poem-translation of ardhanagnam-by mohanakrishnan kaladi

half nakedness

<<<<<<<((((((()))))))>>>>>>>

(daddy,who's this gandhi?
he's a fellow
shot dead by our godse.)

gandhi,
don't be at your freakish whims
that you can please us
with the half nakedness.
we know.
fasting of a single man
won't bring freedom to nation.
and
however long one spins a loom
he can't knit the flag of a state.
a pinch of salt can't satisfy hunger.
easwar and allah never belong
to a single party.
even before you could
we had known that
if one shows the other cheek,
the bullet will be piercing the bossom.

no-
not your notes of silence
can be put in the ballot box.
hand over the bamboo stick
to the guards on sentry
or else,
you won't be let in the house*

whatever may be
your statues are to conserve
for,we called you
"father" once.
_________________________________
*parliament
2007

poem

when the whole world puzzled at the millenium dawn

<<<<<<<((((((()))))))>>>>>>>

recite the overwhelming sobriety of the sun,
that gives in the void,
on the eve of a millenium,
that hails a strange moment,
radiant with tranquilizing comeliness.


when we know it is for another wake-up,
to give radiance full of go,
as progress seems frivolous,
to give a twilight of belief,
with every fibre in our mind,
to live,to hope,to never give in,
when the shadows flee away
into a bright dawn.


01012000

poem

ties of bondage

<<<<<<<((((((()))))))>>>>>>>

o!mother,
where are you now?


i am alone!


when i lay on your laps
and fed on your breasts
how easily and quickly,
like a bird,
after its chirps and coos
and feeding,
i slept!


now it is frozen a night.


without your warmth
and solacing sighs,
something heavy loads upon my chest.
do you see it?


come and sing
all your lullabies,
on my back
and entice
a nice sleep into me,
with soft dreams.
moro,
they would turn
to realities.


i am faltering
in your absence.
let all your throbs
pervade into
my frail being.


20012009

virtue

<<<<<<<((((((()))))))>>>>>>>

dear friend

i am coming there.

be prepared.

i shall put

the timepiece,

i took last time

in place,

without being noticed.

i got a better one

from somewhere else.

i can't afford

the breach of punctuality.

translation of the poem:palice-by mohanakrishnan kalati

                                       milk ice

                                         <<<<<<<((((((()))))))>>>>>>>

o! my slate and o! my pencil

count you all these sums for me,

by the break of morrow dawn,

i’ll buy a milkice for you.

it is not a single one,

each of you’ll get a one.

 

o! the slate,

if you cheat me counting wrong

i’ll break you flinging down.

o! the pencil,

i’ll break you hitting hard.

'am not lacking counting sums!

'amn’t feeling sleepy now!

if i don’t clean all these plates,

don’t i brim these water drums,

o! my slate and o! my pencil!

won’t they grind me into flour? 

translation of poem by sarman

you

<<<<<<<((((((()))))))>>>>>>

yours was

but a one man army

 

yours was

an old horse,

wanting golden wings

and dreamy swifts.

 

yours were the forsaken paths

of the mountains

trailed by nobody.

 

you hadn’t

armour nor sword.

 

neither clarions nor bugles

blew behind,

but a wailing wind!

 

you had no hide-outs

but your shadows.

 

you never met an adversary.

 

the answer call of your war-cry

was a desert.

 

you never looked behind

the paths you scrambled.

 

your horse

got into his strides

like darkness.

 

in the valleys abandoned

hunger and dreams

were your companions.

 

you defeated yourself

like a lonely tree

on the mountain tops.

+++++++++++++++++++

don quixote and the sketches

drawn by picasso for the same gave me inspiration

to compose this poem

)()()()()()()()()()()(

sasthrusarman

translation of poem by sarman

peacock

<<<<<<<<((((((()))))))>>>>>>>

 peacocks i painted

in my childhood,

neither elegant nor lovely,

strolled lively

in my yards and orchards.

in my lofty years

saw a sales-boy

on the sideway

trading in peacock oil.

 

scrapped  and stuffed peacocks

stood in raw

with sublime elegance.

they remembered

charcoal  lines

on the ancient walls;

the feather-kids,

born in books and

flown to hillocks.

 

now my children drawn

in indiscriminate hues,

the peacocks on the roadside,

the indiscoverable woods

in their mortal eyes

 

poem

                                                                            ode to farewell

                                                       <><><><><>()()()()()<><><><><>

if you meet me by chance

among the caravan of ages

passing through the deserts,

stare at me

as if we had never net.

if you meet me,

among the passers-by

see me,

as if we were

not at all acquainted.

if you come across me

among the old portaraits you fondle

as a memento of your voyage

through the ages,

just fall among the novel images

scratched on the walls

of your bowels.

                                                                    

if you see me delirious,

deliver chirping coos

into the ears of your fellow travellers

who you think you love.

if you notice me smiling,

distort my lips 

with your gaze of temper.

if you see me lethargic,

pour the elixir of dejection

into my yet throbbing being.

if you see me standing

in the sun blistering,

bid me farewell

to your own shadows.

if you see me standing,

in the torrent raining,

wave your hands

with the inducing calmness

pervaded under your umbrella

and stride away

into the 'wild wind'

of your subtle ways,

as if it were not your concern.

  

if you hear me singing

my swan son

applaude in thundering claps,

in great solace

that it is valediction.

if you see me silhouetted,

paint me with

pitchblend darkness.

if you see me thirsty,

stream away

into the apparition

of vague memories.

now

you can glide along

in your streams.

and herald the new ages

with chirps and shrills.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   01122006

translation of 'lalitham'-by pp ramachandran

                                                                                lack of pomp

                                                          <<<<<<<((((((()))))))>>>>>>>

"only a sweet crooning

to herald my being,

and the foresaken feather

to hunt the whole being,

and the warmth of  brooding

flashes on you yet.

so simple was our life,"

the birds chirped in ecstasy

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            30042003