Jaded musings on love and loss at the Taj Mahal-- December 17th 2008

In the fog of the early morning, the Taj Mahal appears ghostly, like something out of a dream ill remembered in the light of day. Literally it felt to me like I was sleeping, and at any moment I could wake and it would dissappear. As the first sun hits the towering white marble, it takes on a more tangible quality, and is luminous like a beacon. When Melville listed the multitude of meanings for the color white, he neglected to mention that white symbolizes mourning for some (widows wear white in India) in addition to it's well known connotations of purity. In this case it seems to me that the connotation of "purity" associated with the whiteness of the Taj Mahal embody the idea that love can last forever when it ends with someone's premature death.

The Taj Mahal, or so the story goes, is a monument to love. Emperor Shah Jahan married his true love in 1620-something, only to watch her die giving birth to their son, or so I gleaned from various tourguides whose tirades washed in and out of my ears like the tide as my thoughts turned elsewhere. I couldn't help but think about my own loves and how impermanent they have all turned out to be. Before Mumtaz Mahal died in childbirth, an event she herself foresaw, she made her husband promise to build something enduring for her as a testament to their eternal love. The Taj Mahal was born in this fashion, but it took 22 years and over 20,000 men to build. I was reminded of the immortal work I myself created for my first girlfriend in high school, a gold pendant with a Saphire symbolizing her September birthday. I heard later, after I broke it off with her fearing that she would leave me behind as she was ahead of me in school, that she had tossed it in the lake on the golf course near my house. Maybe that was a daydream or something I told myself in order to get over it more quickly, but I seem to be powerless over what I believe and remember. Just like I cannot disbelieve the myths of the Taj Mahal even though most of them are reputedly false. The myth states that the flowers depicted on the outside of the building, constructed from inlaid glorious semi-precious stones in white marble, weep and sag in mourning over the death of Mumtaz Mahal instead of standing turgidly in the natural way of happy flowers. It was said that all of the flowers planted around the mausoleum that housed her body wept in this fashion, refusing to bloom in the manner befitting their nature. I believe it simply because I like the story, much like we all choose the fiction of belief in our own ways.

I got Jen the Saphire pendant, for Holly I also chose jewelry-- in the form of a "dablam" from Ama Dablam, after one of my trips to Nepal. I even went so far as to cut out a small picture of myself and place it inside the "charm box" (or locket) of the necklace so that she would remember me whenever she wanted. I'm sure she mostly chooses to forget these days. For Anna, I got a camera-- a vast step down in terms of romance. Maybe the pictures will last forever, if nothing else.

Somewhere during the 22 years spent on construction of the Taj, the Emperor was imprisoned by his own son who usurped power believing his father to have been driven mad by grief. The Emperor had of course demonstrated his lack of sanity by bankrupting all of India in his insistence on building an enduring beautiful thing. While people starved in the streets, construction of the Taj continued at great national cost to the citizenry of India. So for his madness, he was imprisoned in the Agra Fort, across the river where he spent his remaining days viewing his creation-- through the tiny window of a cell.

So too have I surrendered to the memories of love when love is gone, and dreams that keep me awake at night. Despite my very strong apathy in other realms, with love, I live with a total inabilty to forget or to stop caring. My imagination and memory are paradoxically more powerful than the world I live in, a world that gets colder and colder every day. But such is the fate of those of us who dedicate our energies to the pursuit of beautiful things, and foolishly believe that they will somehow endure.

As I type these words, so hastily concieved, it occurs to me that I do not know how to finish this entry. My feelings in this realm are so incomplete, it would be impossible to give you something that would resonate with the kind of truth I usually aim for. But I'll go ahead and publish this to you, dear reader, so that you might look at all the pretty pictures and feel happy, if only for a moment.