These My Words

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by Eunice de Souza


  not even a corruption, less than a monument. She will sit

  pulling on one thin cigarillo after another, will lift her teacup

  in friendly greeting to the hills and loquacious stars

  and the music will comb on through her hair,

  telling her: Poetry must be raw like a side of beef,

  should drip blood, remind you of sweat

  and dusty slaughter and the epidermal crunch

  and the sudden bullet to the head.

  The sudden bullet in the head. Thus she sits, calmly gathered.

  The lizard in her blinks and thinks. She will answer:

  The dog was mad that bit me. Later, they cut out my third eye

  and left it in a jar on a hospital shelf. That was when the drums began.

  Since then I have met the patron saint of sots and cirrhosis who used to stand

  in every corner until the police chased her down. She jumped into a taxi.

  Now I have turned into the girl with the black guitar

  and it was the dog who died. Such is blood.

  The rustle of Ernestina’s skirt will not reveal the sinful vine

  or the cicada crumbling to a pair of wings at her feet.

  She will smile and say: I like a land where babies

  are ripped out of their graves, where the church

  leads to practical results like illegitimate children and bad marriages

  quite out of proportion to the current population, and your neighbour

  is kidnapped by demons and the young wither without complaint

  and pious women know the sexual ecstasy of dance and peace is kept

  by short men with a Bible and five big knuckles on their righteous hands.

  Religion has made drunks of us all. The old goat bleats.

  We are killing ourselves. I like an incestuous land. Stars, be silent.

  Let Ernestina speak.

  So what if the roses are in disarray? She will rise

  with a look of terror too real to be comical.

  The conspiracy in the greenhouse the committee of good women

  They have marked her down

  They are coming the dead dogs the yellow popes

  They are coming the choristers of stone

  We have been bombed silly out of our minds.

  Waiter, bring me something cold and hard to drink.

  Somewhere there is a desert waiting for me

  and someday I will walk into it.

  English

  Hiren Bhattacharya (b. 1932)

  These My Words

  In these, the words that have caressed

  The orchards of my dreams.

  In the grace of a lifestyle,

  The intimate warmth of time.

  I have no inventions of my own.

  Like a farmer

  I roll words on my tongue,

  Tasting every one.

  I hold them in my palm

  To find how warm they are.

  I know words are the lusty offspring

  Of man’s noble creation.

  I am a mere poet;

  And in these words that I have relayed

  From other shoulders,

  Is man’s cruel experience

  And the maulings of history.

  Translated from the Assamiya by D.N. Bezboruah

  J.P. Das (b. 1936)

  After Gujarat

  After Gujarat,

  will there be poetry?

  Was it possible

  to write poetry

  after Alexandria was burnt down?

  After Auschwitz,

  after Hiroshima and Vietnam,

  after the Emergency

  and Babri Masjid,

  after 9/11 and Iraq?

  It’s not possible

  to banish poetry.

  Poetry comes back effortless

  to Plato’s Republic,

  to Stalin’s Siberia,

  to Pokhran and Kalahandi.

  Poetry follows

  the footprints of violence

  as it chronicles

  the descent of man.

  Like history

  poetry has no end.

  Poetry is written

  despite fatwas and bans.

  Poetry laughs at Gulag,

  ignores the censor’s blue pencil

  and the fundamentalist’s frown.

  Poetry is written

  against the backdrop

  of bonfire of books.

  After Gujarat

  there will be poetry

  about Gujarat itself.

  It will begin

  with the shame of Ayodhya,

  and track the bloody trail

  to Godhra to Gujarat,

  on to Mumbai.

  When Babri arises again,

  poetry will affirm

  that temples are built

  not with blood-scribed bricks

  and stones carved with hatred,

  temples are built,

  like poetry,

  with imagination and faith

  in the hearts of men.

  After Gujarat,

  poems will be written

  to affirm the truth

  that there is no Ayodhya

  outside of the poet’s

  epic imagination.

  Translated from the Oriya by the poet

  Arvind (b. 1950)

  First Poem

  My best poem

  Is the one

  That I began to write

  On a smouldering evening,

  In the eighteenth year of my life.

  That’s the prettiest of my poems.

  An unknown feeling stirred in my mind

  It was a very tender feeling and I was shy

  I couldn’t comprehend it

  Nor could I articulate it

  It couldn’t be kept suppressed either.

  I picked up a piece of paper and a pen

  I had no knowledge of rhyme rhythm or metre

  My feeling,

  Like a rainy season nullah

  Gushed from my eyes.

  My hand trembled

  It scribbled something, rubbed something out.

  That wet piece of paper,

  Those smudged words,

  That was my first poem

  The best of all my poems.

