Poems Selections from Siddha Paambaatti

POEMS

THE BEST TEACHER

K. Venu Gopala Rao

Awards galore,
Showers of compliments,
Felicitations aplenty,
Choruses of praise,
Thunders of applause,
Flocks of people around,
Best teachers,
Best teachers,
The leaders announced,
The crowds chorused
In great jubilation;
Elsewhere
Unnoticed
In a remote book
With no pomp
For no reward
Amidst stark poverty
In his soul’s happiness,
But in solitude
And deep silence
Slogs untiringly
To dispel the darkness
Of ignorance
The best teacher
The modest
And the humblest.

AN ACTOR TO HIS DIRECTOR

PHANI BABU

Sir, I need a few day’s leave to recuperate.
Under your expert and excellent direction
For too many days I have been acting
The Royal Hero’s part, infatuated with
The monotonous yet flirtatious light of this
Theatre Hall, echoing the words of another man
I’m sick and tired of this routine performance.

That’s why I solicit you to grant me leave
Soon after the celebration of the Hundredth
Gala Night of the current play. Believe me,
I’m really ill and ailing.
You know, Sir, the exact measure of
My breast. It’s 32 inches, and not 38.
Spite of my nightly victories on the stage
I shrank from reacting the other day
When a conductor of a bus rudely behaved.
That speaks for the poor state of my health.

Hence is the request for a few days’ respite
From impersonating a lover feigned.
Wearing time and again the armour and
Costumes too big for my size
The joints of my body are aching.
Appearing Repeatedly in the self-same battle-scene
And emerging Victorious, as pre-planned.
And professing my love without an lot of passion
To the Heroine who Is another man’s wife
My soul is almost purified, I tell you.

And they who crowd the auditorium there
With minds cast in the same mould
Though wearing the mien of different personalities –
Who keep me warm with their conventional claps – ­
Please convey to them my thanks and love.
Their fathers (and mine too) in their times
You know, used to applaud the actors of
A stale drama in the same way
Scratching the false hair of imported fashion
Crying Encore! Encore! drowsily drooping.
All this is perfectly known to you. Please therefore oblige me by granting a short leave Washing the make up, the paints and powder I have not seen the natural colour of my skin in the mirror for a pretty long time. Wearing the weighty armour and embarrassed by The Royal robes much bigger than my size, The pain in my joints is growing sharper daily. On the expiry of my leave I assure you, Sir, I shall take the role of a hero of my mould; The plot and the characters, the dialogues and the soliloquys Will all be designed by myself, and the dress Cut to suit all and each cast admirably. (Translated from Bengali by Umanath Bhattacharya) 

PATRIOTISM

(GURAZADA APPA RAO - 1862-1915)

(A rendering into English from the original Telugu
by Y. Purnachandra Rao)

Love your own native land,
Help goodness grow;
Stop empty bragging;
And choose some good turn!

Tread the path of hard labour,
Make your land fertile;
Where food is, there strength is,
Man is a man, only when strong.

How does your land prosper,
If indolence prevails?
Be active, learn all arts;
Labour, wealth produce!

Venture about all countries
And trade native goods;
Those who can’t earn thus
Miss riches and fame!

Why look ? What benefit?
Past has but little good;
Idle not, step forward;
Left behind, You’re left for ever!

Rival only in learning skills,
Contend only in trades;
Have done with foolish feuds,
Put an end to violence!

Boast not you’re a patriot;
Vaunt not of tradition;
Do some good of your choice
And prove you love your people!

The green-eyed fiend envy
Has sapped your land’s vigour,
Happy with others good be,
Nourish peace and unity!

How can the jealous sinner
Make his life happy?
He who finds his good in others’
Is smart, so he thrives!

Giving up some self-interest,
Go to help your neighbour;
Native land means not earth,
Native land means men;

Hand in hand people should
Strive for their good;
Races and Religious should
like brothers live and let live!

What if faiths are diverse?
If man’s minds are accordant,
Birth and rank frow to heights
With splendour they flourish!

Like a tree should your native land
put forth the buds of love;
Its roots wet with labour’s sweat
Should yield your food and wealth!

Like a cukoo amidst the leaves
A poet should sing of people;
Inspired, Pride should awake
your love for your native land.

The Finale

S. Samal

I have come to the
end of my journey
in fact travelling
a tiresome route.
here ends at last
life’s long
ceremonious odyssey
after this the twilight
the pitch-dark old night
blurring all
sight and symphony.
I must leave now
my dreams and ambition
my love and children
all abandoned
and perforce suspended
as if a curtain draws
heavily on the scene.

no regret
no fear
no anxiety to run away
from the supreme hour
so good-bye, my friends!
i must leave now
alone for the unknown
but know not
how i would
enter the tunnel
yawning with its
dark staggering void
like the jaws
of a dinosaur.

the hour draws close
everything thaws in me
i feel like falling from
a mountain top
to the icy lap
of a profound
sleep and silence.

