[Transcreation] Prompting a conversation

Prompting a conversation


I.

We live inside a dagger
A dagger being brandished by someone else
It is somebody else's heart that it targets
Then, the blood that oozes out blinds us
Smeared in that blood are our war cries
We copulate soaked in that blood
Bloodied are even our dreams


II.

Atop swinging Satellite Television cables
above the simmering street
alights Ezhuthachan's* parrot
sans the olive branch in its beak
blood trickling down its wings


III.

But for tears
I too would have been a dagger
It's my mother who gifted me tears
She was dumb, but in her songs
I drowned and died


IV.

It is a girl that I always wanted to be
As a child, wearing skirts and lining my eyes with kohl
I danced in front of the mirror
No, I do not wish
for twenty men to tear me apart
No, I do not wish you to
usher a third girl into this blinding sunlight



V.

The tears gifted by mother,
the pearls I shed from my eyes
failed to wake up the sea
But, somewhere a small child
heard them fall and opened its eyes
to a flowery existence


VI.

The Dagger does not talk to flowers
It only tears apart roads and cities
It enters each heart merely in the quest
to seek out religions
It dips into each word
to seek out political leanings


VII.

Stranded between a forest and fire
gifted by her beloved husband
Asan's* Sita reminisces
of the sacrifice of Ravana,
the man who taught her what true love is
For a son as demonically intense a lover as him
her womb craves today


VIII.

Amorous words there are no more
Each word, merely a shattered piece
of a broken bottle of wine
We hurt each other with them
When the world pastes subpoenas on your door,
love remains nothing
but relishing each other's blood


IX.

Our language has died
The one who wrote it has escaped
On our shoulders travels the corpse
like the vampire, Betal
Neither the sweet chirps of birds
nor the tinkling bells of golden anklets
can answer its questions


X.

Those with a stammer
speak incessantly without demur
I, like a tongue cut fool
merely grunt and groan
The winds tell me
that what is lost shall be regained
I am afraid it's a dream
and I lash myself with a whip


XI.

Lillies bloom
on the banks of the river Brahmaputra
You are there in the room no more
My back itches
Perhaps, it seeks to load one more corpse
Or maybe, just maybe,
the itch is to sprout fresh wings
immune to daggers
Outside, in the scorching sun
a Jatayu* writhes in pain



A poem in Malayalam by K. Satchidanandan
Transcreation by Vijay © 19th May, 2007



*Ezhuthachan - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunchaththu_Ramanujan_Ezhuthachan

*Asan - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kumaran_Asan

*Jatayu - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jatayu_%28Ramayana%29