  Translated from the Dogri by Shivanath

  Govindadas Jha (1570-1640)

  Homage to Jayadeva

  Jayadeva, the paragon of poets,

  Is the divine wish-fulfilling tree,

  In the shade of whose verdant foliage of songs,

  My heart, tormented with the heat of worldly existence

  Derives a rare soothing cool, and yearns

  To submerge itself into it more and more!

  Glory to Jayadeva, blessed with Padmavati’s boundless love,

  The master supreme among poets inspired to captivate in word

  and rhyme

  The divine dalliance of Krishna with Radha!

  But low and mean as I am,

  I find no means by which to receive and express

  The glory and grandeur inherent in Hari’s love and life.

  But for the shower of grace divine,

  The task is all beyond me.

  So, with abject surrender at your feet,

  With a leaf of grass held between my teeth,

  I, Govindadas, the petty poet, beg you, O Radha, O Krishna, to

  inspire me.

  And make my ardent desire and dream come true.

  Translated from the Maithili by Jagdish Prasad Karna

  Kazi Nazrul Islam (1899-1976)

  From My Explanation

  I am the poet of the present, brother:

  No prophet of the future am I.

  You may call me a poet or refuse to call me one;

  I keep my mouth shut and bear with it all.

  Some say: ‘Mind, your place in the future will be with

  the tribe of stubborn
women! Where is the message of

  the Eternal such as comes out of the pen of Rabindranath?’

  So they all blame me;

  yet I am content to sing the morning tune of Bhairabi.

  My poet friends read my writings and despair of me.

  They sigh for me.

  Say they: ‘He was useful. But in ministering to politics

  he is becoming steadily useless, he has given up studies

  and has gone to the dogs.’

  Some say: ‘He has been devoured by his wife.’

  Some say again: ‘In jail he used only to play cards, has

  got fat and become useless.’

  Some others say: ‘It was well you were in jail. We

  would rather you went to jail.’

  Says the guru: ‘So you have commenced relieving people

  of their beards with your sword!’

  I have a lover who in a letter every Saturday abuses me

  and says: ‘You are the bird with a notoriously coarse voice.’

  Translated from the Bangla by Badusha Chakravarty

  Rituraj (b. 1940)

  Poets

  Poets live to an old age

  Though they’re always getting killed off

  they are still around.

  Making friends

  with fools and lumpens in these selfish times

  thrusting poetry books into their hands

  poets laugh for days on end

  they howl first and then turn silent

  but the cursed poems never shut up

  Poets find birds in children

  and girls in birds

  and flowers in girls

  collect the seeds of all they’ve seen

  and sow themselves together with the seeds

  Poets hide like seeds

  only to return in new forms

  At least now their breed is in no danger of extinction.

  Translated from the Hindi by Manjit Kaur Bhatia, Christi Merrill, Daniel Weissbort and Nalini Taneja

  Vallathol Narayana Menon (1878-1958)

  From Faith and Erudition

  4

  Now rises from among those seated just outside,

  All wise and erudite, whose prayers never cease,

  A man of Kerala. His noble brow is marked

  With sandal paste; and as he goes outside to make

  His triple journey round the triple-hallowed halls

  His lips still tremble with the might of Krishna’s names.

  5

  But now another rises, follows close the first

  And lowly in his bearing, low-voiced in his speech:

  ‘A work there is—or call it play—that I have made

  Where lurk such lapses—will yourself be pleased to read?

  ‘You cavil at the common tongue—but, Patteri,

  I have no comfort else.’ It’s Bhattathiri then?

  Whose thousand flowers wrought of seamless Sanskrit verse

  This house of holiness and its great Master praise,

  Whose words ensure the good? It is indeed. To him

  The Lord has freely given of his choicest gifts.

  Who pleads with him to cast his eye of majesty

  On screeds which reek of sweat from common peasant hands?

  It’s Puntanam, whose poems all extol the Lord,

  Whose tuneful canticles rival the nightingale.

  But Bhattathiri answers in a sharper tone:

  ‘These ditties in Malayalam, show something else!’

  Alas! That pride which comes of mastering the texts

  Should fasten on this knower of the ultimate.

  6

  O speech divine, perfected when the gods were young!

  This deed of thine is ill, to spurn Kerala’s tongue!

  Puntanam, crushed beneath the weight of hopes belied,

  Soon vanished from that place. But mark the sequel now.

  7

  That night the sickness fell which long in him had slept

  And mightily it seized all Bhattathiri’s limbs.

  With straining sinews, writhing as if he is aflame,

  In vain he straggles, crying, ‘O Lord, O Krishna, help!’

  And when at last he wins to this near side of sleep

  A tender youth appears before his reddened eyes:

  O rare is his enchantment! Yellow is his robe,

  His hair a cloud of rain where plumes of peacock dance,

  A gold chain round his waist, which tinkles as he moves,

  He holds a bamboo flute as one may hold a flower.