Polluters

Dr. Kulwant Singh Gill

Polluters of pious places
Perpetrators of inglorious deeds
­Sowing seeds of strife
To reap the thorny hate,
Rousing the innocent fury
Like a monsoon rivulet in spate,
Your deadened conscience
Given to guiles and wiles
Shall not remain for ever
Hidden in closed files.

Your orphaned vision fails to descry
Beyond the bright blue sky
Spaces immense, infinite and great
Where sits in all glory
The Dispenser of justice ultimate.
He will ask Chitragupta
To expose your glory deeds and state
How with the firmness of rose wood
You defiled humanity, you defied the good.
Then -
You will suffer and lament
In that dark, dreary hell
To see how each day
Your ranks would swell.

THE END OF MY PILGRIMAGE
Experts from Mr. B. THEODORE’S
translation of Mr. Belluri Sreenivasa Murty’s “THE HERMITAGE”

My pilgrimage concludes: my part is over;
The shadows of even eclipse my hopes;
This bud unblushed has fallen to the ground;
The cuckoo has lamented in the mango groves.

My pilgrimage concludes; my part is over;
My Lord had sent me to proclaim his message,
Sacred, sweet and full of gladness;
I came down to earth obeying his command.

My pilgrimage concludes; my part is over;
I visited places saturated with tears;
I went to palaces where happiness reigned:
I showered my ambrosial message on earth.

My pilgrimage concludes; my part is over:
To my host of guests in a pleasant manner,
I sang my song enraptured with joy
And quenched their burning desire for Him.

My pilgrimage concludes; my part is over;
My heart that once was weary by pilgrimage,
Has begun to be cheerful as I near the grave;
I make my travel with utmost delight.

My pilgrimage concludes; my part is over;
The cuckoo has lamented in the mango grove;
My soul is filled with steadfast joy;
My commission concludes; my soul departs.

Repair of Mind

Dr. Sankara Sreerama Rao

Mind is a delicate instrument
Given by god to mirror thoughts and emotions.
Very often it is damaged by stress and strain of life
It must be repaired by spiritual technics
And lubricated by Divine oil
It has a derible role for good or bad
Taking to celestial heights of bliss
Or throughing into the gather of vice
It must be humored into useful
And Constructive activity -

MY EPITAPH

P.K. JOY

‘My father who owned a half of this world
is resting here’,
so you wrote on my tombstone.

Erase it my son,
for it glorifies me not;
and write: ‘He longed for an undivided world”.

IN THE GARDEN OF TIME

Yogesh G. Nair

As we sit,
In the garden of time,
And see a flower fall,
From the tree of life,
We think of fate,
And pen down a sad verse,
To let our sorrow
And grief, flow with it.
But unknown to us,
A naughty wind passes by,
Which let some flowers fall,
And as we sit,
We see many flowers fall,
For time is busy,
In giving birth to buds,
That open, smile and fall,
To pave the way for others buds.

THE WAYS OF THE CORRUPT TIMES

UMANATH BHATTACHARYA

Bent with years and misfortunes
Ailing, and duped by fate
At my 85th year I still retain
The greenness of mind and youthfulness.
With a teenager’s zeal, like a lover fervent
I sit by the window thrice a day
For the arrival of my mail: Poetry mags
And letters from the editors of
The International Anthologies, I contribute to.
’Tis the only bliss I enjoy; but now
This, too, alas! is being denied to me.

My wife forbids me gravely no more to sit
Beside the window peeping at the road.
Well, heard she hath of ‘th’ slanderous tongues of
The neighbouring women-folk. O the corrupt.
Times! O’the vulgar ways! They say
I sit at the window to oggle the fair pedestrians.
God! what depraved days have dawned on earth!

GLORIOUS PAST AND GLOOMY PRESENT

P. Indira Devi

Inspired by great personalities,
Came forth the youth with spontaneity,
Sprang up in their hearts a beautiful dream,
Woke up from a deep slumber,
Into independent India.

In the hearts of the founding fathers so many longings,
In their aims many many yearnings.
Amiable society, sociable living,
Awakening into knowlegde -
The ideals of free India.

Days those were when students aspired to learn,
Days those were when teachers strove to streamline the education
and the character of the students.

