Category Archives: Poem of the Week

Lily’s Afternoon

By Bireswar Barua

The letters
Of momentary acquaintance
I’m counting on finger tips.
A doting utterance
Or
A cup of coffee placed on the hand
Are outside the dial of seismograph.

Consequence of one’s acts? Fate?
Darkness has run its hand
Over such accounts on the sheet of paper!
Who is capable of noting down dreams
On the branches and leaves
Where the squirrel wags its tail.
Nursery rhyme,
They’re reluctant to listen
As a proof of that they’ve kept you
In an insane asylum. Alas! Alas! You mad woman!
Helpless—aren’t you totally—
To push away with your hands
The clouds
Of the forenoon sky
They’ve created an artificial afternoon
For the canopy
Over the graveyard of your youth.

Translated by Uttam Duorah

Click here to read the original Assamese poem.

Bireswar Barua (b.1933-d.2010) was a modern Assamese poet, novelist, short story writer and critic.

Uttam Duorah, the translator, retired as the HoD, English, Women’s College, Tinsukia and is based in Tinsukia, Assam.

If life cries in dire needs

By Bhupen Hazarika

If life cries in dire needs
If dust blows on earth in pain
If despair is up to dashing hopes
Croon the song I sing

If you see a heron flying
All alone towards the sea
If a tiny moment makes the cosmos brood
Pore over the lyric penned by me

If you never get what you crave
Time and again the unsought if you get
If tears well up for what you crave
Laugh the laugh I laugh

I’ve seen lots of heartbreak  
So I pen lyrics laced with hope
If in darkness you land by mistake
If you pick up thorns as sewali petals
If your path is traced with blood
Mop it away with tunes I play

Translated by Nirendra Nath Thakuria

Click here to read the original Assamese poem.

Bhupen Hazarika (b.1926-d.2011) was an Indian singer, lyricist, musician, poet, author and filmmaker from Assam.

Nirendra Nath Thakuria, retired Associate Professor of English, is a translator.

Fish

By Mahim Bora

Fish -- golden silvery, blue violet
Lustre of luminous diamonds 
Fish in millions
Coloured-yearnings
Razor-slitting pace splitting the sea into halves
O' irresistible!

With the flying fins
Shrouding even the sea's wide expanse
Thwarting the waves that kiss the summits
O' eternal, coloured-yearning
Creation's first offspring 

Fish-- golden silvery, blue violet
Hued by birth, hued by colours
And by innumerable deaths :
In varied fish-traps, nets 
In the heart of the Ghiladhari*,
Yet immortal.
O' fish, O' eternal fish!

*Ghiladhari : a tributary of the Brahmaputra.

Click here to read the original Assamese poem.

Translated by Krishna Dulal Barua

Mahim Bora (b. 1924-2016) was a modern Assamese poet, short story writer and novelist.

Krishna Dulal Barua is a prominent translator and writer based in Nagaon, Assam. He received the Katha Award for translation in 2005.

For you I go to pick Flowers

By Navakanta Barua

For you I go to pick flowers 
You're among flowers 
For you I go to sing songs 
You're among songs 

So I couldn't pick flowers 
So I couldn't sing songs 
I kept sitting 
Eyes downcast 
In mute shyness 
In search of you I entered a temple 
There I heard only the captive wails 
As I was looking out for you in my heart 
You're already out 

In the sky in the wind in the dust blowing

Translated by Nirendra Nath Thakuria

Click here to read the original Assamese poem

Navakanta Barua (b.1926-d.2002) was a noted Assamese poet, novelist and translator.

Nirendra Nath Thakuria, retired Associate Professor of English, is a translator.

The Patch of Blooming Mustards

By Chandrakumar Agarwala

Yoking me the oil-press of life
What fun do you make of me?
Whirling in the drudging rounds
I’ve fallen into an awful illusion.
To what end is this pressing
Of mustards in such measure?
The oilman will press to supply the world:
Why am I enmeshed in?
Let me free I’ll return to watch
The patch of mustards in bloom,
That—full of butterfly wings—
Has kept me entranced still
Since those dream-like days
Of my childhood.

Translated by Uttam Duorah

Chandrakumar Agarwala (b.1867-d.1938)) was a notable Assamese poet and journalist.

Uttam Duorah, the translator, retired as the HoD, English, Women’s College, Tinsukia and is based in Tinsukia, Assam.

Click here to read the original Assamese poem.

