Translated from Sindhi by Lajwanti. K. Jaisinghani and Gayatri Lakhiani Chawla I myself am Punhoon, O sister this I have not forgotten I don’t turn my back on this truth,tell me what other I would be In Kutch and BamboreIt is I who dwellswhere else should I journey? People say you have many AashiqI, myself…
Hangman Days Unbearable, the world that broke into time.Unbearable, the just-born certainty of distance. ……………………………………………………………–Susan StewartAll I wantis to be told………………………..take your time that the lineisn’t dead……………..instead as soft…………….& malleable asthe forests I hidebeneath my tongue that objectsare no closerthan they appear dead dogs…………….hospital bills………………………..slowing senses ………………………..it’s not that I don’t………………………..look up at the sky………………………..&…
Original Story in Hindi: चीख: धीरेन्द्र अस्थाना The Scream, Translated by: Bhuvendra Tyagi The moment shone like fear in deep darkness was when I was told that Kunni had left the house. Has gone? Where has he gone? How did he go? How can Kunni go from home? There were questions that surrounded me from…
Excerpts from the Epic Hindi Poem Kamayani (Translated from the original Hindi into English by Usha Kishore) _____ Excerpts from Canto I: Chinta (Thought) On Himalaya’s spiring summit……………sheltered under shadows of stone,the lone man, with tearful eyes,……………discerned the swelling deluge. Below was water, above ice;……………one fluid, one frozen.One elemental prime – call it……………what you may,…
Forgiveness, I Am Eclipsed forgiveness, exploding stars, breaths,Faithful embers in the midst of shadows.Forgiveness at our fingertipsCaptured by the smoke ofA train travelling down tracks,Past the house where I lived,With a piano where I prayWith my fingertipsOf forgiveness,And let colors immobilize meIn a world of sound. I have walked down the highway,Feet dragging,Without a coat…
Supplies I Will Require Before Seriously Considering the Job *Forthcoming in Dear Selection Committee (JackLeg Press, May 2022) _____ Family Tree My mother was a lake ………… full of water lilies, my father was a bridge………… between the bardo and heaven. He tossed me………… to his shoulders for the parade of grandparents………… at night: Orion…
A Bucket of Hot Water and Salt
Conscious of my blessings where water poured out of a tap
Even if for two hours a day, the man with the camel skin bags was ready, if it didn’t, I passed the *ghamelas full of mud from the top of the hill, Down the assembly line to the bottom, Baked in the sun, and exhausted in every limb I returned home to water and love.
Awakening The incidence of flightwithin flightwas, for crow,an audacity unspoken.Dreams of this plague,a prelude anticipating hope.For crow, the truth,unvarnished as truth’s manifesto, was lostin winged translation. Lostin archives,where hope trained in narrative,crow deferred to truth,at times, when truth was allhe had, obscure—reminded himof living,tasks, of the vital and the vincible—but oh, crow longed for the daywhen pursued by the very…
The struggle to give everything away Inside the ferry’s heartbeat, we fold ourselves like prayers, sheathed in metal, plastic and flesh, part animal, part technology, it is the thoughts that rise like snapping turtles, rocked by the Aegean green. I want this to be the end of it, a wounded winter amidst the very summer…
Nocturnal Fear I listen to the smooth rowing of his breathfrom one shore to the other side of dreams,consciousness, a gently rhythm of sloshingwater fills the bedroom like music. I panic when it deviates its coursethe lengthy pause of a median size rock.I fear the boat not reaching its destination,getting stucked in the middle of…
One Day I Am A Field Instantly, soundlessly, a meadow called bereft.……………One day, a hawk’s meadow. Above, a red-tailed hawk fools meinto thinking he’s an eagleflaps his wings wildly then glides until I know, yes, it is you. What is remembered when blinded?Try to wake to the sun’s flash of denial.……………The problem: I am grief’s…
T S Eliot is Traditional Now The sea waves iced………..on the ledge I saw……………….Eliot chopping it —-Though hardly I noticed The sea skulls were………..bobbing up in leftover……………….of stale breath. A square hole was in my chiseled chest– Spoons knives forks of………..my modern cutlery……………….Are hung in kitchen –Though my ancestors cooked in Iron cauldron. In breakfast…
