One

The strands of hair you shed
Is my childhood

Love, now, is
Little feet that search each strand,
Toddling.

Mother’s name is written
In every filament
Of your grayed hair

Where were you
In the days when hair
Used to be worn in two plaits?

Two

One night,
Thinking I might get cold
You gave me a blanket

It was given you
By your mother
When you felt cold

This morning,
Daughter sleeps, covered by it

Which sunshine took away our chill?

Once, upon a place
There was a fisherman
He had a river
Of his own
He had
Ten or twelve fishhooks
Of his own

And he had….
Are you listening?

So, he had…
A river
Fishhooks
But then....
Listen listen

He didn’t have
Fishes
Of his own

Every morning
He would go to the riverside
Clean the fishhooks
And call the fishes
Beckoning to them.

Soon, it’ll be noon
Evening
And then night.

Poor fellow

None of them
Were his
None of them
Heeded  him.

I have heard him
Address them
“Vave”
In desperation

Have seen his
Tear flooded
Fondness
Permeate  
The river

I feel sorry
For him.


Translator : Shyma P

O' body, O' dear body...
It's the mackerel you gobbled up yesterday.
Why else does this cat circle you
The third time again.

Silence! O' gut.
Keep thy waves down for a while
At least until the
Cat's wide gaze passes by.

O' body, O' dear body...
Be careful at the beach.
You are in their home land;
What if all those fish inside you
Rush up to the sea.


What if their friends try
Knocking at the doors of
Each of your cells.

O' body, O' dear corpse...
What if you finally come back
To the shore with a thousand fish-kiss.

O' body, O' dear body...
What if
Everything you savoured,
Everything you devoured,
Came to life before you, in a flash.

O' body, O' dear body...
What if you let
Your thirty-year-old breast milk
At the first sight of baby.

Or may be, the bread
And the roast meat
Came up in search of those tiny lips.

O' body, O' dear body...
What if those tender *******
Show up to bedazzle
A sunny noon at the dearest city
And what if the dank aroma
Makes you 'spill' all over again.

O' body, O' dear body...
What if the cattle inside
Come out to graze
At the sight of the meadow

What if that cockerel
Jumps out into the courtyard
At the sight of his hen

And the frogs inside
Start croaking at every downpour.
And the birds that settled in you
Yearn for the skies

O' body, O' dear body,
All those fish, birds and beasts,
Leaping out of thee.
O' body, O' thy soul… -

Wrote
Seed
Ten times.
Dug in
Nine of them.
(One
Fell on
The rock.
I saw
You count
Even
Before
The poem
Started.)

I wrote
Water
And poured
On its foot.
I wrote
Organic Manure
And put it
there,
But it
smelt
Furadan.

Leaves
Leaves
Leaves
Leaves
Leaves
Leaves
Leaves
Leaves

Before I
Wrote
Leaves,
I placed
A board
Saying
Don’t Touch Leaves.

Butterflies
Who cannot read
Fluttered
Around
everywhere.

I was
About to write
Flowerflies
Flowerflies
Next.

Butterflies
Got in
Between.

One day
Will coat the
Brightest corner of the courtyard
With cow dung.

Will draw you
On it
With rice powder

Sometimes, due to haste
Might forget to sketch
Certain details

Surely
A toe to bite on
Hair that sways like a boat

And
*******
With grains measured in a brimming para *

I want to snuggle
Like a baby
In  
Its shades

Dreaming of a river
Through which flows love.



