Inside their own loincloth. Their speech has graceAnd their voice tenderness. When prophets arriveDogs do not bark. They only wag their tailsLike newspaper reporters. Their tongues hang outAnd drool as profuselyAs editorials.Crowds in the streetSplit up like watermelonsWhen prophets arrive.But there are times when even the fuse of heavenly stars is blownSpace boils like a…
As the butterflyhovers near a sunsetits wings touch the sea
Mother of blissSource of painMake my faceReflect the skyAnd every cloudPassing byRiver receiveMy ashes andHold my spiritIn your watery hand
touches your shoulderthe rain has stoppedat lasta faint breezeblows moistureon your eyes
To the sink. Then I luxuriate in the toiletWhile my unprivileged compatriots of Parel Road Cross LaneDefecate along the stone wall of Byculla Goods Depot.I shudder at the thought of going out of this laneTowards the main road. Hundreds of workers are already returningFrom the night-shift, crossing the railway lines.The bus stop is already crowded….
The splitting breakers of foaming oceansYour invisible paths going through raging stormsYou spread like lightning flashes through my heartAnd I grew in this darkness.My back will be of darkness when you willLash me with lightningFor one moment my back will turn into darknessWhen you will come back in flashesFrom the undulating shadows of burning planetsInto…
The Tartars, the Cossacks, the Germans, the Stalinists, the contemporaries,The bridge on the Dnieper River, the ice and slush in the street,Golden hair, blue eyes, the overcoat,Old women buying bread, the arrogant editor,The worried critic, the diplomatic poet.[Translated from Shesha: Selected Marathi Poems]
I remember the Rahman of my childhoodAnd Asmat’s sparkling eyesPlaying carom with meAt midnight in the bakery at the cornerWhile bread and butter-biscuits are being bakedI am boozing alone in my roomIn front of me fried liver pieces gone cold in a plateAll my friends migrated to the GulfAt midnight in the bakery at the…
Said RahmanI said –Leave aside truth and liesPeople only speakAnd what about people who don’t speak –Asked Rahman –What do they say?I said –You know religion, Rahman,I don’t say a thing
Lightning flashes out branches of my beingWhen, through intoxicated wet leaves,The sudden stirring that’s the month of AshadhaPasses tenderly like a slight shiver.And there remainsOnly sheOf the trees, among the trees, for the trees:Woman smelling of the season.