  Now mutely does the Brahmin hear what Krishna says;

  In flute-like voice thus speaks the bearer of the flute:

  ‘The Malayalam poet’s grief you must relieve;

  Your malady can have no other cure but that.

  For learning indeed Bhattathiri has a claim;

  The burning faith of Puntanam is dearer far.’

  Translated from the Malayalam by Vijay Nambisan

  Nilmani Phookan (b. 1933)

  Poetry Is for Those Who Wouldn’t Read It

  A poet had stated

  poetry is for those who wouldn’t read it

  for the wounds in their hearts

  for their fingers where thorns are embedded

  for the anguish and the joy

  of the living and the dead

  for the outcry that trundles

  down the road day and night

  for the desert sun

  for the meaning of death

  and the vacuity of living

  for the dark stones cursed by ruins

  for the red patch between the lusty lips of maidens

  for the yellow butterflies with wings spread on barbed wires

  for the insects, the snails and the moss

  for the bird flying lonely down the afternoon sky

  for the anxiety in fire and water

  for the mothers of five hundred million sick and starving children

  for the fear of the moon turning red as blood

  for each stilled moment

  for the world that keeps turning

  for one kiss from you

  that man of dust will become dust again,

  for that old saying.

  Translated from the Assamiya by Pradip Acharya

  Firaq Gorakhpuri (1896-1982)

  If There Are No Flowers

  If there are no flowers, I can flirt with nettles

  In the heart of autumn, I can flirt with vanished blooms

  I can flirt with the vanity of saints

  Holding the whole galaxy in their embrace

  The poet’s vision can scan anything

  I can flirt with the entire gamut of despondent scenes

  Taking everything in my stride

  I can flirt with demure, hidden sparks

  A loving look has moved beauty’s instruments to speech

  I can flirt with the chords of this harp string

  If the beloved’s goodwill is what life hinges upon

  Then I can flirt with the axis of life

  I can transform this simple ambience into a conundrum

  I can flirt with the eerie suggestion of your eyes

  The smile on your lips seems to suggest

  That I can flirt with the victims of seductive eyes

  Corpses can start breathing afresh

  I can so flirt with moving, marching shrines

  Fingers that failed to fondle your curls

  Are fingers that can surely flirt with the stars

  My grief, Firaq, rivals my gaiety

  I can flirt with friends even in misery

  Translated from the Urdu by Noorul Hasan

  Smita Agarwal (b. 1958)

  Daywatch in the Scriptorium

  The guests have departed.

  The raging fever gone.

  This blank page beckons me

  To give it something of myself.

  Oak leaves turn in the wind,

 
Moss-green on silver. The

  Mesh of needles on a coniferous

  Branch, flat as a palm, strains

  The sunlight. Behind a hill, it

  Seems as if an invisible Indian

  Chief has hunkered down to puff

  Out spreading clouds of peace

  A rufous-throated nuthatch

  Is disappointed. The apples

  are small, hard and green.

  It flies away boring through

  Haze and rows of hills.

  Fair weather, like a leafed twig

  Suddenly landing at my feet,

  Don’t welsh on me. Green lion*

  Day in June, live on in memory.

  English

  Sunil Gangopadhyay (b. 1934)

  City of Memories

  People at the borders speak prose

  In ghettos and factories they speak prose

  During the day the city speaks prose

  All contemporary miseries speak prose

  The parched field and the rough unkempt man speak prose

  The entire civilisation of scissors and knives talk prose.

  What then shall poetry be about?

  Translated from the Bangla by Kalyan Roy and Bonnie MacDougall

  Bhartrhari (c. 400 CE)

  Her Face Is Not the Moon, Nor Are Her Eyes

  Her face is not the moon, nor are her eyes

  Twin lotuses, nor are her arms pure gold:

  She’s flesh and bone. What lies the poets told!

  Ah, but we love her, we believe the lies.

  Translated from the Sanskrit by John Brough

  Dilip Chitre (b. 1938)

  Evenings in Iowa City, Iowa

  On top of being a foreigner

  I am already an old fart

  In this pimple-faced town

  Infested with poets and decadent dons

  Columbuses on Guggenheims

  Magellans on Fulbrights

  Vasco da Gamas supported by National Endowments

  Set out from this little port to discover

  The world we left behind

  Statistics show that about the age of forty

  Most men go berserk

  Even those to whom their women try to be extra kind

  Are we already bitter or are we still bewildered

  Filling our brown bags with the bounty of America

  Wandering through libraries

  Boozing and growing long hair or beards

  The true exterior of the expatriate

  And conversing in exasperated voices

  Sometimes even writing poems

  While the natives mow their lawns

 

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