The Moghul Hedonist

by Farzana Moon

  "Look, Nur, nature's miracle! A rare sight observed only by a privileged few." Jahangir declared without taking his eyes off the amorous birds.

  Nur Mahal stirred, following the emperor's gaze, and stepping closer. Her sadness had left, but a nameless languor had clamped her senses to silence. The emperor's arm was slipping around her waist and drawing her closer, though he was still rapt in admiring the incontinence of the heedless birds.

  "Have you ever seen such tenderness in love, my Nur, such wildness too?" Jahangir was murmuring. His lips were grazing against her cheek, but his eyes were locked to the cranes. "How the male is proud and aggressive? Yet, his kisses are tender. Watch, his passionate attempts in taming his mate. Tender, yet wild. Ah, the spilling of passion, the culmination! Look, how the female swoons. The consummation of two tiny souls! In her eyes—small, beady eyes, you can see the bliss? The pain and light supreme? Yet, the mating of our own souls, is it any different?" He pressed her to him.

  "The beauty of our gardens might reveal our hearts to each other? Let us explore their hearts before we discover ours."

  The white, gleaming terraces were the companions of the emperor and Nur Mahal, as they lingered along the paths edged with moss-roses. Behind them were the marble fountains cascading into ripples of light and music. They seemed to be drunk with the wine of nature and savoring each drop into the cups of their silence and nearness. Feeling closer than ever before, they were drifting together in some dream-haze of a paradise newly discovered. More like the night-lovers, they were exchanging confidences, their voices low and tremulous, as if they had just escaped from the jungles of a prying world, and had discovered these gardens as their perfect refuge.

  A few gardeners were coming into view with lamps in their arms to light more paths and terraces which were left neglected. From the distance, they could see the blaze of red ruby in the emperor's turban and a halo of diamonds on Nur Mahal's head. But the emperor and Nur Mahal were entering the grove of pipals interspersed with pomelo and jacaranda trees. They could inhale the scent of jasmine there, with the mingling of perfume from Rat-Ki-Rani. Fields upon fields of more aromatic flowers were coming into view, juhi, ketki, nargis and molsari, just to name a few. The red and white kaner and the bright red ratan manjari appeared to wave at the royal couple, while swaying and swinging in the wind.

  One small courtyard amidst sprawling lawns was the only vantage point where Jahangir halted to admire the glory of his gardens. He was holding Nur Mahal's hand, and his gaze penciling the scenic splendor inside the very canvas of his heart. There were no terraces here, but the neat, round beds of white tuberoses. Jahangir was leaving the courtyard, still holding Nur Mahal's hand. He could see the large cistern in the distance. He himself had ordered this cistern to be hewn out of a single block of sandstone, and to be filled with clear water. This cistern was Nur Mahal's talisman, as much a part of her, as of the emperor. But right now as the emperor was literally dragging her toward it, her heart was breaking under the weight of sadness once again. His gaze was arrested to the carved numbers on the cistern wall, his name engraved in there, and the year sixteen hundred and eleven chiseled in large, bold letters.

  "Do you remember this, my love?" Jahangir's gaze was arrested to the carved letters. "The monument of our love and marriage. My humble wedding present to you, commemorating the year of our marriage." His voice was low and tender.

  "Yes, Your Majesty." Nur Mahal's eyes were brimming with tears. "And the monument of love in Lahore, Anarkali's." One cry of pain was stifled inside her heart.

  "Love!" Jahangir was startled to awareness. "My pearl, my soul." The kindling of fire and agony in his heart was enough to hurl him toward his beloved. "Our bridal night once more, love, this very night, and tears in your eyes." He held her into his arms, kissing away her tears. "For how long would you stay jealous of the dead, my love?”

  "As long as you drown your anguish in wine, Your Majesty, seeking bliss in oblivion." Nur Mahal smiled through her tears.

  "The slayer of my torment, you have slain my heart!" Jahangir declared under some spell of delirium. "And as for wine, my love, it matches not the sweetness on your lips. This ruby nectar, which serves not the emperor's needs when he needs it the most." His lips were scorching hers, the agony of his soul a blaze most savage.

  where no living soul could dare claim it back. He was heartbroken, and incapable of forgetting the unforgettable. Even now, carrying the weight of his long lost love inside his heart, his fair features were haloed by an aura of sadness. His eyes were sparkling, much like the fire of rubies and diamonds in his turban, his features almost gaunt and translucent. He was wearing a silk robe, the jeweled cummerbund at his waist a profusion of color and sparkle. His long, artistic fingers were decked with gold rings, glinting jewels large and precious.

