Category: Excerpt

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Excerpt Poetry

Poems from Notes of Silent Times

Poetry from Nepal by Mahesh Paudyal

Workers’ Poem

In a small gathering on the lawn

The poet was reciting his verses.

A little away, some masons and labours were busy

Hammering nails.

The poet stopped, looked at them, and yelled—

“Stop your pranks! Can’t you see I am reading a poem?”

The workers were silent. The poet recited his verses.

Much later, when everyone was gone

The workers resumed their life-song.

I don’t know if the poet heard it.

***

Emperor and the Kids

“Emperor, we are hungry!”

This sounded like a shooting lullaby;

The Emperor slept for one more century.

“Emperor, please lend us your crown for a while;

We will play the king-queen game and return.”

The Emperor ordered:

“Officer! Send these children out of the four passes!

They are here to spread measles.”

***

Firefly

Firefly,

Perhaps it’s time that writes our existence.

No matter how much you try

To glow in broad daylight

You need to wait for the night

To make yourself visible

***

Storm!

Blow on, storm!

Blow with all your might!

Unless there is wind

And unless a few homes and roofs are betumbled

No one writes

An epic on air, the puny thing!

***

The Sky

All smoke rising from the earth

Goes skyward

But the sky is never called the country of smoke

It is always called

The land of the stars and moons

***

These poems are excerpted from his latest collection, Notes of Silent Times

Mahesh Paudyal is a Nepali poet, storywriter, critic and translator. A lecturer of English at Tribhuvan University, Mr. Paudyal has written extensively for children and adult readers, and has translated more than 2 dozen books from Nepali into English. His major works include Tadi Kinarko Geet (novel), Tyaspachhi Phulena Godavari (stories), Of Walls and Pigeons (stories),  Sunya Praharko Sakshi (poems) and Notes of Silent Times (poems). Among his seminal translations are Dancing Soul of Mount Everest (representative modern Nepali poems), Radha (an award-winning novel by Krishna Dharabasi), Unfinished Memoirs and Prison Notes by Sheikh Mujibur Rahaman and Silver Cascades (representative Nepali short stories.) A recipient of Nepal Bidhyabhushan, Narendramani Dixit Gold Medal, Bimal Gurung Memorial Award, Sudish Niraula Memorial and Prasiddha Kandel Memorial Award, he has also represented Nepal in many international literary seminars.]

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL. 

Categories
Excerpt

On the Pandemic: To the Rising

Poetry by John Beacham

“Open Up and Die” Updated and Re-titled, “Your Mask is Our Life!”


It all comes down to your masks and your big love, my friends, ‘cause the Big Love is just not in the U-S-A. Not yet. Not until the end of this poem. Perhaps

Florida, where the governor’s mansion makes you “live” with the virus, ‘cause, you know, business before safety. That is what it is is: the bosses’ money before your lungs, heart and brain

Open the gates, open the gates … onward, onward to Disneyworld!

Genocide by individual liberty

Illinois and California, where the demgov does a better job for a few weeks and still more people die than in all of victorious China ‘cause …

The “libgovs” capitulate to a tiny handful of open-it, anti-mask racists; there is no social or public health fabric flesh; there is no we the people, just delusions of “at least we’re not Florida or Texas or Arizona or South Carolina”

Genocide by liberalism

(33 percent

33 percent of children tested in Florida as of July 15 have the genocide. Children!

“We currently have 85 babies under the age of one year in Nueces County that have all tested positive for Covid-19,” said the director of public health for Corpus Christi Nueces County (in Texas).

“These babies have not even had their first birthday yet. Please help us stop the spread of this disease.”

Wear a mask!)

Now.  Quiet your heart, breath and ears feeling …

The pandemic is at your door.   At your door.      It is at your door!