Translator - Shyma P

The lion was extremely lonely
He was wandering around, singing
I am at loggerheads with  you, world

Vomited, watching rabbits eat from the same green plate
Got fever watching crocodiles wallow, wet, in water and in sunshine
Sprained the neck in the giraffe’s interference in neighbour’s affairs
Got all seized up in the tortoise’s stillness
Which wouldn’t put its limbs or head outside, scared of being tried as a witness
Deafness because of the praises sung by foxes

Lonelier than the lonely because of sickness

The envy was
For the freedom trees had on earth as well as the skies
The surprise was
About the solidarity of ants, bees,  herds of deer while they grouped
Fear was the lair
Courage was the ATM card

Unhappiness was,
That the royal insignia which got imprinted in the soil
Closed all doors of any living presence coming near
It was with the heart of the storm that I walked among the plants

“The form of beast that swallowed fire”,
Was what the elephants murmured among themselves

Doff the silk attire of loneliness and come,  Invited water

His aim in the well was a life partner

Sorrow comes,
Goes

Happiness comes,
Goes

Love comes
Goes

Lust comes,
Goes

Wonder
Surprise
Hatred,
Love

Comes
Goes

It is not because
I do not press it
To stay awhile

Comes
Goes

Today is the day I’ll see you
Today is the day you’ll see me
Today is the day we’ll meet

How I see you
Is not how you see me
How you see me
Is not how I see you

How I see you
Is not how you see you
How you see me
Is not how I see me

I want to see you
And you, me
Some time, some day

Leave that

Have been waiting fourteen years  
Yet, how arduous it is
To push through
These one or two hours!

translator  : Shyma P

Was crossing the road
It is not like crossing anything else
A Trailer
Might partition into pieces
Or a Hummer,
In a second, make one a nonentity
Or a tin can of a vehicle
Take away your hand or leg.
Even if your last wish,
In case you have to die in an automobile crash,
Is that it should be the red lancer car you are very fond of,
Which court will listen?
On the other side of the road, there is a neem tree
Its dark green leaves are visible.
No, cannot see the bitterness,
But it is possible it is.

I have to cross the road.
Then
I have to stand a bit under the green on the other side
Those birds have to run away (no, not fly!)
And come back just the way they went.

What then? It is, after all, the road that was crossed,
Which is something!


While crossing the road, came a Trailer
Whose driver was a Tamilian

A Hummer came,
In which there was a father, his friend,
Mother and two kids

The kid was singing loudly
The friend was thinking about his girl friend

A rickety old tin can of a vehicle too came
It was full of wine bottles
For the next century

What then?
Trailer was divided into many pieces
Hummer made one a nonentity in a second
The old vehicle took away two hands, one leg, and two ears.

Now the one who looks this way from the other side:
Is it the one who reached the other side,
Or the one who was standing here,
Or the one who crossed the road,
Or the one who has to return?

It might
Rain today

Can’t be sure
About the clouds
Their
Fecund wanderings

It might rain
Lightning and thunder are certain

Don’t
Be afraid
Or cry along

Just think that
You are watching
Me
Of some life

Just think that
The crows
Of that life
Had come
To see me
Yesterday at dusk

Just think that
One of those crows
Have built its nest
In this life of mine too.


trans : Shyama P

Flaming hunger
Oh, not that at all
A Photostat of that

As though I am sipping a beer
I am relishing a sun’s half,
That is sending golden sunlight
To the wooden chair and the money plant

O God
It will be twilight soon
Hey sun,
You will sink into the sea without a half!

Sky and earth and the sea
Will ask as one,
Lamenting and ridiculing at the same time

Where’s the other half?

The poet is laughing
After having consumed
A sun’s half completely,
Sitting in the armchair.

Mulling over a poem,
While awaiting cigarettes
At the grocery,
The one from Kasargod asked

Is your women here?

I got startled for a moment,
Wondering whether he saw
Everyone inside me

O grocery person from Kasargod,
Who labels the many inside a single female by one word,

Leave me there,
You go into my poem….


*In Malabar, in ordinary parlance, they say “women” when they mean one woman.
I confronted this way of speaking more after reaching the Gulf.