  This bejeweled emperor visiting the tomb of his father in the city of Sikandrah was no other than the eldest son of Great Akbar, Prince Salim himself. After the death of the emperor Akbar, Prince Salim—now styled Jahangir, had acceded to the throne of Agra as the fourth Moghul emperor of Hindustan. Even amidst the jubilations of his accession, he had felt forlorn and lonesome, recalling with profound sadness that it had been seven years since he had lost his beloved, his Anarkali. Seven more years were dissolved into a whirlwind of memories, and Anarkali was still reigning inside his heart like the Queen of love and life. His heart, this afternoon, was throbbing like the heart of a young lover, though he could not return to that bloom of youth in age and time even if he could slice away half the years of his forty-three summers, he was thinking.

  Anarkali, my life and my soul, my very own Anarkali. Angels spoke through her lips when she sang. Thunder and lightning danced in her very eyes when she danced. Oh, how she sailed in the clouds, fair beloved— Jahangir’s thoughts were arresting his beloved's youth, not his own.

  An alien throb of joy and pain was rippling inside the very emptiness of Jahangir’s soul, as he sauntered past the poplars and cypresses toward the tomb of his father. The emperor's heart was on fire as if it was going to leap out of his body and embrace the whole world in its bosom, vast and throbbing. He was becoming aware of the octagonal towers in the distance, looming high over his father' tomb of all marble, where he lay resting in eternal peace. The four gateways of red granite and the open pavilions too were unfolding before his sight in some maze of magic and mystery. A sheet of gold from the very bowl of the sky was gilding the white domes and slender minarets, lending light and warmth to the late emperor whose entire life was spent striving after the light of truth. Jahangir's senses were exploring the light of beauty in Bihishtabad, than following the broken trail of his late father's quest for truth. His gaze was arrested to the ripple of colors in roses, the dark, deep-scented Indian Rose the most glorious of them all. From the vaulted balcony in the distance, the drums and trumpets were already blaring to announce the arrival of the emperor at his father's royal tomb.

  Against these shades of light and color, Jahangir's sight and senses were dissolving into a pool of memories. His thoughts were racing headlong, lurching close to his father's feet in an act of humble obeisance, and then rising aloft like wounded martyrs to crush Anarkali into one eternal embrace. He was caught inside the bubble of time, suspended there in the garden of his youth as a young prince, Prince Salim. His memory was polished like a mirror, reflections upon reflections shifting in there with a painful urgency. Anarkali was singing in the Hall of Mirrors at his father's court. He was sitting beside his father rapt and stricken, arresting each pulse of Anarkali's beauty inside his soul with the longing of a lover gone stark mad! He had poured out his longings before his father, wishing to marry Anarkali, to make her the queen of his heart and soul. But the emperor was incensed. The Great Akbar had forbidden this marriage. He—the Moghul Prince, an heir to the throne of Hind, could not marry this common courtesan! Prince Salim could not make her the queen of his heart and of this world? The Queen, who had usurped the throne insid
e his heart and had begun to reign there like a king and queen all in one? He had fallen ill, the pangs of despair and yearnings cutting the very throbs of his sanity into rags of torments. Great Akbar had relented then, arranging for a private nuptial to appease his son's sufferings. But, alas, the joys of the wedding night were turned into the hot coals of agony. Wearing death as her bridal gown, Anarkali was exiled from this world before dawn could melt into the heart of the sun. Against that haze of a memory, Prince Salim had no recollection of that tragic night and of the days following that tragedy. He had fallen into a coma, remaining insensible for days, and awakening only to receive the savage blow of fate that Anarkali indeed had died. Anarkali had relinquished her beauty to the cold hands of death, and shock and grief had hurled him once again into the bliss of oblivion. Recovering the second time from his comatose state, he had begun to dream as if Anarkali was with him inside each and every breath of his soul and psyche.