Smashing your door into a million flying pieces of masks that twist a virus into tiny shards of mostly harmless waves harmonium

What other option? What other option? Tell me and …

Wait.  Track back finely

The United States, where we send the young out to get infected in pandemic spreading zones of crowded bars and gyms at the epicenter

The country of death and disease is not
Russia, Russia, Russia
It’s not China, China, China

Now.  Look.  I don’t blame the bar owners though some of them are scum

I don’t blame the bargoers though most should do better and don’t

I don’t blame the families getting together

I blame the system that is in reality a non-stop lo-fi psychic filament of virus transmission belt

So.    What now?

Have you seen the new futured-monument? It is twenty-one stories high. On top of the glory mountain. Five of us like one rock, all masked. Realist. Humanist. Crisp steel

Arms twined and extended to the sky with slightly cupped hands. Heads up. Steady and calm. Visage to the stars. Front foot forward to …

The socialist future we drink up as a lip-satisfying, face caressed gentle breeze fountain that was always there but now finally understood and welcomed

I say to you now: “Welcome, my loves!”

“Open Up and Die” and “‘Open Up and Die’ Updated and Re-titled, ‘Your Mask is Our Life!’” are from the book, “On the Pandemic, To the Rising,” which can be found here: https://www.mass-action.org/On-the-Pandemic-Poems.html

Florida is a capitalist dictatorship

Florida so sad …profit-open > your

Friends, let us not mince. The government is killing people. Thousands of people. Florida and everywhere

To be precise: GENOCIDE

Florida so sad is america. Don’t miss miss it—as america as California or NYC where they haven’t stopped the genocide with better words

Words, words, words that do not stick or solve or sinew or lead. Where is the leader? Ohhhh, where are you in all of this?

Listening? Shout it through that massive placard bullhorn over the four corners: Who will stop america?

You. You will stop america

Or else, sister. Or else as Columbus statues brought down by the work of the rainbow future teens

“Florida is a Capitalist Dictatorship” and “Florida is a Communist Dictatorship” are from the book, “On the Pandemic, To the Rising,” which can be found here: https://www.mass-action.org/On-the-Pandemic-Poems.html

John Beacham is a social justice activist, podcast host and college writing teacher who writes political commentary, poetry and science fiction. He is founder of MASS ACTION podcast and publications platform: https://www.mass-action.org. He would bird more if he could.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed are solely that of the author.

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL. 

Categories
Excerpt Poetry

Poems from My Father’s Face by Chandra Gurung

Chandra Gurung’s poetry translated by Mahesh Paudyal

My Father’s Face

Two eyes glitter like the sun and the moon

In that face

A kite of self-confidence keeps flying

Beautiful orchids and rhododendrons bloom

Combating the storms of calamities

.

On that face

A sun rises every morning to carry the burden of a new day

And returns, at the end of the day

Hiding every line of sorrows

Carrying little parcels of joy

Making the house and the patio bright

.

On that face

Narrow are the eyes that read the world

Pug is the nose that looms with raised self-respect

Wrinkled are the cheeks where joys and sorrows glide

Chapped are the lips, where smiles stage a march-past

And the entire Mongol identity has been smouldered by heat.

.

But I am delightful

Happy beyond telling

When everyone says:

“You look exactly like your father.”

.

Trust

Since you are back

Take those roses on the table

And kindly adorn them in the hearts.

Let the fragrance of love waft from it.

.

Bring out on the veranda

A pair of chairs;

Let’s spend some intimate moments.

Also place a bottle of wine, and two glasses

On the table;

We shall spend

Some moments of life, talking.

.

Look!

My weary rags

My books, pen and paper abandoned like an orphan

The stubs of cigarette littered like unclaimed corpses

And the scratched mirror—

All await for a single touch

From you.

.

This dark evening

You showed up at my doorstep all alone.

At this moment

Every nook of my heart

Is filled with love, ripple by ripple.

.

Leave it!

Let that window remain open at least

It reflects my heartfelt belief

That you would certainly turn up.

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Desert: A Life of Mirage

There is not a single bright line of smile

On the broad canvas of the face

No butterfly of joy flutters on the cheeks

Desolate is this desert

Like a garden where all beauty has wilted.