From the moment you mentioned about
That belly without marks
My eyes’ hands
Have been curious

Like a lone tree
That peeks surreptitiously
From the bank of the
Vast field
At the
Muthangha saplings
And karuka sprouts
That lay hugging the mud
My eyes’ hands
Probe for
The myriad depths
Of your body

A beautiful triangle
In the middle of the river
Revealed this moment
In its pupil
In it full of paral fishes
Violet colored maanathukanni  
The ecstatic celebration of
Tiny fishes
Your belly
Like an aquarium
Made transparent by
Undistilled water

Exhausted hands
Of my
Curious eyes

Have you seen or heard
The eyes of my hands
Sigh?


Translator - Shyma P

Yesterday
After
You
Went back
The house
Has not given me peace of mind
It keeps asking
For you.

While getting in
After hastily feeding
The puppy
And the rabbits
The door stopped me
And asked
Where were you?

When I reclined
On the sofa
To have a wink of rest
It pinched me
And rolled its eyes at me
Don’t lie here without her.

When I opened the room
To read
The books
Began to sing a song about you,
A green parrot
Came flying from one of the books
And kissed me on my forehead

To console
The house
That was weeping relentlessly
And asking for you
I searched
Each and every corner  
For a strand of your hair

You could have left
At least a drop of
You.



Translator - Shyma P

Those were the days when cycles were aplenty

Green, red, and black were the only colors in which seats came

Children came to the arrangement that
If a green seat came, I will beat him
And if a red seat came, I will be beaten

The brave ones chose black

On the day he chose green color, friend got  31 beatings
I got 18

2

I remember
You telling
That you saw my poem
Somewhere
Wandering
Asking spring its name

Everything happened in a trice
Yesterday,
An Ilenjhi  sprout in front of me,
All of a sudden.

Didn’t get time
To sigh
Much less
To think.

My poem
Named spring
Ilenjhi

Ilenjhi Ilenjhi..
Weeping, laughing
Confounded with joy
I saw the poem
Give it
Hundreds and hundreds of kisses.

With all that
Watering
It must certainly
Have choked

A drop
Must surely
Have got to its head

Have to give it
One more glass of water
And some gentle taps on the head

Let me go.



Translator - Shyma P

Like what you feel when you see
Tree in bloom
By the wayside

The same as what you feel when you see
A very old lady smiling

When I heard a noise in the morning
I felt this, that

Tears,
Like the ascetic who arrives
uninvited
For performing
Auspicious rites,

Cannot sit,
Cannot walk
The unbearable happiness

Wishing to do many things
But not doing anything
A huge ice piece of happiness

No, not enough,
A snow mountain of happiness!

He doesn't know me

Neither do I know him



There's a lake between us

Full of fish



The fish does not belong to him

Neither are they mine



That these fishes belong

to neither him nor me

is a link that connects us



A sky lies fallen in the lake

and through the slopes

of cloud I see

the fishes slink away.

The clouds fallen, still

show movement when nudged

by the fish



Could there be fish

unafraid of birds? Look

at that sky in the lake



Would he be seeing this,

I began to think

and whether he will read my thoughts

I could not imagine

what he saw in the lake, and

there was not enough time



Let him think whatever he likes



There's a cigarette in his hand

The fact that there's one in mine

is another link that connects us



I think the smoke from my cigarette

and the clouds are friends

That's why I mourn the clouds

floating bloated in the lake.



Reading the face you know

His thoughts are unlike

There's no sadness in him



He might be smoking

out of boredom



He's darker than me

That too is a link, but

he doesn't know that I'm white

and that my blackness is an act



He too might have been white

and would have gathered soot

after being left by a mother

who lost all his memories



Can't be, he's black



The lake of clouds

where sky lies fallen

My curls of smoke

in the company of clouds



A me, unblack

With a touch of spit

was read the written in blood



The writings of hunger

were puked unread



Those of tears

vanished before being read.




Translated by Binu Karunakaran

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Your withered hair strands are my childhood
Love is now those tiny footsteps
That takes its maiden steps
Searching for each of those strands.
My mother's name is written on each of your greyed hair.
Where have you been
When you braided your hair
And kept the two of its braids
On to your chest.

Translation to English Jisha K