  The throne of love in Prince Salim's heart was empty, but he had replaced it with an altar pure where he could weep and lament for his loss in utmost solitude. He had suffered, but he was to suffer more terribly than before under the assault of rumors wild and strange concerning Anarkali's sudden and mysterious death. Many a canards had been afloat here and there, reaching his ears with the fury of the tempests, knocking at the gates of his silent agony with the violence of hurricanes. Anarkali was not dead, even the courtiers had begun to whisper amongst themselves, but was entombed alive inside the dark dungeon of a hole by orders of the emperor himself. Great Akbar was incensed by the defiance of his son and by Anarkali's own defiance in keeping trysts with the prince when she was forbidden to, that's why this punishment was brought upon her by the wrath of the emperor, the court gossip was rampant. Another rumor was that Anarkali was granted clemency from the emperor. That Great Akbar had spared her life, permitting her to live in obscurity as long as Prince Salim could be kept ignorant of her prison-paradise. Prison-paradise was the term they used, for they believed she was banished to some enchanting palace furnished with all sorts of luxuries, so that she would not be tempted to return to her lover. All those rumors were rendered powerless before the naked facts recorded by the court historians that Anarkali had died on the night of her wedding. That her body was transported to Lahore where she was buried in a simple grave with a tombstone depicting her age and tragedy. Slowly and gradually, not even seeking the balm of healing, Prince Salim had succeeded in discarding all rumors, cherishing within the wound of his own tragedy and beloved. Anarkali was with him, inside the purity of his silent love which craved not to witness the tomb of reality. And he had no need to visit her cold grave in Lahore as advised by his friends, who, he knew, wished him to hold on to the hem of reality and not to live in dreams. But he—Prince Salim, had no wish to abandon his dreams. Hoping, that Anarkali would materialize some day like one of the Hindu goddesses from the very waters of Ganges.

  That reed of a hope inside Jahangir's heart, this particular day had awakened, wild and throbbing. It was swollen with the nectar of pain-joy, anticipating some miracle which would transform his whole being into the light of love and serendipity. So intense was this feeling inside him that his gaze seemed to arrest the entire cosmos into one eager embrace. Beholding nature in all its eternalness, which could not cease its rhythm of life, and death, could never tarnish its profusion of scent and beauty in this world. His thoughts were inward-bound, and his gaze admiring the wealth in blooms brimming with the wine of beauty from nature's own treasure-chests. He was approaching close to Akbar's mausoleum, all lofty and exquisite. More than exquisite, it was, as if fashioned by the sorcery of the Titans and finished by the artistry of the jewelers. Jahangir's gaze was alighting on fountains in the distance, their ripple and dance gathering gold from sunshine. Awe and bliss were replacing the sadness in his eyes, but his heart was aching with loneliness, embracing Anarkali with all the sweet pain in living and suffering. Anarkali was with him, his loneliness tasting one small whiff of nostalgia and longing.

  Jahangir’s thoughts were dissolving the scents of longing and nostalgia, sinking deeper to reach the sanctuary of inner peace, but he was not succeeding. Anarkali was gone, leaving behind a vacuum of hope and grief. His heart was clinging to hope. Willing it to live with the promise of love, but it was melting in its pool of silence and vacuity. Even the clumps of roses in bright colors over the trellises appeared dull and lifeless to him, reflecting the inner haze of his misery and loneliness. And yet he should neither feel lonely, nor disconsolate. Jahangir’s thoughts were flashing reproof, reminding him of his harem, boasting many wives. Eleven, thirteen, maybe twenty, and many more wives and concubines, his thoughts were giddy and exploring. A few faces were surfacing in his memory, slashed by the arrows of joys and sorrows. Man Bai, the first wife of his youth, was one portrait of a tragedy. He had loved her truly, and she was devoted to him with a passion as true as his own. She had blessed him with a lovely daughter, Princess Sultanunnisa and a handsome son, Prince Khusrau. Unfortunately, Jahangir's love alone could not keep Man Bai alive. She had committed suicide after a lengthy estrangement from her brother and from her own son, Prince Khusrau.

  Prince Khusrau, an inveterate rebel—even now at the age of twenty-five, was incarcerated in his own palace at Agra. Jahangir's thoughts stumbling on such rugged paths were overwhelming his senses with the weight of fresh sorrow. He was trying to slough off all his past sadness', commanding his thoughts to heed and surrender. His thoughts, against the sheer power of his will, were quick to obey, trampling over the mounds of tragedies and crushing them to invisible lumps, all insignificant. The emperor was sailing toward his father's tomb, his thoughts humbled, ready to pray for peace, for peace within, and for peace of the whole world.

