O’ book collector - Translation of ಪುಸ್ತಕ ಸಂಗ್ರಾಹಕನೆ ‘pustaka sangraahakane’

Dear friends ... here is another Hyderabad ‘fragment’ from eminent Kannada Prof. K. V. Tirumalesh’s Sahitya Akademi award winning AKSHAYA KAVYA.  The Hyderabad location is not mentioned in the poem, in the final analysis the location is just a hook for Tirumalesh anyway, but from the description, it is the Sunday Book Market, the Sunday ‘footpath’ second-hand book market, at Abids ...   

 

Since these are untitled fragments, it would be improper, I thought, to force-fit titles to these fragments.   I have borrowed this idea from the German poet, Ulrike Almut Sandig, who, instead of a ‘titling’ a poem, ‘bolds’ a word or phrase or line in the poem that would serve as the central idea.  Here, on FB, I have used quotes.  Friends are welcome to offer their suggestions.          

 

POET: K. V. Tirumalesh

KANNADA ORIGINAL: 

first line of the fragment: ಪುಸ್ತಕ ಸಂಗ್ರಾಹಕನೆ

‘pustaka sangraahakane’ from AKSHAYA KAVYA

ENGLISH TRANSLATION: S. Jayasrinivasa Rao

 

 

O’ book collector!

One day the books will fall on your head

and you’ll die, get this!

Don’t accumulate so many books

 

It doesn’t matter how death happens

let it happen through letters

“Like every writer the reader too

ends life as a book”

 

or begins

Today I have to journey along the Sunday footpaths

That’s my destiny

 

Book heaps call out to me

Opening each book opens out 

unreachable worlds before me

I sit and read

I stand and read

I become a bookworm 

I bore 

 

a tunnel

from earth to heaven

When nobody is watching

Russia Poland Yugoslavia 

 

I alter the maps

Like dried leaves it crumbles to touch

Century-old paper

Magic on the first page in the letters

 

a name written with great love

Below that the date of gifting  

The year the first world war began

Wishing a thousand years of happy life

 

From my hands too this will escape

back to the footpath again

This my half-clouded moment

will return one day again

Another similar evening it will land in

 

another person’s hands 

and perplex him too

after that an arduous two-thousand-mile journey  

 

Forbidden City Lhasa  

 

*****

Beside the dargah sits this man - Translation of ದರ್ಗದ ಬದಿಗೆ ಇದ್ದಾನೆ ಒಬ್ಬ 'dargada badi iddane obba'

Dear friends ... here is a Hyderabadi ‘fragment’ from eminent Kannada modernist Prof. K. V. Tirumalesh’s Sahitya Akademi award winning AKSHAYA KAVYA. AKSHAYA KAVYA is a series of untitled monologues, if I may say so, that touch upon a wide range of topics.   There is no continuous link, so it is not ‘epical’ in that sense.  As the poet himself says, Akshaya Kavya is a poetic experiment that violates more norms than it obeys.  In my continuing engagement with Tirumalesh’s poems and search for his reflections on Hyderabad in his poems, I came upon a series of fragments on Hyderabad in Akshaya Kavya.  I was delighted, of course ... and this marks the beginning of the second phase of my ‘Hyderabad Project’ of translating Prof. Tirumalesh’s Hyderabad ‘fragments’ from ‘Akshaya Kavya’ into English ... Caesurae and Muse India were kind enough to publish two sets of my English translations of Tirumalesh’s Hyderabad poems from his early collections Mukhamukhi and Avadha.  

 

I wish to thank a lot of my friends here who supported and responded to my first phase of this ‘Hyderabad Project’ ... and hope to receive the same kind of love for this phase too ...           

 

Since these are untitled fragments, it would be improper, I thought, to force-fit titles to these fragments.   Let me try an experiment of my own, I thought, and borrowed this idea from the German poet, Ulrike Almut Sandig, who, instead of a ‘titling’ a poem, ‘bolds’ a word or phrase or line in the poem that would serve as the central idea.  For this fragment, I have chosen the obvious and less risky option.  Friends are welcome to offer their suggestions.   

       

 

POET: K. V. Tirumalesh

KANNADA ORIGINAL: 

first line of the fragment: ದರ್ಗದ ಬದಿಗೆ ಇದ್ದಾನೆ ಒಬ್ಬ  

‘dargada badige iddane obba’ from AKSHAYA KAVYA

ENGLISH TRANSLATION: S. Jayasrinivasa Rao

 

 

Beside the dargah sits this man

stroking his long beard,

despite the sun falling on his head

and spilling on to the road.

 

The neem tree is kind; after noon it will 

pour its dense shadow on the dargah. 

 

Buses and trucks belching smoke

ply by close to the dargah,

he peers through thick lenses

to see if anything can be seen.