.

There are dry tufts, devoid of life, everywhere

Dry hands of wind come to caress youth

The eyes accumulate dead excitement

And looms a mound of desolation

.

The youthful sun comes to face, eye-to-eye, all day long

The wind teases again and again

The desert longs to allure a traveler with its youth

Dreams of enchanting someone with its gestures

The desert is like a bride’s dream

Living in anticipation of a loving embrace.

.

Its breasts are decked by green date palms

A youthful cactus is tucked on its ears

And the desert stands in a long caravan of desires

Like a life of mirage

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All is well

Everything is fine.

Just now,

My children in immaculate uniform

Have been taken to school

By a house-boy their age

.

My parents are happy in an old-age home

I am off from the pack of my siblings

My better half spends time watching TV serials

My home has hosted peace pervasively

From this, we can perceive that

All is well.

.

Since a prayer room in the home accommodates

A bunch of deities

It has been long that praying has been a rare tale

Doesn’t it mean

Everything is fine?

.

Nothing ever tortures my heart

I don’t meddle in others’ affairs

And keep myself away from such trifling hassles

And thus, do not bother myself in vain

It’s true:

Everything is fine.

.

I keep my own ways

Act amiably with all

And keep myself away from problems

For this reason

Everything is fine.

.

I carefully maintain my looks

Dress up myself decently

And follow healthy dietary habits

In fact,

Is everything really fine?

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All these poems are excerpted from Chandra Gurung’s upcoming book, My Father’s Face, with the author’s permission

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Chandra Gurung is a Bahrain based Nepali poet.  He has an anthology of poetry to his credit. That was published in 2007. The second anthology of his translated poems titled My Father’s Face will be published from Rubric Publishing, New Delhi.  He has passion for translation as well. He has translated Hindi, English and Arabic poets into Nepali. He has also has translated some of the Nepali poets into Hindi. His works (poems and articles) have found space in many online and print magazines including More of my beautiful Bahrain, Snow Jewel, Collection of Poetry and Prose complied by Robin Barratt (UK), Warscapes.com and many leading Dailies in Nepal.

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Mahesh Paudyal is a Nepalese writer, translator critic and Assistant Professor of English at Tribhuvan University. His works basically foreground local epistemic traditions and Eastern mythological richness. He has published novels, stories, poems, plays and songs both for adults and children and has extensively written critical works. His major translations include Sheikh Mujiboor Rahman’s Unfinished Memoirs and Prison Notes into Nepali, Silver Cascades, a collection of Nepali short stories and Dancing Soul of Mount Everest, representative modern Nepali poems. He is the Executive Editor of Roopantaran, a translation-based journal of Nepal Academy.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL. 

Categories
Excerpt Poetry

Poems from Rituals

By Kiriti Sengupta

A Place Like Home

Lights turned off,

three glasses retire

as the bar closes.

The first stands upright,

the other upside down,

another lies horizontal.

.

For last few hours

the crystals held liquor,

ice, scent and comfort.

They also witnessed

eyes that spoke volumes

while lashes refused

to flutter.

.

The pub reopens

the next day

to the riff of unrest.

.

Observance

1

Visitors, who checked in 

to see my father post-surgery, 

appeared stressed.

After his discharge several came home.

Eyes moistened, they wished him Godspeed.

All of us except Baba knew… 

Ma informed him months later.

.

No one pays a call anymore. 

Three decades…

2

Tittle-tattle halts.

The mother waves a goodbye

as the school bus sets off.

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Both these poems are excerpted from Kiriti Sengupta’s collection, Rituals (March 2019, Hawkal Publishers), with permission from the author

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Kiriti Sengupta is a poet, editor, translator, and publisher from Calcutta. He has published eleven books of poetry and prose and two books of translation and co-edited five anthologies. Sengupta is the chief editor of the Ethos Literary Journal.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL.