Σύγχρονη ινδική ποίηση

… δυστυχώς, στα αγγλικά. Δεν υπάρχει κάποια μετάφραση στα ελληνικά, στο διαδίκτυο. Παρόλα αυτά αξίζει τον κόπο να πάρουμε μια γεύση.

Πατώντας πάνω στα ονόματα των ποιητών μπορείτε να δείτε τη βιογραφία τους.

Adil Jussawalla

Nine Poems on Arrival Spiders infest the sky. They are palms, you say, hung in a web of light. Gingerly, thinking of concealed springs and traps, I step off the plane, expect take-off on landing. Garlands beheading the body and everybody dressed in white. Who are we ghosts of? You. You. You. Shaking hands. And you. Cold hands. Cold feet. I thought the sun would be lower here to wash my neck in. Contact. We talk a language of beads along well-established wires. The beads slide, they open, they devour each other. Some were important. Is that one, as deep and dead as the horizon? Upset like water I dive for my favourite tree which is no longer there though they've let its roots remain. Dry clods of earth tighten their tiny faces in an effort to cry. Back where I was born, I may yet observe my own birth. Basudev Sunani Question You ask Which virgin had left behind The turmeric paste On the bathing ghat, Applying which on its body The mustard flower Looks so bright, Answering which desperate Farmer’s prayer Has the sea has forgotten Its mischief to create a flood? Collecting the tears Of which first widow Of the world Has the sky in disguise Been telling mankind That this is rain? Kindly free me from such riddles, Help me deviate From my path Of inner conflict Of entangled words. Until today I have unable to fathom How the new dhoti Around one’s loins Gets so rapidly frayed How a wonderful Bestiality enters A closed fist. Seeking answers To these questions Is like angling In flood waters. Maybe I know things. I have been warned. Even if a single broken word Pops out of my mouth Under the pretext of an answer My tongue will be severed And I will turn to stone. Jayant Kaikini Script When did the ant develop a taste for the news? Or did it always nurse it within? Crawling along the newspaper spread on the floor, it devours each letter of news, first the big headlines of national mourning later the medium-sized bride-burning bit and those who slit each other's throats for a dime, and then the small fonts of suicide, missing persons etc . . . Thus polishing off each item, the ant has left. The paper's blank now like the pale cheeks of a pregnant woman who died for want of blood Roll it up now and see the stars at the end of the tube or place it to your ear and hear somebody digging a trench somewhere faraway Place it between your lips and play the flute or if you so wish, abandon it in the bamboo forest nearby Now the only fear is, where is the ant and where is the trail of blood at its feet? Keki Daruwalla Migrations Migrations are always difficult: ask any drought, any plague; ask the year 1947. Ask the chronicles themselves: if there had been no migrations would there have been enough history to munch on? Going back in time is also tough. Ask anyone back-trekking to Sargodha or Jhelum or Mianwali and they’ll tell you. New faces among old brick; politeness, sentiment, dripping from the lips of strangers. This is still your house, Sir. And if you meditate on time that is no longer time (the past is frozen, it is stone, that which doesn’t move and pulsate is not time) if you meditate on that scrap of time, the mood turns pensive like the monsoons gathering in the skies but not breaking. Mother used to ask, don’t you remember my mother? You’d be in the kitchen all the time and run with the fries she ladled out, still sizzling on the plate. Don’t you remember her at all? Mother’s fallen face would fall further at my impassivity. Now my dreams ask me If I remember my mother And I am not sure how I’ll handle that. Migrating across years is also difficult.

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