There Are No Pockets in the Grave

To mark the passing of Naushad-saab, one of the oldest and most talented music composers that India has ever known, the RKB show on the Sahara news channel featured Tabassum, a famous TV personality and the perfect picture of a woman who has aged with the utmost finesse and dignity. In her inimitable style, this glorious lady cited numerous anecdotes on the kind of role that the departed had played in her life and on the quality of their interactions. What struck me as particularly beautiful was the spontaneity with which she recited numerous "shers" (short couplets in Urdu that are composed so as to communicate entire volumes of meaning in concise, poetic bundles) as different ideas came to her mind.

One of these little marvels, has etched itself firmly in my mind. I will not attempt to rewrite the same using English letters, because that will probably kill the aesthetic appeal of the piece, but I will be so bold as to attempt an interpretation. Tabassum's sher was dedicated to all those who spend their lifetimes hoarding wealth and guarding their hoards jealously and it simply meant:

"Earn lots of money, diamonds and pearls,
But remember, there is no pocket in the grave"

My crude and quite literal interpretation does little justice to the exquisite format of the original Urdu composition, but it does highlight the essential meaning. Wealth and material possessions that are amassed for their own sake and to slake the ever increasing thirst of the hoarder will be useless when death comes calling. At the point of death, all the riches of the world are meaningless and will not accompany the body to its final resting place (If you're the foolishly argumentative kind - the way I can sometimes be myself - you might wonder why the ancient Egyptians, in all their wisdom buried their dead with most of their material possessions...but we'll leave that for another discussion!). Wealth that is not shared or put to productive use while the owner of that wealth is alive, is useless and in fact harmful in that it captures the mind of the owner...soon making him/her the "owned"...I won't go much further into this concept, because I wrote about it in "The Folly of a Diamond", a few months ago. I hope you relate to it!