Today's Beautiful Gem: An example of "Garbhakavitva" from
Nandi Timmana's `Paarijaataapaharanam' (The stealing of the Parijata tree)

"vaasudevaa ghanasvacchakaantee ramaa
vaasa vamsasvaravyaktavedakramaa
raasalaasyaprakaarapraveenodyamaa
vaasavaadistutavyaktanaamaa namah

"You have the pure radiance of clouds;
you are the abode of Lakshmi;
the notes from your flute sound like Vedic chants;
you are skilled in the dance of `raasa';
your name has been chanted by gods such as Indra;
O Krishna, my salutations to you."

Note: In the form given above, the metre of the verse is `sragvini'
with the pattern -*--*--*--*- (- long syllable; * short syllable).
If the concluding word `namah' is tagged to the beginning to read:
"namah vaasudevaa....kaantee/ ramaavaasa....veda/
kramaaraasa....praveeno/ dyamaavaasa....naamaa/",
the metre becomes `bhujangaprayaata' whose metrical pattern is
*--*--*--*--. Such poetry is called `garbhakavitva' or loosely
expressed, kangaroo poetry. These poetic feats, although quite
interesting and dificult to achieve, were only curiosities
for a long time. With recent advances in molecular bilogy, such
patterns are observed in protein and nucleic acid sequences. In a
mathematical sense, the concepts are similar. (As a trivial
example, one can verify that there are only eight ways of combining
three short or long syllables, called `gana's or syllabic groups
and there are only sixty-four ways of combining three four letter
alpahbetic chemical groups called codons.)

Om Saantih! Peace! - J. K. Mohana Rao

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