The affection for one another was immeasurable.
The tear in one’s eye burdened the other’s heart,
The rapture in one’s eye kindled the other’s interest.
Such were the days of the past!
As time galloped fast, the country grew up.
Big in size, gigantic buildings,
Many many factories,
Outward expansion but inward contraction.
Drastic change in the hearts of people!
Obsession with selfishness, negligence towards fellow-beings,
That kindred feeling of the past is no more to be found,
That benevolence is nowhere to be seen.
Students and parents collect on the campus for a seat in the college.
Neither the student nor the parent
Feels the responsibility.
Indifference of students towards education
Negligence for learning,
Helplessness of the authorities
Depress the teachers in the class.

Fresh air the pupils breathe under the greenwood tree,
Hate to feel suffocated under the ceiling.
They love to sleep in nature’s lap,
Despise to toil at the desks.
Desperate, desolate, forlorn.
No pedogogic zeal to do the job,
No incentive to do justice to the job.
Cooperation from students’ side is a mirage tantalizing the soul.

A thirst for imparting knowledge,
A desire to mould their character,
A yearning to capture their affection – Everything is in disarray.
Who to blame? Who will shoulder the burden?
Parents blame the teachers,
Teachers blame the environment,
Authorities blame the social conditions.
East to find fault and flee.
Like kites the students fly
Like a hell their hearts burn
Like ignoramuses they grope in darkness.
Unguided, they guide themselves.

Awarenesss among the parents
Love for their own children
May resurrect and enliven the past hope.
Winter has come but Spring is not far behind.

THE POOR HAWKER

EUGENE D’VAZ

You may have to shout yourself hoarse,
I can’t give you a coin
to purchase your simple ware
to ease your growing pain
with dignity.

I have known cunning
Walk in different disguises.
Therefore, if your pain is true
pardon me.

I am not trained to see
the tunnels and flyways of your soul.
They taught me how to make a quick buck
and hold on to it
or make it multiply with cunning.

The heights are so removed from the plains
it may take more than a whole day’s crying
for the summits to catch
echoes of your painful supplications
ascending, ascending     .......

PAIN OF THE CHAIR

P.K. Joy

Now when I leave this railhead station
Carrying myself my heavy luggage
With my wife groaning under another load,
and while bargaining with the cartman on the fare,
I remember those days here
when officers vied with each other
to carry my luggage through the crowd
When a convoy of best cars
waited at the exit”.

‘The Chair’ gave us pleasure for its ‘term’
and then pain for the rest of long life.

THE TOTAL NUDE

Jean Bouhier

To Edouard Pignon and to Helene
Before the curve where the point of sex
reaches the busting point
of a body coiling, embracing
before the fold of parted flesh
where calm repose
transcribes the quiet of the heart
the painter dreams

Slanting thighs
pillars capped by knees
arms clutched, folded and refolded
hiding the secret of sleep
- breasts raised
to the pink of maturity

All rhythm radiating form the belly
when and accompanying glance
in pulsating loveplay discovers
absence, of the face

Waves crest upon crest
smoothing the shore
polishing it
leaving it sweet
as a pebble
which the surf extracts

But just who nourishes this dream?
painter or model
when a life sketch offers
its nudity to summers’s heat?

The embattled artist
knows not a moment’s truce
But the next port of call, recommences
upon a canvas whose every brushstroke
resumes the joy of thanking
pure image, annihilated
by refracted light.

Thus one discovers the picture
which sets the color ablaze
as one discovers the sunrise
every day

As one discovers the shadow
draped,
on the side of the hill
just before one’s departure
hailed as a “bon voyage.”

- trans. Agnes Sotiracopoulou - Skina and Ann Rivers.

FINANCIAL SEASONS

K. Vijaya Kumar

Financially three seasons
are there in a month to us.

Rainy is the first season
When salary comes pocket full,
To produce rice for the month
and make dishes delicious;
Takcum-tin with fragrant flash,
bathing-soap with fresh hope comes;
Milk-tin for the babe come in apace,
Lipstick rushed for lady’s grace;
Milk-bill, cleared to date fully;
House-rent, mercer’s, grocer’s dese
Paid at last at least half-half.

Winter entered as time passed,
financially cold days came.
Wetness-of the purse has gone
heaviness has come down to null,
Shivering hands are not able
to come out of empty purse;
frozen ink in the pen is
not able to fill accounts;
Half weighing tins are staring,
half-weighed dishes warning us;
State of man is contracted
in the middle of the month.

The financial summer has
come as the third and the last;
Dry-dry, hot-hot, rough and tough
days are these in the month-end.
Rice-tin yawned and milk-tin signed
dishes cried all, of hunger;
Eyes for source are seeking fast,
body is sweating for debt.