if the flowers have faded, let me throw them out of the

temple [unveiling in her original male attire]. Now, look

at your worshipper with gracious eyes.

I am not beautifully perfect as the flowers with which I

worshipped. I have many flaws and blemishes. I am a

traveller in the great world-path, my garments are dirty,

and my feet are bleeding with thorns. Where should I achieve

flower-beauty, the unsullied loveliness of a moment's life? The

gift that I proudly bring you is the heart of a woman. Here have

all pains and joys gathered, the hopes and fears and shames of a

daughter of the dust; here love springs up struggling toward

immortal life. Herein lies an imperfection which yet is noble

and grand. If the flower-service is finished, my master, accept

this as your servant for the days to come!

I am Chitra, the king's daughter. Perhaps you will remember the

day when a woman came to you in the temple of Shiva, her body

loaded with ornaments and finery. That shameless woman came to

court you as though she were a man. You rejected her; you did

well. My lord, I am that woman. She was my disguise. Then by

the boon of gods I obtained for a year the most radiant form that

a mortal ever wore, and wearied my hero's heart with the burden

of that deceit. Most surely I am not that woman.

I am Chitra. No goddess to be worshipped, nor yet the

object of common pity to be brushed aside like a moth with

indifference. If you deign to keep me by your side in the path

of danger and daring, if you allow me to share the great duties

of your life, then you will know my true self. If your babe,

whom I am nourishing in my womb be born a son, I shall myself

teach him to be a second Arjuna, and send him to you when the

time comes, and then at last you will truly know me. Today I can

only offer you Chitra, the daughter of a king.

Arjuna

Beloved, my life is full.