  Baidulat, Baidulat, Jahangir's thoughts were murmuring. Baidulat, meaning unfortunate, was the epithet Jahangir had bestowed upon Prince Khusrau after the undisciplined Prince could not be restrained from the temptations of rebellions.

  The loud music from drums and trumpets was carving its way down the cloistered thoughts in Jahangir's head, and he was becoming aware of the royal entourage behind him. On each side of the emperor were his viziers, Bir Singh Deo and Mahabat Khan. Behind them were Mutamid Khan, the historian, and Abdur Rahim, the chief advisor. The royal guards were keeping their distance, Jahangir was trying to remember their names, but his thoughts were straying down the wounded trails where Prince Khusrau languished unrepentant. Prince Khusrau had raised the banners of rebellion once again not too long ago, and this time he had fallen prey to his own acts of defiance and insurrection. After escaping out of his prison-palace, Prince Khusrau had acted most blatantly, marching onward to Punjab and plotting to capture Lahore with the intention of proclaiming himself the sole sovereign of this city. This was an open act of treason, and though the son of an emperor, he was to be hanged by the unanimous verdict of the Moghul jurists. But the emperor's love for his son was greater than his wrath, and keeping the rod of justice in abeyance, he had requested clemency from the judges to spare the life of his first-born son. The emperor's request could not be denied, and Prince Khusrau's life was spared in ransom for his sight. Prince Khusrau was blinded by the orders of the judges, and then incarcerated under strict vigilance.

  Blinded! My son, my Prince. One painless murmur was escaping the silence in Jahangir's thoughts. Turning abruptly, his gaze was holding Mahabat Khan captive. "Mahabat, what's the name of that physician from Persia?" He was resuming his walk toward the square platform of white marble.

  "Hakim Sadra, Your Majesty." Was Mahabat Khan's quick response.

  "He is a skilled surgeon, working wonders beyond belief. Command him, Mahabat, to restore the sight of Prince Khusrau." Jahangir intoned dreamily.

  The emperor stood by the wall of marble latticework, his gaze arrested to the glory of garden down below where the fountains serenaded the flowers. And the fields upon fields of oleander were reaching out to embrace the gleaming terrac
es, it seemed.

  "Yes, Your Majesty." Mahabat Khan's low response remained unacknowledged by the emperor.

  The emperor was floating ahead toward the great vault, graceful and dream-like, the royal entourage following at his heels. The music from the balconies above was flooding the vault with notes sad and sweet. Sounding like the chant of hymnals, half pensive, half jubilant! Man Singh had edged closer to Mahabat Khan, more so to gain the emperor's attention than to seek the company of this reticent vizier. Abdur Rahim and Bir Singh Deo were lingering a few paces behind the emperor, mindful of the etiquette in not getting too close to the royal monarch until he himself wished to summon them closer. And the emperor did not, as it was obvious, for Jahangir stood facing the cenotaph, his expression aloof and contemplative. His gaze was sweeping over the gold inscriptions where the ninety-nine names and attributes of God shone pure and bright, but he was not reading them, only fascinated by the artistry of calligraphy. His thoughts were retracing their steps, getting lost into the vast chambers of his own palaces and gardens, and melting inside the surge of faces and names.

  Nurunnisa, Khairunnisa, Salihah Banu, Malika Jahan— Jahangir's thoughts were entering the harem of his lovely wives. Many youthful brides, twenty of them lawful, the rest concubines— His very senses were feeling a whiff of ache and memory.

  The names of his beautiful wives were some allusive jingle in the emperor's head, a few faces emerging and dissolving. All haze and loveliness with sparkling eyes! A pair of lovely eyes was mocking him, Man Bai's? They were tearing the shroud of death and surcease, flashing accusations at her ever-estranged son, the unfortunate Prince Khusrau. Jahangir's own eyes were gathering arrows of defense and aiming to slay the impudent thoughts ambushed somewhere inside the dark recesses of his mind. The vision of pain was gone. His thoughts were closing shut the tomb of the dead, and gasping for breath to enter the tomb of the living. Prince Khusrau, along with Man Bai was banished from his mind's sight by the sheer volition of his thoughts, now humbled.