Rise Young Blood, Rise

By Ambikagiri Raichoudhury

Rise young blood, rise today, rise,
Rise with a volcanic eruption --
Break the nodes of indolence into dust
Covering the earth with the flow of work.
Rise young blood, rise today, rise,
Rise quaking both heaven and earth,
Slaying the nation's woes and indigence,
The stains of bondage in the alleys of disgrace.
Rise young blood, spilling your spates of blood,
Immersing the numbness of the nation,
Let the golden ragas bubble up
With the thriving of greenery upon the earth.
Rise young blood holding in your lightning-fist
The hammer that crushes and rebuilds,
Let all hypocrisy in the name of nation-building
Fly away pounded into dust.

Translated by Krishna Dulal Barua

Click to read the original Assamese poem.

Ambikagiri Raichoudhury (1885–1967) was an Assamese poet, song writer, playwright and freedom fighter of India.

Krishna Dulal Barua is a prominent translator and writer based in Nagaon, Assam. He received the Katha Award for translation in 2005.

Letter to Mother, from Hell

by Navakanta Barua

Mother, I am in hell. Its not so bad. 
Love is loose change, 
Sucking the bones of making a living.
Life is quite a plump dog,
The dog does not remember the road
The great journey. 

Oho, my mistake- no one here forgets anything.
Its just that one feels afraid to think. 
That’s why, with soft, heavy,trivial and big talk
We keep kicking the eternal rolling stone.
But then, without this babble,
Its difficult to live in hell.

The earth’s memories are doled out in little pieces, 
To hell’s whole citizens. There’s a ban on love. 
If you are thirsty, there’s booze,
Tea and lemonade, but you won’t find
Cool water. If you send some in a bottle,
It might perhaps look like medicine.

If you see a spring somewhere, and go towards it, 
A love from earth comes and hangs a ‘NO’ sign.
You know, mother, 
The spring is all earth, the border, of the earth
You live in, the earth apparently
Does not want to trade with hell.

What to do, mother, 
I could just manage to smuggle out 
This secret letter.
If you can, do come forward, a little,
I too will get out of my hell
To the heart of that spring. 

There, in that river island, 
You will remove the earth’s tired air,
The closed road from earth.
I too may flee dark emotions, my deep blue thirst. 
Else, perhaps, I will have to stay
Without alternative, in this hell

Sucking trinkets of love, and making a living.
Just that, mom, 
Don’t give me solace, 
That its only the mind that’s hell.  
Only then, would I be, truly helpless. 
My mind. That’s something that’s still mine.  
Yours. 

Translated by Amlanjyoti Goswami

Click here to read the original Assamese poem.

Navakanta Barua (b.1926-d.2002) was a noted Assamese poet, novelist and translator.

Amlanjyoti Goswami‘s new collection of poetry is Vital Signs (Poetrywala). His earlier collection River Wedding (Poetrywala) was widely reviewed. His poetry has been published in journals and anthologies around the world. A Best of the Net and Pushcart nominee, his poems have also appeared on street walls in Christchurch, exhibitions in Johannesburg, an e-gallery in Brighton and buses in Philadelphia. He has reviewed poetry for Modern Poetry in Translation and has read in various places, including New York, Delhi and Boston. He grew up in Guwahati and lives in Delhi.

The Temple of Melody

By Bishnu Prasad Rava

The temple of melody
  The silver fetters of which
    You’ve torn apart and opened
      The golden doors
        O’ Priest!
          O’ Priest!!
            You worshipper of beauty!!!
             The enduring 
            Dulcet Borgeet
           Melodious Bongeet
          Sing, O’ the Assamese people
        Filling your heart and mind
     O’ Priest!
    O’ Priest!!
   You worshipper of beauty!!!
In your touch
  The ecstasy of the heart
    Shakes off slumber
      Attains freedom
       Contours of ragas
         Move on wafting
          O’ Priest!
            O’ Priest!!
              You’ve set up the altar
                  You’ve placed the idol
                      Performed the worship too
                 Shaping the idol of freedom
            O’ Priest!
      O’ Priest!!
 O’ Priest!!!
Blow the conch
   Strike the cymbals
       Begin the rituals of prayer
           Light up the lamp
              Welcoming with elation
                 O’ Priest!
                   O’ Priest!!
                      You worshipper of beauty.

[Translated by Uttam Duorah]

Click here to read original Assamese poem

Bishnu Prasad Rava (1909-1969) was a renowned artist, writer, actor, song writer and politician of Assam.

Uttam Duorah, the translator, retired as the HoD, English, Women’s College, Tinsukia and is based in Tinsukia, Assam.