 

Nobody comes to him

I thought as I watched him for long, 

enveloped in beedi smoke

like he knew the world’s secret.

 

A sympathetic smile

 

The power of the amulet alone 

beckons those sinners,

nobody has any sense of time

this is something that belongs to another time.

 

What is going to happen is 

the same that happens every day  

 

There is always a secret hidden in 

his unsaid prediction, unasked by us,  

like a veil over the mind, invisible to all,

however much you search, unseen.

 

So many people running around 

to escape from disappearing

into Hussain Sagar or

under the Charminar.

 

As the sun goes down 

he too gets up and goes away.

 

(Hyderabad, 18 March 2022) 

 

*****

VAN GOGH'S BOOTS - Translation of VAN GOGH-ANA BOOTUGALU ವಾನ್ ಗಾಫ್‌ನ ಬೂಟುಗಳು

VAN GOGH’S BOOTS

(from Avadha 1986)

 

Van Gogh painted cafés

painted streets

painted parks

painted fields

immersed pine trees 

in colour

 

Critics said – 

Tsk-tsk!

Whoever paints

all these!

The Fall of Icarus

The Great Flood

The Resurrection of Christ

These are the subjects of art!

 

Then Van Gogh painted a picture 

of a pair of old boots

Goes down in history

Where are the frustrated critics now?

They are under those boots!  

 

*****

... inspired by Van Gogh's painting 'A PAIR OF SHOES' ... the poem itself tells everything about this painting and Van Gogh ... 

SEPTEMBER 1981 - Translation of SEPTEMBER 1981 ಸೆಪ್ಟೆಂಬರ್ 1981

SEPTEMBER 1981

(from AVADHA 1986)

 

This is the time of the masked-corn,

it’s there everywhere.

 

Glowing coals in the open stove,

peeled corn-spikes on live coals.

 

The local train that had stopped at the station

continues to wail.

 

A buffalo here,

a stubborn boy over there.

 

Careful!

Flying sparks!!

 

In another half hour darkness will envelop

the desolate street.

 

Somewhere in some place,

another corn-field is priming for harvest.

  

§

MONDAY'S CART - Translation of SOMAVAARADA GAADI ಸೋಮವಾರದ ಗಾಡಿ

Monday’s Cart

(from Avadha 1986)

 

See, how it’s trundling along,

this Monday’s cart.

Moving through each lane,

lane by lane,

crushing tar and gravel,

leaving crooked wheel marks.

A huge crushing wheel

leaving behind a long furrow. 

 

Eyes are many, but only 

words hang on to words

forming a bridge.

There a stream, here a stream

below is a crocodile mouth ajar.

In case of a breach

all goods would go under.

Belief in god

is the ultimate reason or rhyme.

 

Quli Qutub Shah’s ghazal 

cannot be sung during daytime.

When the bakula flowers sprinkle

on the minar

in the evenings,

it’s time for Bhagyamati to dance.

She, the eternal maiden of the poets,

standing on ancient graves and

appearing in our dreams.

Of all the forms and metaphors

why did you like the one you liked?

Or else, would you prefer to buy the

language in its bare form?

What would you do after buying it?  

How many of these words are actually correct?

Would the same weekday come again

after it’s already arrived once?

                                             § 

BANDICHORATE - Translation of BANDICHORATE ಬಂಡಿಚೋರಟೆ

Bandichorate*

(from Mukhamukhi 1978)

 

As I watch the local train, going

from Secunderabad to Falaknuma, slithering 

slowly on the far away bridge on the Musi river,

what I am reminded of sometimes is – 

 

the thousand-legged bandichorate-s

that are seen in the rainy season in

the betelnut groves in my village;

how they curl around curves,

how they spot straight lines,

how they unravel parallel lines – 

 

§

 

*‘Bandichorate’ is a ‘millipede’ ... I have retained the original Kannada name for my English translation ... ‘millipede’ is also called ‘cherante’ and ‘savirakalu’ (and many other names possibly) in other parts of the Kannada speaking areas ... thank you Prof. Shivarama Padikkal for helping me in sorting out the name ... 

THE THIEVES OF TANK BUND - Translation of TANK BUND-INA KALLARU ಟ್ಯಾಂಕ್ ಬಂಡಿನ ಕಳ್ಳರು

 The Thieves of Tank Bund

(from Mukhamukhi 1978)

 

I created the thieves of Tank Bund and sent them out to steal.

I taught them the art of picking pockets.

Very smart chaps.  They would always get away somehow.

One of them liked tortoises.  The other one

was in love with a girl from long time back.

Both were heavy drinkers (they were thieves after all!).

Once they had read a love-letter found among the stolen loot

and got all choked up.  By then I had them 

thrown out.  They must have stumbled headlong and fallen 

near the corporation garbage bin.

But I forgot to give names to these people.

You people keep your names safe under lock and key, ok!

  

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