That Overwhelming Existence

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“Who if I cried out, would hear me among the angel’s hierarchies?
and even if one of them pressed me suddenly against his heart:
I would be consumed in that overwhelming existence.
For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror which we are still just able to endure.
and we are so awed because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.
Every angel is terrifying.”
(From “Duino Elegies” by Rainer Maria Rilke – Austro-German lyric poet, 1875-1926)

This was shot from the main room leading to the Tomb of the Mughal Emperor Akbar the Great (1555–1605) which is in Sikandra, a suburb of Agra, in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

Whenever my brother Manish and I drive from Delhi to Benaras we often stop there or at the Taj Mahal for a break.
The fun is to try to take pictures of those places with a new angle.
That day the heat was almost unbearable, I went inside the mausoleum hoping to find some freshness, Manish sat at the door surounded by jali screens and I took this picture…

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The Absolute and The Particular

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“All forms of beauty, like all possible phenomena, contain an element of the eternal and an element of the transitory — of the absolute and of the particular.
Absolute and eternal beauty does not exist, or rather it is only an abstraction creamed from the general surface of different beauties.
The particular element in each manifestation comes from the emotions: and just as we have our own particular emotions, so we have our own beauty.”
(Charles Baudelaire – French Poet, 1821-1867)

I’ll never get tired of taking pictures of the Taj Mahal…
This is the absolute embodiment of everything on earth.

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One Eternal Sigh

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“Kingly power is like a cruel bolt of thunder,
Let that fade away like the blood-red sky at dusk,
Let just one eternal sigh remain like sadness in the sky
Wasn’t that all you’d ever asked for?
The glittering jewels cast their spell like an eternal magical mystery.
But even if that does vanish,
Let just one tear drop roll down the cheeks of Time;
The pure light of Taj Mahal.”
(Rabindranath Tagore – Indian Poet, Playwright and Essayist. Won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, 1861–1941)

Endless passion, everlasting love, eternal sigh…the Taj Mahal should remain forever the essence of perfection…
However there is a threat over this image of Heaven as it could collapse within four years because wooden foundations are rotting.
( Read more at www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2045183/Taj-Mahal-collap… )
Nowadays it is almost impossible to take this picture anymore as the army doesn’t allow to go to this side of the Yamuna river.

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The Creators’ Glory

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“Should guilty seek asylum here,
Like one pardoned, he becomes free from sin.
Should a sinner make his way to this mansion,
All his past sins are to be washed away.
The sight of this mansion creates sorrowing sighs;
And the sun and the moon shed tears from their eyes.
In this world this edifice has been made;
To display thereby the creator’s glory.”
(Emperor Shah Jahan)

It is said that Shah Jahan wrote himself this poem about the Taj Mahal that he built for Mumtaz Mahal, his favorite wife (Original Source: Mahajan, Vidya Dhar (1970). Muslim Rule In India. p. 200).
The Taj Mahal seen from the banks of river Yamuna might be a common dream for many but truly this stunning architectural beauty is second to none and each time I come there I simply love it a little more…

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The Gardens of Eden

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“Hail, blessed space happier than the garden of Paradise
Hail lofty buildings higher than the divine throne
A paradise, the garden of which has thousands of Rizwans as servants
A garden of which has thousands of paradise for its land
The pen of the mason of the Divine Deeree has wrotten on its court
These are the gardens of Eden, enter them and Live Forever.”

This is a Persian poem on the third Mughal Emperor’s tomb complex’s entrance gate located in Sikandra in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh from where this picture was shot.
This visual metaphor is a reference to paradise.
It was designed and written on the north facade, the side facing the tomb, by Abd al-Haqq Shirazi who was later known as Amanat Khan when he became the designer of inscriptions on several major Mughal monuments including the Taj Mahal.

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Towards Eternity

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“May his [Akbar's] soul shine like the rays of the sun and the moon in the light of God.”
(Final verse of the Persian inscription on the emperor tomb’s entrance gate)

This is one more picture of the third Mughal Emperor’s tomb in Sikandra in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.
This door shows a long narrow corridor which leads to the basement of the burial chamber where an interior domed chamber contains Akbar the Great’s true sarcophagus.
Although this interior was later whitewashed, it is reported that originally it was painted with Christian subjects including angels and the Virgin Mary, however such images were a matter of fashion and not reflection of religious belief.

Into Light

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“Allah is the Protector of those who have faith: from the depths of darkness He will lead them forth into light.”
(From the Holy Quran – 2.257)

 

Tow lamps are the only furnitures inside the mausoleum complex of the third Mughal emperor Akbar the Great (1542 – 1605).
Therefore it was easy to connect this picture with those symbolic words found in the Holy Quran…
It is located in Sikandra in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

 

 

Abode of Paradise

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“Eden is that old-fashioned house we dwell in every day Without suspecting our abode, until we drive away”
(Emily Dickinson – American Poet, 1830-1886)

 

This is the main room leading to emperor Akbar’s burial place inside the mausoleum located in Sikandra in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.
In the Akbarnāma (the official chronicle of the reign of Akbar the Great, the third Mughal emperor) this monument is mentioned as Behistan or Behistabad which literally means “Abode of Paradise”.

 

 

The Duties of an Emperor

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“Emperor Akbar: Though I am a beloved father to a kind son, I can’t ignore the duties of an emperor.
I cannot change the destiny of India for my son’s love. “
(From the Indian movie “Mughal-e-azam “, 1960)

This Akbar the Great’s cenotaph inside the mausoleum which is located in Sikandra in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.
Per traditions the true tomb lies below this Mughal architectural masterpiece.

A Tear Drop in the Face of Eternity

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Since many years I wanted to take a few pictures of the Taj Mahal from the other side of the Yamuna river and a few days ago I could at last do it while I was going by car from Delhi to Lucknow.
Rabindranath Tagore once said that this wonder of the world was “A tear drop in the face of eternity”, those words allow me to fly away with the birds and to open a new ethereal dream, under a mysterious moonlight…

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