Vemana: One true gem is enough

Told in English, Telugu.

In a small village near Kadapa, where the fields turn gold just before Sankranti, there lived a girl named Sravya. She was seven years old, she had two long plaits, and she loved her Thatayya more than anyone in the whole world.

One afternoon she came running home from school, her slate bag bumping against her back.

"Thatayya! Thatayya! There is going to be a padyam contest for Sankranti! Every child has to say Vemana poems in front of the whole school!"

Thatayya was sitting on the thinnai, shelling groundnuts. He smiled. "That is wonderful, chitti thalli. How many poems will you say?"

Sravya's face fell. "That is the problem. Bhanu says he will say ten poems. Ten! He is already practising. I only know two, and I always mix up the middle lines."

Bhanu was her cousin from the next street. He was nine, he was very quick, and he liked to win.

Thatayya put down the groundnuts. "Come inside. I want to show you something."

He opened the old wooden almirah and took out a rusty tin box. Sravya had never seen it before. He lifted the lid. Inside were dozens of little stones, red ones and green ones and yellow ones.

"When I was a boy, about your age," said Thatayya, "I went to the Tirunalla fair. A man there was selling stones that glittered like stars. I spent every coin I had and filled my pockets. I thought I was the richest boy in the village."

Sravya picked one up. It was scratched and cloudy, like a dirty window. "But Thatayya, they don't shine at all."

"No," he said softly. "They were only coloured glass. In one year, they had all gone dull."

Then he called out, "Ammaa, come here a minute!"

Nanamma came in, wiping her hands on her saree. Thatayya pointed to the ring on her finger. In the middle sat one small blue stone, deep blue, like the sky just after sunset.

"I gave her this on our wedding day," said Thatayya. "Fifty years ago. It is a real sapphire, a neelam. Look at it now."

Nanamma held up her hand to the window. The little stone caught the light and sparkled, as bright as if it were new.

"One true stone," said Thatayya, "and a whole box of shiny ones. Which is worth more?"

"The one," whispered Sravya.

"Our Vemana said the very same thing, hundreds of years ago," said Thatayya. "Listen.

Nikkamaina manchi neelamokkati chaalu, taluku beluku raallu tattedela? Chaatu padyamilanu chaaladaa okkati, Vishwadabhirama vinura Vema.

He is saying, one real, good sapphire is enough. Why carry a whole basket of glittering stones? And in the same way, one good poem, truly understood, is enough. Can you say the first line with me?"

"Nikkamaina manchi neelamokkati chaalu," said Sravya slowly.

Every evening after that, Sravya sat with Thatayya and learned that one poem. She learned every word. She learned what each word meant. She said it to the cow, to the tulasi plant, and to her baby brother, who only laughed and clapped.

But sometimes, at night, she worried. Bhanu will say ten, she thought. I will say only one. Everyone will laugh at me.

At last Sankranti morning came. The school yard was decorated with mango leaves, and bright muggulu covered the ground. All the parents sat on mats under the neem tree.

Bhanu went first. He stood up very straight and began. The poems came out of him like a train rushing past, one, two, three, four, so fast that nobody could catch the words. On the sixth poem, he stopped. He opened his mouth. He closed it. The seventh poem had disappeared from his head.

The yard went very quiet.

The teacher, Lakshmi garu, said kindly, "That is all right, Bhanu. Can you tell us what your first poem means?"

Bhanu looked at his feet. "I don't know, teacher," he said in a tiny voice. "I only learned the words."

Then it was Sravya's turn. Her knees were shaking. She looked out at all the faces, and then she saw Thatayya at the back, smiling at her. Nanamma held up her hand, and the little blue stone twinkled in the sun.

Sravya took a deep breath, and she said her poem slowly and clearly, every word in its place.

Then she told everyone about the tin box full of dull glass, and the one true sapphire that still shone after fifty years. "Vemana says one real good thing is better than a whole basket of shiny things," she said. "So I learned one poem, but I learned it all the way to the inside."

For a moment, nobody made a sound. Then Lakshmi garu began to clap, and soon the whole yard was clapping.

Sravya won a bundle of sugarcane and a new notebook. But when she looked around, she saw Bhanu sitting alone by the well, rubbing his eyes.

She went and sat beside him and broke off a big piece of sugarcane for him.

"You said six poems, Bhanu. That's so many," she said. "Thatayya can teach you what they mean. Then they will shine, just like Nanamma's ring."

Bhanu sniffed, and then he gave a small smile. "Will you teach me yours first?"

So there, under the neem tree, chewing sweet sugarcane, the two cousins said it together. Nikkamaina manchi neelamokkati chaalu.

And now, my dear, close your eyes. Tomorrow, maybe you can learn one good thing too, all the way to the inside.